Don’t laugh at me, long time Bible readers. I only just noticed for the first time that in the days when Solomon had his first vision of God, the ark of the covenant and the tabernacle of the Lord, also called the tent of meeting, were in different places. David had brought the ark into Jerusalem and had pitched another tent for it there, but the original tabernacle and the bronze altar made by Bezalel in the days of Moses remained at Gibeon.
I think we can safely say separating the ark of the covenant from the Holy of Holies, where it belonged, was a fairly egregious breach of the revealed will of God. Somehow, nobody seemed to notice.
Missing the Obvious
I’m not entirely sure how I overlooked this fact during previous readings of 2 Chronicles 1. The writer of that chapter has taken pains to make it as plain as day. Wayne Turner has documented how the ark and tabernacle parted ways here, so I won’t reinvent the wheel by reproducing his research into the ark’s movements from the time Israel conquered Canaan, but we know the ark was in the tabernacle at Shiloh when God spoke from it to Samuel as a boy. Samuel grew to maturity, established as a prophet of the Lord, and still the ark was in the tabernacle at Shiloh.
Then in 1 Samuel 4, as Israel went out to battle the Philistines, its superstitious elders imprudently
decided to bring the ark out to war to save Israel from its enemies.
I suspect Samuel was not consulted, as I doubt he would have agreed,
but the scripture does not say. Anyway, this innovation went very badly. 30,000
Israelites died in battle, and the Philistines captured the ark for
seven months, passing it around like a hot potato from city to city as
their fortunes did a
Never Go Back
What I did not register is that Israel never returned the ark to its place behind the veil in the Holy of Holies. The original tabernacle, brazen altar and all, moved from Shiloh to Nob and finally to Gibeon. Meanwhile, the ark went to Beth-shemesh, then to Kiriath-jearim for twenty years, where it remained until David decided to move it to Jerusalem and built a tent for it there. Had it been returned to its home in the tabernacle, where it belonged, at least one man’s fate might have been very different.
When Solomon wanted to seek God at the beginning of his reign, he went to the tabernacle at the high place in Gibeon, since he intended to offer burnt offerings. Burnt offerings require an altar, and that’s where the altar was at the time. Solomon would eventually build the first temple in Jerusalem, where he would restore the ark to its rightful place in the new Holy of Holies.
For over twenty years in between these events, the ark and tabernacle resided roughly seven miles apart. The king was oblivious to the offense. The priests were silent. The prophets had no comment.
Ignorance of God’s Will
However, the matter of where the ark belonged was a huge issue. The writer of 1 Samuel refers to “the Lord of hosts, who is enthroned on the cherubim”. The ark was believed to be the earthly, visual representation of God’s throne. It did not belong on public display, but behind the tabernacle veil. Even when carried by the priests, the ark had three separate coverings to keep it from being seen.
In bringing the ark from Kiriath-jearim to Jerusalem, David showed himself as ignorant of the laws associated with transporting the ark as any Philistine. Moreover, no priest or prophet of his acquaintance bothered to correct him, which seems a highly unlikely circumstance if the commands of Moses had been on their front burners. Manifestly, they were not. Thus, Uzzah died because an ox stumbled, and he unthinkingly put out his hand to steady the ark, and David became afraid of the Lord because of it.
This need never have happened. God’s will concerning the transportation of the ark of the covenant was fully revealed to Israel in his law. It was built right into the design of the ark, which had four gold rings attached to its feet, through which passed acacia wood poles overlaid with gold. God told Moses, “You shall put the poles into the rings on the sides of the ark to carry the ark by them. The poles shall remain in the rings of the ark; they shall not be taken from it.” That’s fairly unambiguous.
Thus the priests carried the ark throughout the conquest of Canaan until the tabernacle reached its long-term destination. Transporting the ark on a cart was a trick adopted unthinkingly from the Philistines, who dared not attempt to carry it and wanted it gone as expeditiously as they could possibly get rid of it.
My Lack of Education Hasn’t Hurt Me None
How does widespread ignorance like this happen? Rather easily, it seems. We can put it down to a lack of education on the part of the average Israelite concerning the Law of Moses, but that doesn’t hold water. Moses wasn’t the only Israelite who could read and write. The law itself implies every priest could do it, and that average husbands could manage the basics of comprehension and composition. Historians may ramble on all they like about “illiterate Israelites”, but many Israelites could read and write. Concerning the words God commanded Israel, Moses said, “You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”
How much writing can you get on a gate or a doorpost? Probably nowhere near the entire law. Probably not anything to do with the ark or the tabernacle. Perhaps no more than the Ten Commandments, which summarized the law. But how much is not the issue. The point is that the law itself assumes literacy in large numbers of those it governed. Moses did not direct his command to “write” only to scribes and priests, but to the people more generally. He commences it with, “Hear, O Israel.”
God never intended his law to be buried in the Levitical archives, but spread abroad throughout the land, written down and talked about on a daily basis.
God’s Will Unobserved
It’s abundantly evident these commands to circulate God’s word were not generally observed. Not for long at least. Plenty of Israelites could read and write. They just didn’t bother to read and write about anything important to the Lord.
Here, perhaps, is the lesson for us in all this. When we drift away from the teaching of scripture in our local churches, it is not because the will of God is the slightest bit difficult for us to access or know, but because we make insufficient effort to refresh our memories by reading and studying it. Many churches, even whole denominations, habitually entrust the knowledge of scripture to a modern-day “priestly caste” of educated men. If they do not tell us how we ought to conduct ourselves, many of us would not have a clue. Moreover, no small number of those who teach God’s people week after week have never questioned or restudied for themselves the things explained (and explained away) by their professors in seminary.
Ignorance is both easy and incremental. Every believer in every generation has a responsibility to battle ignorance by taking advantage of the resources the Lord has made available to him, and no generation in history has had more of these than we do.
Let us then take care how we order our gatherings. We would not want the Lord to have to get our attention the same way he had to get David’s.
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