Tabernacle

What is it about?

Roughly one quarter of the biblical book of Exodus is taken up with the tabernacle – the portable wilderness sanctuary, precursor to the Jerusalem temple. First come the instructions to Moses (Exod 25–28) and then an account of the tabernacle’s construction (Exod 35–40). Exodus ends with the glory of God filling the tabernacle tent (Exod 40:34). Early Christian writers sought to identify the enduring significance of the divine tabernacle instructions – the “pattern” revealed to Moses on Mount Sinai (Exod 25:9). They were not, by and large, interested in the historical practicalities of the desert tent, but in its theological symbolism. One approach was to allegorize each piece of tabernacle furniture. Another was to reflect on the tabernacle as a material structure enclosing the glory of God, and to see it as a precursor to the incarnation, or the church. And a third approach was to equate Moses’ vision with a heavenly sanctuary, in which God’s throne took the place of the ark in the holy of holies. In these theological interpretations, clear distinctions between the tabernacle and the temple were not always drawn. In Platonic frameworks, for example, both could be viewed as imperfect earthly copies of the same heavenly archetype. This article starts by outlining the biblical material and postbiblical Jewish traditions from which early Christian interpretations developed. It will then trace those Christian interpretations, starting with the New Testament, and paying particular attention to the Alexandrian tradition, in which there is a succession of detailed discussions of the Exodus tabernacle instructions stretching from Philo of Alexandria (c. 20 BCE–c. 50 CE) to Cyril of Alexandria (c. 375–444 CE). It will end with a brief note on how early Christian interpretations were taken in a new direction come the medieval period.

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