A Handful of Gleanings out of the Book of Exodus, Section 28 – Section 33
SECT. XXVIII. The Covenant made with Israel: They not sworne by it to the ten Commandements, Exod. 24.
VVHen Israel cannot indure to heare the ten Commandements given, it was ready to conclude, that they could much lesse keepe them. Therefore God giveth Moses privately fifty seven precepts besides, namely Ceremoniall and Judiciall: to all which the people are the next morning after the giving of the ten Commandements, sworne and entered into Covenant, and these made them a Ceremoniall and singular people. About which these things are observable.
1. That they entred into Covenant to a written Law, Chap. 24. 4. And Moses wrote all the words of the Lord, &c. Against tradions.
2. That here was a booke written forty dayes before the writing of the two tables: Against them that hold that the first letters that were seene in the world, were the writing of God in those Tables. And we have seene before also two pieces of writing before this of Moses, viz. the 88. and 89. Psalmes: And of equall antiquity with them, or not much lesse was the penning of the booke of Iob, most probably written by Elibu one of the Speakers in it, as may be conjectured from Chap. 32. 15, 16, 17. and some other probabilitie.
3. That this first Covenant was made with water, and blood, and figurative language: For the twelve pillars that represented the people are called the people, Exod. 24. 4. 8. As the words in the second Covenant, this my body, are to bee understood in such another sense.
4. That the ten Commandements were not written in the book of that Covenant, but onelyonly those 57. precepts mentioned before.
For 1. The Lord giveth the other precepts, because the people could not receive the ten: for could they have received and observed those as they ought, they must never have had any parcell of a Law more: as if Adam had kept the Morall Law, he had never needed to have heard of the promise; and so if we could but receive the same Law as we should, we had never needed the Gospell. Now it is most unlike that since God gave them those other commands, because they could not receive the ten, that hee would mingle the ten and them together in the Covenant.
2. It is not imaginable that God would ever cause a people to sweare to the performance of a Law which they could not indure so much as to heare.
3. The ten Commandements needed not to be read by Moses to the people, seeing they had all heard them from the mouth of the Lord but the day before.
4. Had they beene written and laid up in this booke, what necessitie had there beene of their writing and laying up in the Tables of stone?
5. Had Moses read the ten Commandements in the beginning of his booke, why should he repeate some of them againe at the latter end, as Exod. 23. 12.
Let such ruminate upon this, which hold and maintaine that the Sabbath as it standeth in the fourth Commandement, is only the Jewish Sabbath, and consequently Ceremouiall. And let those good men that have stood for the day of the Lord against the other, consider whether they have not lost ground, in granting that the fourth Commandement instituted the Jewish Sabbath. For,
First, The Jewes were not sworne to the Decalogue at all, and so not the Sabbath as it standeth there, but onelyonly to the fifty seven precepts written in Moses his booke, and to the Sabbath as it was there, Exod. 23. 12.
Secondly, The end of the Ceremoniall Sabbath of the Jewes was in remembrance of their delivery out of Aegypt, Deut. 5. 15. but the morall Sabbath of the two Tables is in commemoration of Gods resting from the workes of the Creation. Exod. 20. 10. 11.
SECT. XXIX. The punishment of Israel for the golden Calse. Exod. 32.
ISRAEL cannot be so long without Moses, as Moses can be without meate. The fire still burneth on the top of mount Sinai, out of which they had so lately received the Law, and yet so suddainely doe they breake the greatest Commandement of that Law to extremity: of Aegyptian Jewels, they make an Aegyptian Idol, because thinking Moses had beene lost, they intended to returne for Aegypt.
Grievous was the sinne, for which they must looke for grievous punishment, which lighted upon them in divers kinds.
First, the Cloud of Glory, their divine conductor, departeth from the campe, which was now become prophane and uncleane.
Secondly, the Tables Moses breaketh before their face, as shewing them most unworthy of the Covenant.
Thirdly, The building of the Tabernacle, the evidence, that God would dwell among them, is adjourned and put off, for now they had made themselves unworthy.
Fourthly, for this sinne God gave them up to worship all the host of heaven, Act. 7. 42.
Fifthly, Moses bruiseth the Cal…e to Powder, and straweth it upon the waters, and maketh the People drinke. Here spirituall fornication commeth under the same tryall that carnall did. Num. 5. 24. These that were guilty of this Idolatry the water thus dr…nke, made their belly to swell, and to give a visible signe and token of their guilt: then setteth Moses the Levites to slay every one whose bellies they found thus swelled, which thing they did with that zeale and sincerity that they spared neither Father, nor Brother of their owne, if they found him guilty.
In this slaughter there fell about three thousand, these were ring-leaders and chiefe agents in this abomination, and therefore made thus exemplary in their punishment: upon the rest of the People the Lord sent a Plague, vers. 35.
A…ron had first felt the smart in this destruction, had his action in this businesse beene as voluntary as was theirs, but what hee did, hee did in feare of his life.
SECT. XXX. That Moses fasted three Fasts of forty dayes apeece.
IT is a doubt of no small import: Why seeing it pleased God to appoint the Feast of expiation, the solemne Feast of Humiliation, in that monethmonth of the yeare, in which sinne entred into the World, why he also did not appoint it upon the same day in which sinne entred, viz. the sixth day of the monethmonth, but on the tenth.
The reason of this is to be found out by observing Moses his Fasts in the mount, and the conclusion of the last of them.
That he fasted thrice forty dayes, is not so frequently observed, as it easily may be concluded from his owne words.
The first Fast in Exod. 24. 18. And Moses was in the mountaine forty dayes and forty nights: At the end of these dayes they made the golden Calfe.
The second Fast, Exod. 32. 30, 31. It came to passe on the morrow that Moses said unto the People, Ye have sinned a great sin…e, and now I will goe up into the mount, &c. and Moses returned unto the Lord, &c. which he explaineth, Deut. 9. 18. I fell down… before the Lord, as at the first, forty dayes and forty nights, &c.
The third Fast when he goeth up with the new hewed Tables. Ex…d. 34. 28. And he was there with the Lord forty dayes and forty nights, &c.
All which being reckoned together from the day after the giving of the ten Commandements, or from the seventh day of the monethmonth Sivan, it will be found that his last fast, when he had obtained pardon for Israel, and the Tables renewed, ended on the tenth day of Tisri: on which day he came downe with the glad tydings of reconciliation: in mem…riall of which, that day was ever after observed for the Feast of expiation: upon the tyding… of this, and of the making of the Tabernacle the People begin to dispose of their tents, and to build them booths, because it will be long ere the worke be finished, and they remove from Sinai: for this the fifteenth day of the monethmonth is instituted for the feast of Tabernacles, ever after.
Hence forward is the Tabernacle begun, and is halfe a yeer… in making within a very little.
SECT. XXXI. The sornte, or Idea, and representation of the Tabernacle.
THe forme and fabrick… of the Tabernacle is thrice re…earsed in the patterne, in the making, and in the setting up, as if by this threefold coard of description, the Holy Ghost would draw all to a serious observation.
Moses saw a glorious Tabernacle pitched in Mount Sinai to be the patterne of his, as his was to be the patterne of a more glorious: According to the exact forme of this that he saw, was he to make his: This taught Moses and Israel, that the making and service of their Tabernacle, did onelyonly serve to the Patterne and shadow of heavenly things, Heb. 8. 5. Christ is the true Tabernacle, by, and in whom God dwelleth among men. Joh. 2. 21. Heb. 9. 11. Now as there was a Tabernacle pitched before God in Sinai, before there was one made in Israel, so was Christs inca…nation in the decree of God, long before he was exhibited in the flesh. Upon the making of Moses his Tabernacle, this in the mount vanished, as that of Moses was to doe upon the comming of the true one, Christ.
The Tabernacle was Israels moveable Temple, and so at every flitting might teach them to looke for one that should not be moved. It consisted of three parts, the holiest, the holy, and the Court, as our Churches doe, of the Chancell, Church, and Churchy…rd. It was alwayes pitched East and West, whensoever it was set downe, as our Churches stand, but with this difference, that the chiefest place in the Tabernacle, or holiest of all, answering to our Chancels, stood Westward, and Israel worshipped with their faces Westward, because they would not imitate the Heathen, who worshipped towards the Sun-rising. And in their services looked alwayes towards us Gentiles in the West, as expecting us to be joyned to their God with them.
SECT. XXXII. The dimensions of the Tabernacle.
THe Tabernacle was thirty cubits long, for twenty plankes of a cubit and a halfe breadth apeece made one side, or the length of it, and it was ten cubits broad, as shall appe…re hereafter. But first observe these two things.
First, That those which are translated boards, were indeed planks of a good thicknesse, even of nine inches thicke apeece, for it is said, in the fastning of the sides of the Tabernacle, that a barre of Shittim wood, ran through the thicknesse of the boards, as they stood edging oneto another. Now this barre was no small one, for it was the chiefe strength of the side, and therefore must have a large hole bored to run through, and consequently, it must be a thicke planke that would beare such a hole, and not an inch, or two inch board.
Secondly, The cubi… by which the Tabornacle is measured, was but halfe a yard, or the common cubit, and not the Sanctuary or holy cubit, which was a full yard. For, first, it is said that every planke was a cubi… and a hal…e broad; if this were a yard and a halfe, doe but imagine where plankes of such a breadth should be had: Secondly, every planke was ten cubits long; if this were ten yards, imagine how they should be carryed: Thirdly, every two silver Bases were as long as a planke was broad; now two talents would fall short of reaching to a yard and an halfe. Lastly, the Altar of burnt offering was three cubits high; if this were three yards, who could reach to serve at it? These things considered, you finde that the cubit here spoken of, is but halfe a yard, and this will helpe well in measuring all the things to be spoken of after.
SECT. XXXIII. The peoples contribution to the silver foundation: and its forme and posture.
MEasure out in your imagination, an unequall square, or a plot of ground, of thirty cubits, or fifteene yards long, and of ten cubits or five yards broad, such was the compasse of the Tabernacle betwixt Wall and Wall. The Foundation was of massy peeces of silver, shewing the solidity and purity of the truth, whereupon the Church is founded; Of these massy peeces there were an hundred in all, and in every peece was a talent of silver. Every man in Israel from twenty yeares old and upward, was to give halfe a Shekell, towards these foundation peeces, whereas for other things they were not bound to a setsumme, but to give what their hearts moved them. This might teach them, that to the fundamentals of their Religion, they were all bound, but to other things, each one according to the gift given him. Their manner of giving halfe a Shekell, you finde Exod. 36. 26, 27, 28. thus. There were numbred of Israel, from twenty yeares old, and upward, sixe hundred thousand, and three thousand five hundred and fifty men. Reckon thus; The Talent of the Sanctuary, contained 120 pound, the pound 25 shekels, or 50 halfe shekels, so that every Talent contained 3000. shekels, or 6000. halves: so that sixe hundred thousand halfe shekels, given by sixe hundred thousand men, doe amount to a hundred talents: Now there were three thousand five hundred and fifty men besides, which gave so many halfe shekels, or one thousand seven hundred seventy five whole ones, with which were made the hookes of pillars, &c. Exod. 38. 28. These hundred Talents of silver were thus wrought. Each one was cast into a solid peece of thirteen inches and a halfe long, and nine inches square; in the side that lay upward was a morteise hole, neere unto the end, now two and two were laid close together, end to end, and the morteises were not in the ends that joyned, but in the outmost ends.
Now every planke, whereof the sides were made, was in height five yards, but in breadth three quarters, just as broad as two of these peeces of silver were long, at the foote of the planke, at either corner was a tenon made, the planke being cut downe, or abating so much betweene the tenons, as the tenons themselves were in length, so that when the tenons were shrunke in the morteises, the middle of the planke setled upon the peeces or Bases.