Exodus27

New Living Translation

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¹“Using acacia wood, construct a square altar 7 1⁄2 feet wide, 7 1⁄2 feet long, and 4 1⁄2 feet high.

²Make horns for each of its four corners so that the horns and altar are all one piece. Overlay the altar with bronze.

³Make ash buckets, shovels, basins, meat forks, and firepans, all of bronze.

⁴Make a bronze grating for it, and attach four bronze rings at its four corners.

⁵Install the grating halfway down the side of the altar, under the ledge.

⁶For carrying the altar, make poles from acacia wood, and overlay them with bronze.

⁷Insert the poles through the rings on the two sides of the altar.

⁸The altar must be hollow, made from planks. Build it just as you were shown on the mountain.

⁹“Then make the courtyard for the Tabernacle, enclosed with curtains made of finely woven linen. On the south side, make the curtains 150 feet long.

¹⁰They will be held up by twenty posts set securely in twenty bronze bases. Hang the curtains with silver hooks and rings.

¹¹Make the curtains the same on the north side—150 feet of curtains held up by twenty posts set securely in bronze bases. Hang the curtains with silver hooks and rings.

¹²The curtains on the west end of the courtyard will be 75 feet long, supported by ten posts set into ten bases.

¹³The east end of the courtyard, the front, will also be 75 feet long.

¹⁴The courtyard entrance will be on the east end, flanked by two curtains. The curtain on the right side will be 22 1⁄2 feet long, supported by three posts set into three bases.

¹⁵The curtain on the left side will also be 22 1⁄2 feet long, supported by three posts set into three bases.

¹⁶“For the entrance to the courtyard, make a curtain that is 30 feet long. Make it from finely woven linen, and decorate it with beautiful embroidery in blue, purple, and scarlet thread. Support it with four posts, each securely set in its own base.

¹⁷All the posts around the courtyard must have silver rings and hooks and bronze bases.

¹⁸So the entire courtyard will be 150 feet long and 75 feet wide, with curtain walls 7 1⁄2 feet high, made from finely woven linen. The bases for the posts will be made of bronze.

¹⁹“All the articles used in the rituals of the Tabernacle, including all the tent pegs used to support the Tabernacle and the courtyard curtains, must be made of bronze.

²⁰“Command the people of Israel to bring you pure oil of pressed olives for the light, to keep the lamps burning continually.

²¹The lampstand will stand in the Tabernacle, in front of the inner curtain that shields the Ark of the Covenant. Aaron and his sons must keep the lamps burning in the Lord’s presence all night. This is a permanent law for the people of Israel, and it must be observed from generation to generation.

Study Guide

Public-domain commentary and original-language notes for Exodus 27.

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Chapter Summary

In this chapter: The altar of burnt offerings. (1–8). The court of the tabernacle. (9–19). The oil for the lamps. (20, 21).

vv1-8

In the court before the tabernacle, where the people attended, was an altar, to which they must bring their sacrifices, and on which their priests must offer them to God. It was of wood overlaid with brass. A grate of brass was let into the hollow of the altar, about the middle of which the fire was kept, and the sacrifice burnt. It was made of net-work like a sieve, and hung hollow, that the ashes might fall through. This brazen altar was a type of Christ dying to make atonement for our sins. The wood had been consumed by the fire from heaven, if it had not been secured by the brass: nor could the human nature of Christ have borne the wrath of God, if it had not been supported by Divine power.

vv9-19

The tabernacle was enclosed in a court, about sixty yards long and thirty broad, formed by curtains hung upon brazen pillars, fixed in brazen sockets. Within this enclosure the priests and Levites offered the sacrifices, and thither the Jewish people were admitted. These distinctions represented the difference between the visible nominal church, and the true spiritual church, which alone has access to God, and communion with him.

vv20-21

The pure oil signified the gifts and graces of the Spirit, which all believers receive from Christ, the good Olive, and without which our light cannot shine before men. The priests were to light the lamps, and tend them. It is the work of ministers, by preaching and expounding the Scriptures, which are as a lamp, to enlighten the church, God's tabernacle upon earth. Blessed be God, this light is not now confined to the Jewish tabernacle, but is a light to lighten the gentiles, and for salvation unto the ends of the earth.