Moreover thou shalt make the tabernacle with ten curtains of fine twined linen, and blue, and purple, and scarlet: with cherubims of cunning work shalt thou make them.
Parallel translations
- WEB “Moreover you shall make the tabernacle with ten curtains; of fine twined linen, and blue, and purple, and scarlet, with cherubim. The work of the skillful workman you shall make them.
- BSB “You are to construct the tabernacle itself with ten curtains of finely spun linen, each with blue, purple, and scarlet yarn, and cherubim skillfully worked into them.
- NKJV “Moreover you shall make the tabernacle with ten curtains of fine woven linen and blue, purple, and scarlet thread; with artistic designs of cherubim you shall weave them.
- NASB “Moreover, you shall make the tabernacle with ten curtains of fine twisted linen and violet, purple, and scarlet material; you shall make them with cherubim, the work of a skilled embroiderer.
- NLT “Make the Tabernacle from ten curtains of finely woven linen. Decorate the curtains with blue, purple, and scarlet thread and with skillfully embroidered cherubim.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
The tabernacle proper was to be made of ten richly woven curtains of fine linen in blue, purple, and scarlet, embroidered with cherubim. Its beauty and the cherubim signaled God's holy, heavenly dwelling.
Overview
These ten skillfully crafted curtains formed the innermost covering of God's dwelling, their colors and craftsmanship marking it as royal and sacred. The cherubim woven into them recalled the guardians of God's presence, as at Eden's gate (Genesis 3:24). The whole structure pictured God dwelling among His people, a foretaste of the incarnation, when the Word 'tabernacled' among us (John 1:14).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 20
- Exod 36:8–19And every wise hearted man among them that wrought the work of the tabernacle made ten curtains of fine twined linen, and blue, and purple, and scarlet: with cherubims of cunning work made he them.
- Exod 26:36And thou shalt make an hanging for the door of the tent, of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen, wrought with needlework.
- Exod 26:31And thou shalt make a vail of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen of cunning work: with cherubims shall it be made:
- Exod 36:35And he made a vail of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen: with cherubims made he it of cunning work.
- Exod 25:18And thou shalt make two cherubims of gold, of beaten work shalt thou make them, in the two ends of the mercy seat.
- Rev 21:3And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.
- John 2:21But he spake of the temple of his body.
- Heb 9:9Which was a figure for the time then present, in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices, that could not make him that did the service perfect, as pertaining to the conscience;
- Heb 9:23–24It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.
- Exod 25:8And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them.
- 1 Chr 21:29For the tabernacle of the LORD, which Moses made in the wilderness, and the altar of the burnt offering, were at that season in the high place at Gibeon.
- John 1:14And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.
- Exod 35:6And blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine linen, and goats’ hair,
- Heb 8:2A minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man.
- Exod 40:2On the first day of the first month shalt thou set up the tabernacle of the tent of the congregation.
- 1 Chr 17:1Now it came to pass, as David sat in his house, that David said to Nathan the prophet, Lo, I dwell in an house of cedars, but the ark of the covenant of the LORD remaineth under curtains.
- Rev 19:8And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints.
- Exod 40:17–19And it came to pass in the first month in the second year, on the first day of the month, that the tabernacle was reared up.
- Exod 25:4And blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine linen, and goats’ hair,
- Exod 35:35Them hath he filled with wisdom of heart, to work all manner of work, of the engraver, and of the cunning workman, and of the embroiderer, in blue, and in purple, in scarlet, and in fine linen, and of the weaver, even of them that do any work, and of those that devise cunning work.
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Christ at the center
The Passover lamb whose blood turns away death, the exodus through the sea, the manna, the rock, and the tabernacle where God dwells with his people all foreshadow Jesus — our Passover, our redemption, the bread from heaven, and God-with-us in the flesh.
How Exodus 26:1 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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