and the twenty pillars thereof, and their twenty bases of copper, the hooks of the pillars and their connecting-rods of silver.
This verse lists the parts for one long side of the court around God's dwelling: twenty pillars, twenty bronze bases, and hooks and fillets of silver. Two metals hold the wall up, and commentators read each one as carrying its own meaning.
The pillars carried a wall of linen. Ridout says what that wall marks out.
So we have an enclosure, the "court," for the house of God. His dwelling place is set apart from the world around it. I think it is easy to see that the Lord's people form this enclosure. In practice they are the dividing line in this world between everything that is of God and everything that is not of Him.
Here is the whole court, with the parts this verse names set in place.
The Court was 100 cubits long and 50 cubits wide. Hangings of fine twisted linen enclosed it. The hangings hung from pillars. Sockets of "brass" (copper, or perhaps bronze) held those pillars upright, together with cords tied to brass pins, or tent pegs. The pillars had tops of silver, and silver "fillets," or connecting rods, joined them to each other.
The verse raises a question. It never says what the pillars themselves were made of.
Scripture does not say what the pillars were made of. At first sight verse 10 seems to make them brass. But compare Exodus 38:10, and it is most likely that the brass refers only to the sockets. Going by how other parts were made, you might conclude they were acacia wood overlaid with brass. But where Scripture is silent, human conclusions stay uncertain, even if we are allowed to draw them.
Commentators differ on how to settle it. Ridout finds meaning in the silence.
It means something, though, that the acacia wood is never mentioned here, as it usually is wherever the text clearly uses it. So whether the pillars were made of that unmentioned wood, or of copper, and hollow, as such pillars are made, what we are shown is only the copper of their foundations, or sockets. The pillars themselves drop out of sight, except as they rest on the sockets.
Gold belongs inside the sanctuary. Bronze belongs outside, where man stands. Kelly draws the contrast from the bronze altar that stood in this court. (Older translations say "brass" where the ESV says "bronze.")
The brazen altar, no less than the ark — the golden throne of God in the Most Holy Place — shows us God's righteousness. But there is this difference between them. Gold is the righteousness of God for drawing near where God is. Brass is the righteousness of God for dealing with man's evil where man is. That is the line which divides them.
The silver in the court had a known source. Every Israelite paid it in.
It is well worth noticing that the silver paid in by the children of Israel, a bekah or half shekel each, went into making the silver sockets of the veil and the hooks of the columns… What is the force of silver here? Is it not His grace shown in man, even in the man Christ Jesus? So the redemption price was the basis. The hangings of the court, which separated the sanctuary service of God from the world, hung on hooks made of that silver atonement money.
The weight of the hangings does not stop at the hook.
The silver hook hangs on the silver rod. The rod throws the weight onto the brass posts, and they carry it without strain — redemption linking the believer with a strength that is not his own.
This verse counts the pillars on one side of the court. Ridout turns their firmness into a test for us.
With us, sadly, when success comes in, or pleasure, or the smiles of this world, how the pillars of our testimony seem to stand on shifting sand! How often the people of God fail on the south side, on the prosperous side of life. And when hard times come in — trouble, or insult for the truth, for Christ's sake — how often the people of God lose heart, when they should be holding firm in faithful witness.
- Foundation. The bronze bases carry everything. Bronze stands for God's righteousness dealing with man's evil out where man is. It is the metal of the outside, as gold is of the inside.
- Fastening. The silver hooks and fillets came from the redemption money every Israelite paid. Grace is what the whole curtain hangs on.
- Strength. The load runs from hook to rod to pillar to socket. What the believer holds up rests on a strength that is not his own.
- Boundary. All of it holds up a wall of white linen. That wall is the visible line between God's dwelling and the world. God's people form that line.
- Steadiness. The pillars held the same line on every side. Prosperity tests our witness as much as hardship does, and it must stand in both.
And likewise on the north side in length, hangings a hundred [cubits] long, and its twenty pillars, and their twenty bases of copper; the hooks of the pillars and their connecting-rods of silver.
Exodus 27:11 sets the north wall of the court around God's dwelling: a hundred cubits of fine linen on twenty pillars, with bronze bases and silver hooks. It repeats the south side almost word for word — so what did this plain white fence say to everyone who walked past?
Walk round the court and the same white wall meets you, with Levite families camped in front of it.
Facing the court on the south side, you could have counted the tents of the Levites of the family of Kohath on one hand. On the other, an unbroken line of white linen curtains ran a hundred cubits. On the north side, where the Merarites camped, an unbroken line of white curtains a hundred cubits long would again have met the eye.
The inner curtains of the tent and this outer wall show the same Person, but to different eyes.
The curtains of the tabernacle present Christ in His nature and character, and Christ in His future glories and judicial authority. But presented that way, He was for the eye of God and for the eye of the priest. No one could see Him from outside, only from within. The fine twined linen hangings also present Christ, but not so much to those inside as to those outside. Everyone in the camp could see them. So it is the presentation of Christ to the world, Christ in the purity of His nature. He could challenge His enemies to convict Him of sin; Pilate had to admit again and again that he found no fault in Him.
This fence was not built for defence or for show.
We may call the twined linen curtains that formed the limit of the court the white wall. It was a barrier that separated the sacred dwelling from the camp. These curtains were probably see-through, and they hung from silver rods that joined together the brass — or rather copper — pillars of the court. Its construction had no ordinary grandeur, no physical protection, no ornament. But God ordered every proportion, material and combination, and each one carried spiritual instruction. The fine twined linen, choice and brilliant — the glorious white — spoke to every eye in the camp of purity.
Each of the twenty pillars stood in a bronze base, or socket — older writers call the bronze brass. Silver capped the pillars, and the silver rods the verse calls fillets linked them. The two metals carry different messages, and their place matters.
Brass is divine righteousness testing man in his responsibility. That is why brass marks the outside of the tabernacle as gold marks the inside. Man's responsibility must be tested and met before he comes into God's presence… Silver speaks of redemption. It caps the pillars, and the curtains hang upon it. So if He searches the sinner by the sockets of brass, He at the same time declares to him the value of the blood, shown by the silver. Brass testing man uncovers his need, and as soon as the need is known, the silver is there to meet it.
The linen showed a life. The metal that held it up points back to the cross.
These squares of fine linen set out what the life of our Lord was in all its purity and holiness. The pillars banded with silver, with hooks of silver and sockets of brass, point to this. Unless the claims of God's holiness had been met at the cross, there would have been no presentation of the wonderful life of our Lord in testimony in this world.
Dennett reads the same measurements as the twofold responsibility — toward God and toward man — that Christ perfectly met, so that "the spotless purity of His life sprang from His perfectly meeting this twofold responsibility."
Commentators differ here. Dennett sees Christ shown to the camp. Grant reads the same hangings of God's people, and points to what holds them up.
The measure of the hangings of the court is exactly that of the beautiful curtains of the tabernacle. Here the fine linen hangs from silver hooks. So it is not Christ that is pictured, but the righteousness of saints, yet measured by what Christ is. The silver hook depends on the silver rod, which throws the weight onto the brazen posts. They carry it with ease — redemption linking the believer with a strength that is not his own.
The same reading makes the enclosure the Lord's people, "who are in practice the dividing line in this world between everything that is of God and what is not of Him" (Samuel Ridout).
- Foundation. The bronze bases come first. God's righteousness tests man's responsibility, and nothing stands in the court until Christ has met that claim.
- Redemption. Above the bronze comes silver — the value of the blood — and every curtain hangs from it, not from the pillar's own strength.
- Purity. The fine white linen shows spotless purity, unbroken for a hundred cubits on the north side.
- Reach. Only priests saw the inner curtains. This wall faced the whole camp — the same measure of holiness, on public view.
- Result. Holiness alone fenced God's dwelling off from the camp. His people are meant to be that visible dividing line today.
-- And the breadth of the court on the west side, hangings of fifty cubits; their pillars ten, and their bases ten.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
-- And the breadth of the court on the east side, eastward, fifty cubits;
The east side of the court is its front — the only side with a way in. This verse gives only a width, fifty cubits, yet that width held the court's one gate, and commentators read the whole way of approach to God out of it.
The court was a rectangle of linen curtains, longer than it was wide. On the east side, those fifty cubits divide into curtain, gate, curtain:
The court was that enclosure, formed by the linen curtains which surrounded the tabernacle. Its length, running east and west, was 100 cubits, and its breadth 50 cubits. On the east side was an opening, or "gate," of 20 cubits, in the middle, leaving 15 cubits of linen curtains on either side.
More doors would have been more convenient. God chose otherwise.
Separate entrances on the north, south and west sides might have been more convenient. But meaning mattered far more than convenience. It was deeply significant that there was only one gate, and that this one gate was on the east side, where the altar stood. People of royal or priestly family had no private entrance. Everyone who would enter at all had to enter by the one gate, the same gate for all.
The same writer links the direction to the sunrise:
The gate of the court was at the eastern end of the enclosure. So the light of the rising sun shone on it, and on the altar inside it. That light made clear and plain the way by which man could draw near to God. In the same way, when Christ came, Who was the true Light and the true Way, it was recorded that, through God's tender mercy, "the sunrise shall visit us from on high . . . to guide our feet into the way of peace" (Luke 1:78-79).
(Older translations render the Luke phrase "the Dayspring from on high has visited us.")
One way in — but a wide one. The gate was made like the door of the holy place, and just inside it stood the altar for sacrifice.
The entrance was to be on the east side. It was to stretch no less than twenty cubits. There the plain linen gave way to blue, purple, scarlet and fine-twined linen, embroidered with needlework, like the curtain at the entrance to the holy place. The man who only entered the court had to take in the character and the glory of Him who lived in the tabernacle, just as much as the man who entered the holy place. Twenty cubits made it a broad entrance. This shows that God is marked by largeness of heart, with no desire to shut anyone out. But all who would enter must approach by the altar of sacrifice, which stood straight in front of them.
The same white linen ran round the court, standing fifteen cubits either side of the gate. One writer sees that single fabric doing two opposite jobs:
The court of the tabernacle had for a wall fine twined linen. This was a symbol of the righteousness of God. It shuts the sinner out of His presence. But there was a gate (verse 16) where the colours came back... The gate is a picture of Christ. If an Israelite entered through that gate in the linen wall, which shut him out, he found, after entering in, that the same fine twined linen shut him in. Even so, if we enter in through the one door, Christ, the righteousness of God which condemned us, covers us.
Each pillar stood in a socket of brass and carried a cap of silver. One writer reads the two metals as an order: testing first, then redemption.
Brass is divine righteousness testing man in responsibility. So brass marks the outside of the tabernacle, as gold marks the inside. Man's responsibility must be tested and met before he can be brought into God's presence... Silver speaks of redemption. The pillars were capped with it, and the curtains hung from it... So if He searches the sinner by the sockets of brass, at the same time He shows him the value of the blood, seen in the silver. Brass tests man and uncovers his need. As soon as the need is known, the silver is there to meet it.
- One way. The fifty cubits of the east side held the court's only opening. Rank bought nobody a private entrance; everyone used the same gate.
- One way, made plain. The morning light struck that gate and the altar inside it first. God's way of approach is not hidden.
- One way, made wide. Twenty of those fifty cubits stood open, showing God has no wish to shut anyone out. Its colours matched the inner door, so even the man who came no further than the court met the same glory.
- One way, past the altar. Whoever stepped through faced the altar of sacrifice. Coming in and sacrifice always go together.
- One way, and then covered. The righteousness that shut the sinner out now shuts him in. Once he is through the gate, it covers him.
the hangings on the one wing, of fifteen cubits; their pillars three, and their bases three.
This verse measures one short stretch of curtain beside the entrance of the tabernacle courtyard. Why would God fix the width of a fence panel and the number of its posts? And what is a reader meant to see in it?
The doorway of the court had matching lengths of curtain on both sides. One writer sets out the arithmetic, then presses the count of the posts:
The east side was the front, and the gate was twenty cubits wide, leaving fifteen cubits on either side of the gate for hangings similar to the rest of the court. Three pillars with their sockets upheld the hangings on each side of the gate. Three is the resurrection number. That surely adds the truth here that believers bear witness they have been raised with Christ, so their moral righteousness is the result of His work.
This curtain was part of one white barrier running the whole way round. Here is what that barrier said to anyone standing in the camp:
This white wall of fine twined linen marked the tabernacle out from all the surrounding tents, and separated it from the camp at whose centre it stood. It signified purity and righteousness (Revelation 19:8), and pictured both the difference and the distance between the holy God and sinful man… So when "the Word became flesh and dwelt among us," when the Son of God became also the Son of Man, when the great reality the tabernacle pictured appeared, He differed from all other men. He alone was "the Righteous", the "Just One", the One "who knew no sin", the One who was always "holy, innocent, unstained, separated from sinners".
Why measure so exactly? One writer answers by imagining a smaller total:
Suppose God had given a shorter measure than 280 cubits, what would it have resulted in? A court without enough protection. There would have been gaps, and God's holy presence would not have stayed apart from the outside world. So it is now. Without this full standard of perfect holiness, seen in Christ and to be shown in His people, God would be thought of as less holy, less separate from sinful man.
This curtain hangs beside the gate. The same white fabric that shuts a person out also encloses him once he has gone through:
The court of the tabernacle had for a wall fine twined linen. This was a symbol of the righteousness of God. This shuts the sinner out of His presence. But there was a gate in which the colours reappeared… The gate is a picture of Christ. If an Israelite entered through that gate in the linen wall, which shut him out, he found, once inside, that the same fine twined linen shut him in. In the same way, if we enter in through the one door, Christ, the righteousness of God which condemned us now covers us.
The verse also counts the posts and their bases, which the writers call sockets. One writer looks at what they were made of:
The pillars that hold it up are all of brass, and so are their sockets, which are single. But the connecting rods and the hooks it hangs from are silver. The hangings of the court measure just the same as the beautiful curtains of the tabernacle. Here, though, the fine linen hangs from silver hooks, matching the sockets of the tabernacle boards. So it is not Christ that is pictured, but the righteousness of saints — yet measured by what Christ is. The silver hook hangs on the silver rod, and the rod throws the weight onto the brass posts, which carry it easily — redemption linking the believer with a strength that is not his own.
Who does this wall stand for?
We have, then, an enclosure, the "court," for the house of God: His dwelling place is in this way separated from the world around. I think we shall have no difficulty in seeing that this enclosure is formed by the Lord's people, who are in practice the dividing line in this world between all that is of God and what is not of Him.
What the camp saw of that line was cloth, not framework:
The pillars were not seen from the outside, but only the fine white linen. This speaks of "the righteous deeds of the saints" (Revelation 19:8). So the pure, devoted obedience of believers is the testimony that should draw the attention of those outside. It is not their words so much as their actions.
- Measured. God fixed the front of the court to the cubit: fifteen cubits each side of the gate, three pillars, three bases. Nothing was left to the builders.
- Separated. The white linen wall set God's dwelling apart from the camp. It pictured both the difference and the distance between a holy God and sinful people.
- Full. A shorter measure would have left gaps. God's presence would then have looked less holy. The standard of holiness is never trimmed to fit.
- Supported. The linen hangs from silver hooks and rods onto brass posts. A believer's righteousness rests on redemption and on a strength that is not his own.
- Seen. From outside only the cloth showed, not the posts. Onlookers read the purity of obedient lives, not words.
And on the other wing hangings of fifteen [cubits]; their pillars three, and their bases three.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
-- And for the gate of the court a curtain of twenty cubits, of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and twined byssus, embroidered with needlework; their pillars four, and their bases four.
Plain white linen fenced the court around the tabernacle, five cubits high. On the east side that fence opened. This verse describes the screen that filled the gap: its width, its four pillars, and its coloured needlework.
God could have opened the fence on every side. He did not.
Separate entrances on the north, south and west sides might have been more convenient. But significance mattered far more than convenience. It was significant in the extreme that there was only one gate, and that this one gate was on the east side, where the altar stood. People of princely or priestly descent had no private entrance. All who would enter at all had to enter by the one gate, which was the same for everyone.
It was also the only place to look in. To see inside, people "had to come to that many-coloured hanging." The white curtains on the other three sides "were five cubits high, about seven and a half feet, which stopped anyone but a giant from looking over them" (C. E. Stuart).
Being the only door did not make it a narrow one. Its size also ties the gate to the altar.
But notice: although there was only one gate, it was a very wide one. The width of the gate was equal to the length of the Holy Place. It was no less than twenty cubits wide (Ex. 27:16). That is two-fifths of the total width of the Court, and twice the width of the Tabernacle itself. It is a true "whoever" width, an "anyone" width, a width for "all" (John 3:16; 10:9; Matt. 11:28). Here again we can see the close connection between the gate and the altar. The altar was a square, and each side was five cubits long. So the gate was as wide as all four sides of the altar together — but no wider.
The gate used the same fine twined linen as the fence, with colours added. That detail decides how a person stands once inside.
The court of the tabernacle had for a wall fine twined linen. This was symbolic of the righteousness of God. This excludes the sinner from His presence. But there was a gate (verse 16) where the colours reappeared: blue, purple and scarlet. The gate is a picture of Christ. The linen wall shut the Israelite out. But if he entered through that gate, he found that the same fine twined linen now shut him in. In the same way, if we enter in through the one door, Christ, the righteousness of God which condemned us now covers us.
Each thread in the verse stands for a different glory of Christ, and the stitching for His daily life.
We have spoken before of blue as a symbol of the heavenly character of the perfect manhood of our blessed Lord. Purple symbolises His universal glories as the Son of Man. Scarlet is His kingly glory as the Messiah in connection with Israel. The fine twined linen brings before us His blessed holy life. The needlework symbolises all the small details of that life. Many a Christian will face a crisis with great courage, by the help of God. Yet the same Christian can fail in the small details of life — politeness, tact, consideration.
Nobody printed or stamped this pattern; it grew stitch by stitch. In "the countless marks of the needle in the gate we see in symbol the infinite beauty of Christ's perfections" (H. Forbes Witherby).
Something is missing from this screen: the cherubim — the angel figures that guarded the way to the tree of life. Commentators read the absence as deliberate.
Once again there are no cherubim. This is because He is here the Door, the Way, as presented to the world. We are told that God did not send His Son to judge the world — that was not His mission then — but that the world through Him might be saved (John 3:17). There are now no cherubim and no flaming sword to guard the way of the tree of life. That flaming sword has fallen upon the holy victim offered up to God at Calvary.
The screen did not hang in mid-air.
The gate speaks of Christ, the only entrance for anyone into the presence of God. But it hung by silver hooks on the copper pillars. This shows that only by His redemption at Calvary can we have any right to enter. The entrance then was far more attractive than the white enclosure. How true of the Lord Jesus!
Others read the four pillars as a sign of reach. The gate stood open "for the whole world, not for one nation, or one family, the priests, but for the wide world, wherever man is found" (A. J. Pollock).
- One — there was a single gate, on the altar side, with no private entrance for rank or priestly birth.
- Wide — that one gate ran twenty cubits, as wide as all four sides of the altar together: a "whoever" width.
- Same linen — the righteousness that shut the sinner out is the righteousness that covers him once he has entered.
- Coloured — blue, purple and scarlet show Christ's heavenly manhood, His universal glories and His kingly glory; the needlework shows the small details of His life.
- Open — no cherubim guard this screen; the sword fell at Calvary, so the way stands unguarded and inviting.
All the pillars of the court round about shall be fastened together with [rods of] silver; their hooks of silver, and their bases of copper.
Exodus 27:17 closes the list of parts for the courtyard wall. It sums up what every pillar had in common: silver at the top, silver in the hooks, and bronze underneath. Two metals, two truths. Both ran right round the enclosure, on every side.
Writers on the tabernacle read each metal as a fixed symbol, and this verse sets two of them one above the other. (Older translations say "brass." Some writers say "copper." All three words name the same metal.)
Gold is intrinsic righteousness in God's nature — not His essence, but what we approach in. Brass is the judgment of righteousness as applied to man... What led me to this was that the sockets of the pillars of the court were brass, while their bands and hooks were silver. What gave stability was judgment.
The silver of these hooks and rods was not just a costly metal chosen for beauty. The people themselves had paid it in.
The silver paid in by the children of Israel, half a shekel each, went into the silver sockets of the veil and the hooks of the columns. Now if gold represents God's righteousness which we approach within, and if copper means His righteousness as applied to man outside in His unchanging judgment, what is the force of silver here? Is it not His grace shown in man, even in the man Christ Jesus? So the redemption price was the basis. The curtains of the court hung on hooks made of the silver of the atonement money. Those curtains separated the sanctuary service of God from the world.
From outside, an Israelite saw only white linen, silver rods, and bronze feet. One writer gathers the three into a single message spelled out to the whole camp.
But the curtains hung from silver rods. These rods connected the pillars together, and silver hooks fixed the curtains to them. The metal they were made of spoke of redemption... The wall around Jehovah's dwelling put this before every eye: purity upheld by enduring strength, and hanging on redemption. For us, with the whole of Scripture in our hands, the wall presents three truths: God's purity, God's strength, God's redemption.
Inside the tabernacle the silver lay underneath, in the sockets. Here it sits at the top, and the linen hangs from it. One writer takes that switch to mean a change of subject.
The hangings of the court measure exactly the same as the beautiful curtains of the tabernacle. But here the fine linen hangs from silver hooks, which match the sockets of the tabernacle boards. So the picture here is not Christ, but the righteousness of saints — a righteousness measured by what Christ is. The silver hook hangs on the silver rod. The rod throws the weight onto the bronze posts, and they carry it with ease. Redemption links the believer with a strength that is not his own.
The verse leaves no pillar out. One writer sees meaning in the silver band that joined every post to the next.
The silver filleting connected the whole. The principle of redemption runs through and unites all that is really divine. A religion that ignores redemption and what it implies is not of God at all.
The order of the two metals matters. A man walking up to the wall met the bronze first, at ground level, and the silver above it.
Bronze is divine righteousness testing man in responsibility... Man's responsibility must be tested and met before he can be brought into God's presence... Silver speaks of redemption. The pillars were capped with it, and the curtains hung from it... If therefore He searches the sinner by the sockets of bronze, He declares to him at the same time the value of the blood as shown by the silver. Bronze testing man discovers his need, and as soon as the need is known, the silver is there to meet it.
Scripture never says what the pillars themselves were made of, and commentators differ. One writer holds that only the sockets were bronze, and warns against guessing where the text is silent. Another draws meaning from the silence itself.
It is significant that the text never mentions acacia wood, as it usually does wherever that wood is clearly used... Only the copper of their foundations, or sockets, is before us. The pillars themselves drop out of sight, except as resting on the sockets.
- Foundation. Bronze sits at the bottom of every pillar. It stands for righteousness applied to man in judgment, and that judgment is what holds the court steady.
- Ransom. The silver above it was the atonement money the people paid in — redemption, hammered into hooks and rods.
- Suspension. Nothing in that white wall stood by itself. The linen hung from silver, so the whole display rests on a strength that is not the believer's own.
- Reach. Silver banded every pillar on every side. Redemption runs through the whole, and anything that claims to be of God without it is not.
- Result. Bronze uncovers the need and silver meets it, so the same wall that shuts man out also tells him the price has been paid.