also simply to show that the law, which enjoined that the ark should merely preserve the stone tables of the covenant (Exo 25:16; Exo 40:20), had not been departed from in the lapse of time. אשׁר before כּרת is not a pronoun, but a conjunction: when, from the time that, as in Deu 11:6, etc. כּרת without בּרית, signifying the conclusion of a covenant, as in 1Sa 20:16; 1Sa 22:8, etc. Horeb, the general name for the place where the law was given, instead of the more definite name Sinai, as in Deuteronomy (see the Comm. on Exo 19:1-2).[1]
Verses 10-11
At the dedication of the tabernacle the glory of Jehovah in the cloud filled the sanctuary, so that Moses could not enter (Exo 40:34-35); and so was it now. When the priests came out of the sanctuary, after putting the ark of the covenant in its place, the cloud filled the house of Jehovah, so that the priests could not stand to minister. The signification of this fact was the same on both occasions. The cloud, as the visible symbol of the gracious presence of God, filled the temple, as a sign that Jehovah the covenant-God had entered into it, and had chosen it as the scene of His gracious manifestation in Israel. By the inability of the priests to stand, we are not to understand that the cloud drove them away; for it was not till the priests had come out that it filled the temple. It simply means that they could not remain in the Holy Place to perform service, say to offer an incense-offering upon the altar to consecrate it, just as sacrifices were offered upon the altar of burnt-offering after the dedicatory prayer (1Ki 8:62, 1Ki 8:63).[2].
- ↑ The statement in Heb 9:4, to the effect that the pot of manna and Aaron's rod that budded were also to be found in the ark, which is at variance with this verse, and which the earlier commentators endeavoured to bring into harmony with it by forced methods of different kinds, simply rests upon an erroneous interpretation of העדוּת לפני in Exo 16:33-34, and Num 17:10, which had become traditional among the Jews; since this merely affirms that the objects mentioned had been deposited in front of the testimony, i.e., in front of the ark which contained the testimony, and not within it, as the Jews supposed. - Still less are De Wette and others warranted in deducing from this verse an argument against the existence of the Mosaic book of the law in the time of Solomon, inasmuch as, according to the precept in Deu 31:26, the book of the law was not to be kept in the ark, but by the side of it, or near it.
- ↑ Bertheau's opinion (on 2Ch 5:14), that the priests could not remain in the hall and in front of it on account of the cloud, namely, “the cloud of smoke, which, ascending from the sacrifices burned upon the altar of burnt-offering, concealed the glory of the Lord,” is decidedly erroneous. For the cloud which hindered the priest from performing the service was, according to the distinct words of the text, the cloud which filled the house; and the explanatory clause, “for the glory of the Lord filled the house of Jehovah,” indicates in the most unmistakeable terms that it was the vehicle of the glory of God, and therefore was no a cloud of smoke formed by the burning sacrifices, but the cloud in which God manifested His invisible being to His people, - the very same cloud in which Jehovah was to appear above the Capporeth, when the high priest entered the Most Holy Place on the day of atonement, so that he was commanded not to enter it at all times, and, when he entered, to cover the Capporeth with the cloud of the burning incense (Lev 16:2, Lev 16:13
