by
Rabbi Hirsch Geffen
(1879 - 1977)
The Ark of the Covenant contained the most
sacred monument of the Jewish, or of any other, religion. At the east end of every synagogue, the Jews
have a chest which they call Aron, or
Ark, in which they lock the Pentateuch, written on parchment. As the Ark was the emblem of the peace and
alliance God made with His people, it was put under the shadow of the wings of
the cherubim.
The Ark was a symbol of the divine presence and protection of the
Israelites, and a pledge of the stability of the theocracy, so long as the
people adhered to articles of the Covenant which the Ark contained.
It is perpetually called the Ark of the Covenant, with a primary
preference to the Covenant vouchsafed by God to Noah, with a secondary
reference to the same covenant renewed in a particular manner with the seed of
Abraham. Hence, in the Tabernacle, it
was surmounted by the mercy seat and the cherubim; as the mercy of God rested
on the diluvian ark, and as His providence guarded it from surrounding dangers,
the Holy Ark was to remind the people of the most signal instance of Divine
mercy and judgement.
The sacred chest was made of shittim wood, or the timber of thorny shrub, which grew in great profusion in many
parts of the wilderness where the Israelites were directed to encamp. It is supposed to have been the wood of the
Burning Bush, which was once held in such veneration by Royal Arch Chapters. This timber has a close grain
and consequently capable of receiving a beautiful polish, and like the cedar,
from its fragrance, was exempt from the attacks of worms and rottenness. Hence the Ark endured, without losing any of
the specific virtues, from the time of its construction in the wilderness until
the demolition of the Temple by Nebuchadnezzar, a period of nine hundred years.
It was made by Aholiab and Bezaleel, under the direction of Moses. Some say there were two arks. In Siphre, it says
that the ark which moved in advance of the camps was the one that contained the
two broken tables. Rabbi Judah Ben
Lakish held the opinion that Israel carried two arks in the wilderness, one
made by Moses previous to that of Bezaleel, in which he put the broken tables,
and the other made by Bezaleel after the construction of the Tabernacle, in
which the new ones were placed.
The Ark was overlaid with plates of gold, and surrounded by a golden rim
or cornice, which was denominated a crown,
in reference to the ornament that was worn by monarchs as a symbol of their
dignity. This fillet of gold served also
to support the mercy seat, which constituted the lid or the cover of the
Ark. The cherubim being represented with
their faces toward each other, and their eyes fixed upon the covering of the
Ark, denoted they were the guardians of the Law enclosed within it. Their wings being extended was symbolical of
their readiness to fly wherever they might be commanded to execute the Divine
will. Their faces being turned toward
each other, showed their mutual consent and cooperation.
The Ark with its propitiatory was not only an emblem of peace and
alliance between God and his people, but was also the resting place of the Shechinah. In this Ark all heavenly virtues entered, and
from thence imparted, not only as an oracle to foretell future events, but also
to confer present benefits. The mercy
seat was the oracle of the Jews. The Ark
was also the emblem of immortality, because shittim
wood is Acacia, which is the evergreen, the symbol of immortality that acacia
is a kind of mimosa, and a native of Arabia.
The thorns are twined, as in many other species of this genus, and
nearly equal to the leaves in length; the leaves are repeatedly winged; the
spikes of white flowers proceed from the bottom of the leaves; the wood is of
an excellent quality, and never decays – the true representation of
immortality.
Solomon did not make a new Ark, which was the only utensil belonging to
the tabernacle he did not reconstruct with greater splendour; but this he was
forbidden to touch. He therefore let it
remain, and placed two other cherubim for ornament. At the destruction of the first Temple, the
true Ark of the Covenant was lost. But
King Josiah, some assume, put the Ark in a vault underground, which, Solomon
foreseeing this destruction, had caused purposely to be built for the
preserving of it. And there is to prove it
this text from 2 Chronicles 35:3, where Josiah commanded the Levites to put the
Holy Ark into the house which Solomon did build, where it hath lain ever since,
even to this day.
(Adapted from an article from The Royal Arch Mason, Volume VIII, Number
1, Spring 1964, pages 26 – 27.)
No comments:
Post a Comment