HISTORICITY OF THE MOSAIC TABEENACLE. 113 



together. It is granted that there must have been from the 

 beginning a tent of some kind as a protection and habitation 

 for the ark. But the tent must have corresponded in some 

 degree with the character of the ark, and if this was the 

 beautiful, gold-covered object which we have seen reason to 

 believe that it was, in other words, if it agreed with the 

 description given of it in Exodus — it is highly probable that 

 the tabernacle sheltering it would have some degree of 

 splendour also ; would be a habitation worthy in dignity and 

 significance of the Jehovah whose ark it was. The counter- 

 theory that the ark was originally simply a fetish-chest, with 

 perhaps two meteoric stones representing the deity, I dismiss as. 

 a figment of rationalistic imagination contrary to all historical 

 evidence. The ark had a well-known history ; men could verify 

 what it was like at the time when David and Solomon brought 

 it up to Zion ; when Deuteronomy was written ; in the age when 

 the temple was destroyed ; and we are on the safest ground 

 when we affirm that Exodus correctly describes it, and with 

 it the tabernacle that enshrined it. 



This brings us back to the primary descriptions in Exodus, 

 and to the question of their historical worth. Di*. Driver and 

 other writers say flatly that the tabernacle could not have been 

 historical, because, apart from the costliness and skill implied 

 in its construction, the descriptions are " marked by omissions 

 and obscurities " which indicate that " they are not the 

 working directions upon which a fabric, such as is described, 

 could be actually constructed " (Exodus, p. 427). It may be 

 sufficient to put in opposition to this the opinion of an expert 

 working architect like Mr. Eergusson, who as the result of his 

 minute study of the subject, declared, " It seems to me clear 

 that it must have been written by some one who had seen the 

 tabernacle standing. No one could have worked it out in such 

 detail without ocular demonstration of the way in which the 

 parts were put together " (cited in Speaker s Commentary on 

 Exodus!' p. 379, cf. Art. on " Temple " in Smith's D.B.) Stress 

 is laid upon the fact (Driver, Kennedy, etc.) that the bulk and 

 weight of the materials of the tabernacle (boards, bars, sockets, 

 pillars, etc.) were such that they could not be transported in 

 the six covered wagons offered by the princes (^sTumbers vii, 

 2 ff".). We need not suppose, however, that these gift-wagons 

 were the only means of transport at the disposal of the Levites 

 for this purpose {ef. Keil, in loc.). 



The most plausible critical objection, to my mind, to the 

 liistoricity of the tabernacle is that drawn from the difference 



I 



