Exodus 40 Study Notes
Share
40:1-15 The Lord gave instructions for setting up the tabernacle.
40:1-2 The first day of the first month, in other words New Year’s day, was appropriate for inaugurating use of the new structure. Since the Israelites had left Egypt at the middle of the first month of the year (12:1-11), the tabernacle was to be erected two weeks before the first anniversary of their exodus, at the start of the month that marked the beginning of their second year of freedom (40:17), and nine months after their arrival at Mount Sinai (19:1).
40:12-15 A full description of installing Aaron and his sons as priests appears in Lv 8-9.
40:16-33 Moses complied with the Lord’s instructions. The phrase just as the Lord had commanded Moses/him occurs eight times here. The perfect obedience of Israel and Moses in chaps. 39 and 40 is a momentary high point, in contrast with what went on earlier (chap. 32) and what will happen later (e.g., Nm 14).
40:17 The first month of the second year refers to the start of the Israelites’ second year after they had left Egypt.
40:34-35 This visible display, in the form of a cloud, showed that the Lord was consecrating the tabernacle by his presence, as he had promised (25:8; 29:44-46). What he had described to Moses before the Israelites made the golden calf was taking place on the basis of the Lord’s character and Moses’s intercession. The Lord was revealing himself to his redeemed people at this meeting place (1Kg 8:10-11,56-60; 9:3; Mt 17:1-8; Mk 9:2-8; Lk 9:28-36; Jn 1:14,18; 2Co 3:18; 4:6; Eph 1:17-18; Rv 21:3).
mizbeach
| Hebrew pronunciation | [miz BAY akh] |
| CSB translation | altar |
| Uses in Exodus | 59 |
| Uses in the OT | 403 |
| Focus passage | Exodus 40:5-6,10,26,29-30,32-33 |
Mizbeach is related to the verb zabach (“sacrifice”) and the noun zebach (“sacrifice”). Use of altars to present sacrifices to God is as ancient as Noah (Gn 8:20). Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob built altars at places where God manifested himself to them in some way. Exodus 20:24-26 gives instructions for building “an earthen altar for me . . . in every place where I cause my name to be remembered.” Forbidden is the use of cutting tools on a stone altar, and steps are also disallowed. The tabernacle and sanctuary had more elaborate altars of two types. The outdoor sacrificial altar was large and bronze-plated. It probably required a ramp to mount and there were horns at its four corners. The indoor incense altar was small and gold-plated. Ezekiel pictures an indoor altar that was made of wood (Ezk 41:22). At least one biblical altar is purely memorial (Jos 22:21-29). The tabernacle and sanctuary altars were portable.
40:36-38 Exodus ends with a summary of what was ahead. The Lord guided the Israelites on their journey by means of the movement of the cloud, as he had done before their sin with the golden calf. Now the cloud that the Israelites had seen above Mount Sinai was associated with the tabernacle, a portable dwelling place for the Lord. He would dwell among his covenant people on their way to the land that he had promised them.