And thou shalt take fine wheaten flour, and bake twelve cakes thereof; each cake shall be of two tenths.
Right after the instructions about the lamps, God turns to the table in the Holy Place. He tells Moses what bread to set on it, down to the grain, the baking, the number and the amount. Commentators read every one of those details as a picture.
The bread begins with the same flour as the grain offering. One common ingredient is missing.
The loaves or cakes were made of fine flour. This at once points to the grain offering, which was also made of fine flour, with oil and frankincense added. No leaven is mentioned here. In the two wave loaves (Lev. 23:17) leaven is clearly named. The reason is obvious: there the loaves represent the church, so leaven, the emblem of evil, is found in them. But the fine flour is a type of the humanity of Christ. So the loaves of the showbread have no leaven, since He is holy, harmless, undefiled, absolutely without sin.
Why "fine" flour in particular? One writer notes what happens when you handle it:
Fine flour has no grit in it. Run your hand through flour — how smooth it is. With all of us, how much grit and unevenness there is in our lives. With Him all was perfection.
The flour did not go onto the table raw. It passed through the oven first.
The loaves were baked. So they set Christ before us as one who was exposed to the action of fire. That fire is the judgment of God's holiness. It searched and tested Him on the cross, and found that He answered its every claim, and answered it perfectly.
Each cake held a set amount. The same amount turns up elsewhere in the offerings.
Each cake or loaf was made of two tenths of an ephah of flour. This was the amount of the grain offering that went with the offering of a ram. The grain offering with the bull was three tenths, and with a lamb only one. The ram, as we saw in the covering for the tabernacle, signifies the consecration or devotedness of our Lord even to death. So the fine flour, which speaks of His person, reminds us of Him who was wholly devoted to God. He now represents His people before Him in all the value and energy of that devotedness.
The number is not accidental. It matches the tribes, and it comes back again and again in Scripture.
They were twelve in number — six in a row. So on the shoulders of the high priest there were the names of six tribes on the one, and the names of six tribes on the other. The loaves equally point to the twelve tribes of Israel. The number twelve signifies administrative perfection of government in man. So there were twelve tribes, twelve apostles, twelve gates, and twelve foundations in the holy city, new Jerusalem. The twelve loaves may then be taken to represent Israel in its twelve tribes. This gives us God revealed in Christ in association with Israel, in perfection of government. But the loaves were on the table, and so, on the other hand, Israel is seen in association with Christ before God.
The loaves sat inside the sanctuary, where the nation could not see them. One writer traces a prophet's altar back to the truth they pictured:
What was the meaning of Elijah's altar of twelve stones, on the top of Carmel? It was nothing else than the expression of his faith in that truth of which the twelve loaves were the pattern or the shadow. He believed in the unbroken unity of the nation. That unity was held before God in the eternal stability of the promise made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The outward condition of the nation made no difference. Man might look in vain for the visible unity of the twelve tribes. But faith could always look inside the sanctuary, and there see the twelve loaves.
The bread was not only on display. It was also a meal.
The pure table with its twelve loaves of fine flour represents Him as the heavenly food of the priests. He was also the manna that came down for the people on earth. Jesus was also the bread of life as man. If Israel does not see this yet, any more than they see the light of heaven, we whom He made priests by grace delight in both.
Commentators differ on who the loaves stand for. Most take them as a picture of Israel. One writer finds a second picture in them, and explains the bread's name:
Showbread means, word for word, "bread of the face" — that is, the bread before God. As regards the present time, we no doubt have in the showbread another picture of those who are now His people, the church, while the twelve loaves also typify Israel as a nation.
- Flour — fine flour with no leaven pictures Christ's spotless humanity, unlike the leavened wave loaves of Leviticus 23.
- Fire — the baking pictures Him tested by the judgment of God's holiness, and answering its every claim.
- Measure — two tenths matches the grain offering for a ram, the figure of devotion even to death.
- Twelve — the loaves match the twelve tribes, whose names the high priest carried on his shoulders.
- Table — inside the sanctuary, the loaves hold Israel's unity before God when no one on earth can see it. They also feed the priests who serve there.
And thou shalt set them in two rows, six in a row, upon the pure table before Jehovah.
Leviticus 24 turns from Israel's feasts to the quiet work inside the sanctuary. Twelve loaves sat on a gold-covered table. Commentators see in that detail one of Scripture's clearest pictures of how God keeps His people before His face.
The name of this bread explains why it sat there. The loaves were not stored on the table. They stood in full view of God, and one writer links them to the high priest's breastplate:
These loaves were called showbread, which means "bread of faces," because they were always before the face of God. Of these the Lord Himself said, they shall be "before Me always." (Ex. 25:30.) They were twelve in number, presenting the twelve tribes of Israel — that is, all the people of God among whom He dwelt. The names of all the tribes were before the Lord's face in the breastplate of the high priest. In the same way, all the people were before Him, pictured in the loaves laid out on the holy table.
The verse calls it a table of pure gold. But gold was not the only material in it:
The table was made of acacia wood and overlaid with pure gold. (Ex. 25:23-25.) The acacia wood pictures what is human, and gold, as always, stands for what is divine. So we have here a figure of Christ in His human and divine natures combined in His person. So in its material the table matches the ark completely, and the ark too is a symbol of the person of our Lord.
The split into two sixes matches something else the high priest wore. One writer draws out that echo, the meaning of the number, and the future reign it points to:
They were twelve in number — six in a row. So on the shoulders of the high priest there were the names of six tribes on the one, and the names of six tribes on the other. The loaves equally point to the twelve tribes of Israel. The number twelve signifies administrative perfection of government in man. So there were twelve tribes, twelve apostles, twelve gates, and twelve foundations in the holy city, new Jerusalem... The twelve loaves may then be taken to represent Israel in its twelve tribes. So with the number twelve we get God revealed in Christ, in association with Israel, in perfect government. Christ was of the seed of David, and heir to his throne (Luke 1:32). This will be displayed in the millennium, as the prophets foretold. But the loaves were on the table, and so, on the other hand, Israel is seen in association with Christ before God.
The ESV says two piles where older translations say two rows. Commentators differ on what the arrangement means. One reads it as a picture of order, then turns to what the loaves say about Christ and His people:
The loaves arranged in two rows seem to suggest the perfect order of all God's government, and the true witness to what is taught in the loaves. They set forth Christ in the perfection of His person, and the frankincense on them tells of His fragrance and sweet savour to God. But they also show Christ's people in Him, always before God according to the value and fragrance of what the Lord is. They are not seen in what they are in themselves, which could not be a sweet savour to God, but as in Christ.
Another takes the pairing as a picture of shared enjoyment:
The bread was placed in two rows, six in a row (v. 6), for fellowship is necessarily between two parties.
The loaves sat inside the sanctuary, out of public view. One writer applies that to Israel's scattered history:
The night is dark and gloomy. There is not, in all this lower world, so much as a single ray by which the human eye can trace the unity of Israel's tribes. They are scattered among the nations, and lost to man's sight. But their memorial is before the Lord. Faith owns this, because it knows that "all the promises of God find their Yes in Him." By the Spirit's perfect light, faith sees the twelve tribes faithfully kept in memory in the sanctuary above.
The loaves pictured Israel. One writer says the symbol does not stop there:
But there is more than Israel's position in this symbol. In principle, it takes in the position of every believer. There in the holy place he is seen in Christ, always before the eye of God, covered with the welcome fragrance of the frankincense. It is indeed the perfect presentation of the believer to God. In other words, it is our acceptance in the Beloved.
- Table — Acacia wood covered with gold: Christ, human and divine in one Person, made of the same materials as the ark.
- Loaves — Twelve, for the twelve tribes. Twelve is the number of perfect government, seen again in twelve apostles and twelve gates. One day Christ will display that government over Israel.
- Arrangement — Six and six, like the tribal names on the high priest's shoulders. Commentators read the two rows as divine order, or as fellowship between two parties.
- Position — "Bread of faces," set before God always. God sees the people in Christ's fragrance, not in themselves.
- Result — The tribes are scattered and out of sight. Faith still sees their memorial kept, and every believer stands in the same acceptance.
And thou shalt put pure frankincense upon each row; and it shall be a bread of remembrance, an offering by fire to Jehovah.
Twelve loaves of fine flour lay in two rows on the golden table inside the holy place. Pure frankincense went on each row, and that fragrance made the bread a memorial — so what does God remember, and why does the fragrance belong on bread?
Frankincense appears earlier in Leviticus on the grain offering. One writer sets the two side by side:
The grain offering of fine flour had frankincense on it. When only part of the meal was to be burned, all the frankincense was consumed (Lev. 2:1-2). The showbread on the golden table also had frankincense on it (Lev. 24:7) "for a memorial." Here the grain offering and the showbread both speak of the person of our Lord, and the frankincense would suggest His preciousness to God, and to everyone who shares God's thoughts.
The word translated "memorial" is rare. Writing on the grain offering, where the same word appears, one writer notes where else it is found:
Of this offering, a handful of the flour, with all the frankincense, was burned on the altar for a "memorial." That word is used elsewhere only of the very similar showbread (Lev. 24) and of the jealousy offering (Num. 5). It is a beautiful word for this one perfect life on earth: will God ever forget it? Tested by the fire of God's holiness, it was nothing but a sweet aroma. The rest became the portion of the priest — the worshipper.
The loaves are twelve, one for each tribe of Israel. The frankincense covers them, and one writer finds here why God keeps the nation before Him through its unbelief:
The frankincense stands for the sweet fragrance of Christ to God. So notice that Israel, in its twelve tribes, is always presented before God, covered with all the fragrance of Christ. God keeps them there through the whole night of their unbelief because of what He is and has done. That is the sure promise of their future restoration and blessing.
The same scene points forward. One writer sees in the pure table an age still to come:
The pure table had on it the twelve cakes of fine flour, covered in pure frankincense, renewed sabbath by sabbath before the Lord… In that age too, God will at last keep the twelve tribes before Himself in a fragrance they draw entirely from Christ.
The memorial portion is a food offering to the LORD; older translations render this "an offering made by fire." One writer follows that fire to the cross:
Frankincense was put on the twelve loaves — a picture of the fragrance of the life of the blessed Lord… So we learn that fire played its part in this memorial. The fine flour had to pass through the fire, which changed its appearance and texture and made it food. So there can be no feeding on Christ apart from His death… But now every question of sin has been met, and all that the believer is in his old fallen nature has been set aside in the cross of Christ. The new nature is free to feed on Christ and share God's delight in Him.
The frankincense went up to God, and the loaves went to the priests. One writer explains what the priests were doing when they ate:
The incense on the memorial of the bread, which represented the twelve tribes of Israel, was burned as a sweet smell to Jehovah. The priests then identified themselves with the tribes by eating this bread. The act of eating carried the meaning of continued identification.
One writer turns the same picture toward believers now:
We must not leave out the pure frankincense on earth now, for a memorial — our acceptance in all the grace of Christ, the fragrance before God… Only the priests eat of Him in this way, and only in a holy place.
- Fragrance. The pure frankincense stands for the preciousness of Christ to God — the one element on the table that belongs wholly to Him.
- Memorial. The rare word here speaks of God's own remembrance of one perfect life. "Will God ever forget it?" The question answers itself.
- Covering. The fragrance goes on the bread, so the twelve tribes stand before God in a sweetness that is not their own.
- Fire. Fire touched the loaves and the incense. There is no feeding on Christ apart from His death.
- Identification. The incense rose to God and the bread fed the priests. By eating, the priests joined themselves to the tribes the loaves stood for.
Every sabbath day he shall arrange it before Jehovah continually, on the part of the children of Israel [it is] an everlasting covenant.
This verse closes the instructions for the twelve loaves set on the golden table inside the sanctuary. It raises three simple questions: who arranges the bread, why twelve loaves, and what makes a weekly routine last forever?
The command names a day and a person. The work starts with Moses and then passes to the high priest:
It appears from Leviticus 24 that at first Moses set the loaves "upon the pure table before the Lord." Afterwards the service belonged to the high priest, just as it is recorded: "Every sabbath he shall set it in order before the Lord continually." The twelve loaves surely represent the twelve tribes of Israel. Placing them on the table each sabbath would confirm that God will never forget His ancient people Israel.
One writer reads the twelve loaves as the twelve tribes themselves, kept before God whatever their outward state:
They were laid up in the sanctuary before the Lord, on the pure table, for seven days. Then they became the food of Aaron and his sons. This gives another striking picture of Israel's condition as God views them, whatever their outward appearance may be. The twelve tribes are always before Him. Their memorial can never perish. They are arranged in divine order in the sanctuary, covered with the fragrant incense of Christ. The pure table on which they rest reflects them back beneath the bright beams of that golden lamp. That lamp shines, undimmed, through the darkest hour of the nation's moral night.
The same writer finds that faith in Elijah, who built an altar of twelve stones on Mount Carmel:
What did Elijah's altar of twelve stones on the top of Carmel mean? It was simply the expression of his faith in the truth that the twelve loaves pictured. He believed in the unbroken unity of the nation, kept before God by the unchanging promise made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, whatever the nation's outward condition. People might look in vain for the visible unity of the twelve tribes. But faith could always look inside the sanctuary and see the twelve loaves there, covered with pure frankincense, set in divine order on the pure table.
The loaves stay in place because God is faithful, not because Israel is:
They may be unfaithful, as they have been, but God cannot deny Himself; He remains faithful. And so, though their unbelief has scattered them through the world, He will yet carry out His purposes of mercy and truth. He will gather them from the four corners of the earth and bring them back into their own land in fullness of blessing. That blessing is established in Him and secured by Him — the One the showbread table symbolizes.
The same thought is put briefly elsewhere: the table pictured "Israel's place before God in the acceptability of Christ, who, as the true Aaron, maintains them even now before God: it is a perpetual covenant."
The word "continually" raises a question: who arranges the loaves now? One writer points to a priest still at work while Israel waits:
In His public dealings with Israel, God has called them "Lo-ammi," that is, "Not my people." But they are "before the Lord continually," as seen in the twelve loaves. Paul's faith saw the twelve loaves on the pure table before the Lord. He spoke to king Agrippa of "our whole twelve tribes serving day and night without ceasing." Our great high priest will certainly appear "to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel." Until that day He serves in the holy place with the twelve loaves upon the pure table.
One writer reads the choice of day alongside the manna in Exodus 16:
We see the sabbath here too, following the manna, as shown historically in Exodus 16. Our rest depends on Christ, not on the Spirit in us. The Spirit is our help and power; but Christ is our peace before God. Only the priests eat of Him in this way, and only in a holy place.
One writer takes the picture further than Israel:
But there is more than Israel's position in this symbol. It includes in principle that of every believer. He stands there in the holy place, always before the eye of God, covered with the pleasing fragrance of the frankincense. God sees him in Christ. It is indeed the perfect presentation of the believer to God.
- Twelve. The loaves stand for the twelve tribes, set in divine order in the sanctuary. Their memorial can never perish.
- Covered. Frankincense, the fragrance of Christ, covers them. God sees Israel in Christ's worth, not their own.
- Kept. The covenant lasts forever because God cannot deny Himself. Being scattered has not cancelled His purpose to gather Israel home.
- Continual. A priest still sets the loaves in order and will serve in the holy place until He appears to raise up the tribes of Jacob.
- Shared. The same picture holds every believer: seen in Christ, in the holy place, always before the eye of God.
And it shall be Aaron's and his sons'; and they shall eat it in a holy place; for it is most holy unto him of Jehovah's offerings by fire [it is] an everlasting statute.
Twelve loaves stood a week on the golden table in God's presence. Leviticus 24:9 says who eats them afterwards, and it raises two questions: why is bread called "most holy," and why may only certain men eat it, in only one place?
The loaves stood for Israel, yet Israel never ate them. The right to eat belonged to one family, and commentators see a wide reach in that limit:
The twelve loaves refer to Israel. Yet the nation did not eat the showbread. It was the food of the priests. Does this not show us how it applies to every true believer in Christ today? All who belong to Christ are priests, as pictured in the words "for Aaron and his sons."
The count of twelve matters. So does the missing leaven (yeast):
There is no mention of leaven in these loaves. They represent, I have no doubt, Christ in immediate connection with "the twelve tribes of Israel." They were laid up in the sanctuary before the Lord, on the pure table, for seven days. After that they became the food of Aaron and his sons. This is another striking picture of Israel's condition as Jehovah sees it, whatever they may look like from outside. The twelve tribes are always before Him. Their memorial can never perish.
The order matters. The loaves spent a week under God's eye before any priest ate one:
Week by week the priests brought the new showbread. They had the privilege of eating what had stood through the week "upon the pure table before the Lord." So God had fellowship with the priests at that "pure table." They received for their nourishment the "most holy" food that had given Him satisfaction. How all of it reminds us of Him who is both the delight of His Father and the life and sustenance of His people.
The verse names a place as well as a people. No priest took this food home, and that setting shapes what he could take in:
Everything precious in the offering of Christ is the food and nourishment of our souls. We see it from every angle — in His life and in His death; in that bread come down from heaven, seen in His life of devotedness and grace here below; and in His death for us. All of it nourishes us in that communion with God in which we ourselves are kept in our priesthood. The priests alone ate the holy things, and they ate them in a holy place. We can grasp what is precious in the work of Christ only in the sense of the presence of God, and under the power of that oil which is not poured on flesh.
Why does it matter who eats? Eating says something about the eater:
Feeding shows identification and communion with the thing fed upon… It was the same with the priests. For example, they also ate of the sin offering in certain cases (Lev. 6:26), and by that act identified themselves with it. So feeding on the showbread is a symbol: Christ, as the Priest, always identifies Himself with Israel before God. It was only to be eaten, notice, in the holy place.
David broke this rule while he was on the run, and took the bread from the priest Ahimelech. One writer explains why it was allowed:
He had Ahimelech give him the showbread, which only the priests could eat after it came off the table. This bread taken from God's presence was "in a manner common" (v. 5). God's king had been rejected. The showbread presented the true Israel in Christ to God — so what value could it still have in God's sight? So David could treat this bread as ordinary. Sovereign grace rose above legal ordinances. Feeding David and his followers mattered more than preserving what had become old.
- God first — the bread is "most holy" because it stood a full week before God on the pure table; no priest ate until that food had pleased Him.
- Then the priests — God gives the bread away: "it shall be for Aaron and his sons." Everyone who belongs to Christ stands in that priestly family.
- In a holy place — no one enjoys this food on common ground; we taste it only in the conscious presence of God.
- Israel pictured — the twelve loaves show Christ joined to the twelve tribes, and that memorial can never perish, whatever the nation looks like from outside.
- Grace above rule — when God's king was rejected and hungry, sovereign grace rose above legal ordinances and fed him with the holy bread.