the sanctuary to make it withal." And so the work of construction proceeded. "According to all that the Lord commanded Moses, so the children of Israel made all the work, and Moses did look upon all the work, and behold they had done it as the Lord commanded, even SO had they done it. And Moses blessed them" (Ex. xxxix. 42).

On the first day of the first month of the second year after Israel's departure out of Egypt was the tabernacle set up and furnished with all its appurtenances. It will be our duty, in ensuing chapters, to consider the peculiarities of the structure, its furniture, and the nature of the service conducted in it; with respect to the concealed meanings to which we are admitted in the writings of the apostles. They form in their totality what Paul styles "the form of knowledge and of the truth in the law.” Their indications are plain. They show the terrible majesty and holiness of God, and the impossibility of man saving himself except by strict and reverential and loving conformity to His appointments. These things are revealed in the Gospel; but they become more striking when contemplated over again in the pictures and symbols of the Mosaic example and shadow of heavenly things.

Nothing enables us more powerfully to feel that the professing Christian world around is as far astray from the righteousness of God as ever were Israel, His own people. Be it ours, to try to fulfil the part shadowed for the sons of God in the Mosaic ritual.

Every true son and daughter of the Lord God Almighty is a miniature tabernacle or temple, as saith Paul, “Ye are the temple of the living God. If any man defile the temple of God, him will God destroy." Our minds should be a holy place lined with the gold of a tried faith, in which the one Christ-sacrifice for sins is continually offered, and the smoke of grateful incense, kindled by the fire of the altar, continually ascending, while deeply secreted in the innermost ark of the heart is the law of God in its remembrance, the scriptures in their affectionate study, the institutions of divine appointment in continual reverence, and the bread of God in its continual eating. Thus shall we be the sons of God in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, misunderstood by all, hated by many, despised and rejected of men, persevering in a bitter probation that will end at last in life and light and joy everlasting, when "the tabernacle of God shall be with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away."

I

CHAPTER XII.-ALLEGORICAL TRANSACTIONS AT SINAL.

N the establishment of the Mosaic economy, there are one or two other general features of the work deserving of notice before proceeding to the consideration of the tabernacle in detail. The first is the fact that besides being shown the pattern on the Mount, Moses received very full specifications, which are twice set forth, first in a "thou shalt make " series, and then in an “and he made" series. He was fully informed by word of mouth of what was to be done in the construction, erection, and dedication of the tabernacle. And these detailed specifications occupy seven long chapters (Ex. xxv.-xxxi.). They are so full and complete, in the first instance, that one would naturally have supposed that it would have been unnecessary afterwards to do more in the way of record than the addition of a brief statement to the effect that the work was performed according to all these directions. Instead of this, a very particular account is given in chapters xxxvi.-xxxix. of every step in the execution of the work— almost corresponding item by item with the specifications. The two accounts are in many particulars nearly identical. The difference is chiefly in the tense of the verb. The one reads, "thou shalt make" this, that, and the other; and the other, "and he made" this, that, and the other.

Pondering whether there can be anything in this apparently needless duplication of details, we may note the Divine interpretation of doubling a matter in the case of Pharaoh's dreams: "For that the dream was doubled unto Pharaoh twice, it is because the thing is established by God, and God will shortly bring it to pass" (Gen. xli. 32). We have already seen that the tabernacle was a figure for the time then present,” a shadow of good things to come therefore a prophecy in enigmatical form. It had reference to something that "God will shortly bring to pass." Therefore the thing, as a matter of record, was "established" in being doubled. It is the principle observed in the enactment that matters of judgment should not be decided except at the mouth of two witnesses.

There is also an observable analogy in the two sets of specifications to the two phases in which all Divine procedure towards man appears first plan, then fulfilment; first command, then obedience; first prophecy, then history; first the Divine purpose unfolded in the

Gospel, and illustrated in the prophetic Scriptures; and then its realisation in the setting up of the kingdom in due time, when there will probably be as deliberate an execution of the programme and as complete a rehearsal of the facts achieved as there was in the building of the tabernacle in harmony with the fully-recorded preliminary specifications.

In agreement with this idea, we have to note the character of the incidents that occurred between the promulgation of the original specifications, and their full carrying out by Bezalee!, Aholiab, and their fellow workmen: these are quite striking, and seem to correspond in the main with the circumstances that have marked the development of the antitypical work.

"When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down out of the mount," that is, during what we may call the "thou-shalt-make stage, they assembled in a mutinous mind before Aaron, and called upon him to make gods whom they might see and serve in place of the invisible God pressed upon their attention by their vanished leader. Aaron, the high priest, intimidated by their clamour, complied with their request; and they gave themselves over to idolatry, and were found in the act at the return of Moses. The cause of the apostacy was the temporary absence of their divinely-appointed head, and the development of apostacy took place under the divinely-appointed priesthood. We may see in this the germinal foreshadowing of the course of events among both Jews and Gentiles. As regards Israel, it was after the death of Moses, and under the leadership of the priests, that Israel abandoned the law: as regards the Gentiles, it has been during the absence of the Christ, and under the leadership of the religious heads of the people, that the community has turned away from the truth and given themselves over to the worship of the beast and his image.

When Mcses came down from the mount, at the end of the forty days, he found the people in the full tide of their apostate worship, and was so fired with anger at their folly that he flung out of his hands the divinely-written stone-tables which he had received from the hand of God on the mount, and unsheathed the avenging sword by the hand of the Levites, to the destruction of a multitude of the apostates. Whether we apply this to the first or second manifestations of the prophet like unto Moses, we see a parallel. At his first coming, he found Israel in a state of complete departure from the law of the Lord, and fulminated in terrible wrath against them, both by word of mouth and deeds of judgment, expelling a sacrilegious crowd from the temple courts with a whip, and afterwards chastising the nation sorely

.

by the sword of the Romans. Concurrently with this outburst of indignation, he flung the law of Moses out of his hands in nailing it to his cross, and taking it out of the way as a ground of acceptance with God. At his second manifestation, he finds the professing Gentiles in a similar state of apostacy and idolatry, and flames with a similar vengeance against "them that know not God and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ." At the same time, he flings the gospel invitation to the ground in withdrawing it from further operative force among mankind, and "shutting the door" against all further admission to the kingdom and glory of God.

After Moses had chastised the people, he said, "Ye have sinned a great sin, and now I will go up unto the Lord: peradventure, I will make an atonement for your sin." And Moses returned unto the Lord, and said, "Oh, this people have sinned a great sin, and have made them gods of gold. Yet, now, if Thou wilt forgive their sin" (Ex. xxxii. 30-31). Here appears to be the foreshadowing of the ascension of Christ to make intercession for the transgressors. (Isa. liii. 12.) The parallel at his second coming would be found on his acting as a priest on his throne when the kingdom has been established after the world has been taught righteousness by judgment (Zech. vi. 13; Ezek. xlv. 17; Isa. xxvi. 9; Rev. xv. 4).

Between the "thou-shalt-make" and the "and-he-made records of the Mosaic work, Moses was permitted to have a special vision of the glory of the Lord. The Lord had said to him, "Thou hast found grace in my sight." Moses responded, "I beseech thee show me thy glory" (Ex. xxxiii. 17-18). And the Lord granted him his request, saying, "There is a place by me and thou shalt stand upon a rock and it shall come to pass while my glory passeth by that I will put thee in a cleft of the rock and will cover thee with my hand while I pass by; and I will take away mine hand and thou shalt see my back parts, but my face shall not be seen. Be ready in the morning and come up in the morning unto Mount Sinai, and present thyself there to me on the top of the Mount. And no man shall come up with thee." After the impressive manifestation, in whose presence Moses made haste and bowed his head towards the earth and worshipped, Moses remained on the mount forty days and forty nights, at the end of which, on descending, Israel were afraid of the brightness of his face-of which Moses was unaware-and retired from him. Even Aaron and the elders stood at a distance. Moses beckoned them to come near that he might communicate to them what had passed on the top of the mount. They represented to him that they could not come near unless he put something on to dim the brightness of his face.

So Moses put a veil on his face. Then Aaron and the chief men drew near, and afterwards the congregation returned, and he rehearsed to them all that the Lord had spoken to him, keeping the veil on his face all the time. When he had done speaking, the people dispersed and “When he went in before the Lord to speak with Him, he took the veil off." When he came out he put it on again, every time he had occasion to communicate with the people (Ex. xxxiv. 34).

In these interesting and singular circumstances, we probably have both history and prophecy from the modern point of view-that is, history which was (concealed) prophecy at the time of the transactions but has since become plain accomplished history; and prophecy which remains prophecy of events yet to come.

The historical counterpart may be seen in the day of Jesus(dropped in between the dispensation of promise in the hands of the prophets, and the dispensation of performance in the hands of the glorified saints). To Jesus, the Father bore testimony of his good pleasure, "Thou art my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased." Jesus prayed, "Glorify thou me with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was." It had been, in anticipation, written long before: "Sit thou on My right hand." So after his resurrection, "he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God" (Mark xvi. 19), shortly after which, Stephen "saw the glory of God and Jesus standing on the right hand of God" (Acts vii. 55). And there, ever since that time, Jesus has remained bathed and steeped and transfused with the glory of God. The prophetic part would be connected with the return of Moses with face aglow to the children of Israel. If the face of mortal Moses was so affected by contact with the divine glory on the top of Mount Sinai that it shone with a lustre too strong for the comfort of those to whom he had afterwards to speak, how must it be with the immortal Christ on his return from heaven? When Saul, of Tarsus, saw him on the way to Damascus, the light of his person was "above the brightness of the sun." It is probable that as Moses was unaware of the dazzle on his face, but conscious only of calm, piercing power of eye, so Christ, in the effulgent splendour of the new nature, may feel chiefly the glad, strong comfort of the garment of praise that comes with the mantling of the Eternal Spirit, and may not at first realize so fully the over-powering effect of his glory on the poor, blinking mortals to whom he will address himself at his coming. It may be necessary, as in the case of the typical Moses, that he impose some restraint on the out-shining of Spirit power during his intercourse with mortal men. This would be in harmony with the type and with Dr. Thomas's rendering of Zech. xiv. 6-7: "The splendid ones draw