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Hebrews 9:2-4

For a tabernacle was prepared. In the first part were the lamp stand, the table, and the show bread; which is called the Holy Place. After the second veil was the tabernacle which is called the Holy of Holies, having a golden altar of incense, and the ark of the covenant overlaid on all sides with gold, in which was a golden pot holding the manna, Aaron’s rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant;

World English Bible · Public Domain
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Now indeed even the first covenant had ordinances of divine service and an earthly sanctuary. For a tabernacle was prepared. In the first part were the lamp stand, the table, and the show bread; which is called the Holy Place. After the second veil was the tabernacle which is called the Holy of Holies, having a golden altar of incense, and the ark of the covenant overlaid on all sides with gold, in which was a golden pot holding the manna, Aaron’s rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant; and above it cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat, of which things we can’t speak now in detail. Now these things having been thus prepared, the priests go in continually into the first tabernacle, accomplishing the services, but into the second the high priest alone, once in the year, not without blood, which he offers for himself, and for the errors of the people. The Holy Spirit is indicating this, that the way into the Holy Place wasn’t yet revealed while the first tabernacle was still standing. This is a symbol of the present age, where gifts and sacrifices are offered that are incapable, concerning the conscience, of making the worshiper perfect, being only (with meats and drinks and various washings) fleshly ordinances, imposed until a time of reformation.

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Parallel Translations

  • WEB World English Bible

    For a tabernacle was prepared. In the first part were the lamp stand, the table, and the show bread; which is called the Holy Place.

    After the second veil was the tabernacle which is called the Holy of Holies,

    having a golden altar of incense, and the ark of the covenant overlaid on all sides with gold, in which was a golden pot holding the manna, Aaron’s rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant;

  • TYNDALE Tyndale New Testament (1534)

    For there was a fore tabernacle made wherin was the candlesticke and the table and the shewe breed which is called wholy.

    But with in the seconde vayle was ther a tabernacle which is called holiest of all

    which had the golden senser and the arcke of the testament overlayde round about with golde wherin was the golden pot with manna and Aarons rodde that spronge and the tables of the testament.

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  • GNV Geneva Bible (1599)

    For the first Tabernacle was made, wherein was the candlesticke, and the table, and the shewebread, which Tabernacle is called the Holy places.

    And after the seconde vaile was the Tabernacle, which is called the Holiest of all,

    Which had the golden censer, and the Arke of the Testament ouerlayde rounde about with golde, wherein the golden pot, which had Manna, was, and Aarons rod that had budded, and the tables of the Testament.

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Examined in Scripture Analysis

Contradictions (1)

Questions where the Bible appears to say two different things, with the passages on each side set together.

  • What was in the Ark of the Covenant?

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Cross-references (46)

  • Numbers 17:10 (v4) Yahweh said to Moses, “Put back the rod of Aaron before the covenant, to be kept for a token against the children of rebellion; that you…
  • Exodus 40:4 (v2) You shall bring in the table, and set in order the things that are on it. You shall bring in the lamp stand, and light its lamps.
  • Exodus 26:33 (vv2, 4) You shall hang up the veil under the clasps, and shall bring the ark of the covenant in there within the veil. The veil shall separate the…
  • Exodus 40:3 (vv3–4) You shall put the ark of the covenant in it, and you shall screen the ark with the veil.
  • Leviticus 16:12 (v4) He shall take a censer full of coals of fire from off the altar before Yahweh, and two handfuls of sweet incense beaten small, and bring it…
Show all 44 cross-references
  • Leviticus 24:5-8 (v2) “You shall take fine flour, and bake twelve cakes of it: two tenths of an ephah shall be in one cake. You shall set them in two rows, six…
  • 2 Chronicles 5:10 (v4) There was nothing in the ark except the two tablets which Moses put at Horeb, when Yahweh made a covenant with the children of Israel, when…
  • Exodus 26:31-33 (v3) “You shall make a veil of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen, with cherubim. It shall be the work of a skillful workman.…
  • Exodus 16:32-34 (v4) Moses said, “This is the thing which Yahweh has commanded, ‘Let an omer-full of it be kept throughout your generations, that they may see…
  • Exodus 26:35 (v2) You shall set the table outside the veil, and the lamp stand opposite the table on the side of the tabernacle toward the south. You shall…
  • Exodus 34:29 (v4) When Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of the covenant in Moses’ hand, when he came down from the mountain, Moses…
  • Exodus 40:20-21 (v4) He took and put the covenant into the ark, and set the poles on the ark, and put the mercy seat above on the ark. He brought the ark into…
  • Exodus 40:21 (v3) He brought the ark into the tabernacle, and set up the veil of the screen, and screened the ark of the covenant, as Yahweh commanded Moses.
  • Numbers 17:5 (v4) It shall happen that the rod of the man whom I shall choose shall bud. I will make the murmurings of the children of Israel, which they…
  • Matthew 27:51 (v3) Behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two from the top to the bottom. The earth quaked and the rocks were split.
  • Exodus 40:18-20 (v2) Moses raised up the tabernacle, and laid its sockets, and set up its boards, and put in its bars, and raised up its pillars. He spread the…
  • Exodus 40:22-24 (v2) He put the table in the Tent of Meeting, on the north side of the tabernacle, outside of the veil. He set the bread in order on it before…
  • Numbers 17:8 (v4) On the next day, Moses went into the Tent of the Testimony; and behold, Aaron’s rod for the house of Levi had sprouted, budded, produced…
  • Deuteronomy 10:2-5 (v4) I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets which you broke, and you shall put them in the ark.” So I made an ark…
  • 1 Kings 7:50 (v4) the cups, the snuffers, the basins, the spoons, and the fire pans, of pure gold; and the hinges, both for the doors of the inner house, the…
  • 1 Kings 8:6 (v3) The priests brought in the ark of Yahweh’s covenant to its place, into the inner sanctuary of the house, to the most holy place, even under…
  • 1 Kings 8:9 (v4) There was nothing in the ark except the two stone tablets which Moses put there at Horeb, when Yahweh made a covenant with the children of…
  • 1 Kings 8:21 (v4) There I have set a place for the ark, in which is Yahweh’s covenant, which he made with our fathers, when he brought them out of the land…
  • Hebrews 9:8 (v3) The Holy Spirit is indicating this, that the way into the Holy Place wasn’t yet revealed while the first tabernacle was still standing.
  • Revelation 8:3 (v4) Another angel came and stood over the altar, having a golden censer. Much incense was given to him, that he should add it to the prayers of…
  • Exodus 25:8-9 (v2) Let them make me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them. According to all that I show you, the pattern of the tabernacle, and the pattern…
  • Exodus 25:10-22 (v4) “They shall make an ark of acacia wood. Its length shall be two and a half cubits, its width a cubit and a half, and a cubit and a half its…
  • Exodus 25:23–26:30 (v2) “You shall make a table of acacia wood. Its length shall be two cubits, and its width a cubit, and its height one and a half cubits. You…
  • Exodus 29:1 (v2) “This is the thing that you shall do to them to make them holy, to minister to me in the priest’s office: take one young bull and two rams…
  • Exodus 29:35 (v2) “You shall do so to Aaron and to his sons, according to all that I have commanded you. You shall consecrate them seven days.
  • Exodus 30:1-5 (v4) “You shall make an altar to burn incense on. You shall make it of acacia wood. Its length shall be a cubit, and its width a cubit. It shall…
  • Exodus 36:8-38 (v2) All the wise-hearted men among those who did the work made the tabernacle with ten curtains of fine twined linen, blue, purple, and…
  • Exodus 37:1-5 (v4) Bezalel made the ark of acacia wood. Its length was two and a half cubits, and its width a cubit and a half, and a cubit and a half its…
  • Exodus 39:32-34 (v2) Thus all the work of the tabernacle of the Tent of Meeting was finished. The children of Israel did according to all that Yahweh commanded…
  • Exodus 39:35 (v4) the ark of the covenant with its poles, the mercy seat,
  • Exodus 39:36-38 (v2) the table, all its vessels, the show bread, the pure lamp stand, its lamps, even the lamps to be set in order, all its vessels, the oil for…
  • Exodus 40:2 (v2) “On the first day of the first month you shall raise up the tabernacle of the Tent of Meeting.
  • 2 Chronicles 3:14 (v3) He made the veil of blue, purple, crimson, and fine linen, and ornamented it with cherubim.
  • Psalms 110:2-3 (v4) Yahweh will send out the rod of your strength out of Zion. Rule among your enemies. Your people offer themselves willingly in the day of…
  • Isaiah 25:7 (v3) He will destroy in this mountain the surface of the covering that covers all peoples, and the veil that is spread over all nations.
  • Hebrews 6:19 (v3) This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and entering into that which is within the veil;
  • Hebrews 10:19-20 (v3) Having therefore, brothers, boldness to enter into the holy place by the blood of Jesus, by the way which he dedicated for us, a new and…
  • Exodus 36:35-38 (v3) He made the veil of blue, purple, scarlet, and fine twined linen, with cherubim. He made it the work of a skillful workman. He made four…
  • Exodus 37:10-24 (v2) He made the table of acacia wood. Its length was two cubits, and its width was a cubit, and its height was a cubit and a half. He overlaid…

44 distinct cross-references across this passage (46 total citations).

Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)

Explain this passage (20 sources)

Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.

John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On v2 2. For there was a tabernacle, etc. As the…

2. For there was a tabernacle, etc. As the Apostle here touches but lightly on the structure of the tabernacle, that he might not be detained beyond what his subject required; so will I also designedly abstain from any refined explanation of it. It is then sufficient for our present purpose to consider the tabernacle in its three parts, — the first was the court of the people; the middle was commonly called the sanctuary; and the last was the inner sanctuary, which they called, by way of eminence, the holy of holies.

As to the first sanctuary, which was contiguous to the court of the people, he says that there were the candlestick and the table on which the shew-bread was set: he calls this place, in the plural number, the holies. Then, after this is mentioned, the most secret place, which they called the holy of holies, still more remote from the view of the people, and it was even hid from the priests who ministered in the first sanctuary; for as by a veil the sanctuary was closed up to the people, so another veil kept the priests from the holy of holies. There, the Apostle says, was the θυμιατήριον by which name I understand the altar of incense, or fumigation, rather than the censer; then the ark of the covenant, with its covering, the two cherubim, the golden pot filled with manna, the rod of Aaron, and the two tables. Thus far the Apostle proceeds in describing the tabernacle.

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But he says that the pot in which Moses had deposited the manna, and Aaron’s rod which had budded, were in the ark with the two tables; but this seems inconsistent with sacred history, which in 1 King s 8:9, relates that there was nothing in the ark but the two tables. But it is easy to reconcile these two passages: God had commanded the pot and Aaron’s rod to be laid up before the testimony; it is hence probable that they were deposited in the ark, together with the tables. But when the Temple was built, these things were arranged in a different order, and certain history relates it as a thing new that the ark had nothing else but the two tables.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On v3 The holiest Sanctuary.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv2–4 2 For there was a tabernacle made; the first,…
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv2–4 For there was a tabernacle made: the Spirit descends…
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On v2 In these verses, the Holy Ghost, by the apostle,…
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv2–4 For there was a tabernacle made,.... By the direction…
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv2–4 The first - The outward tabernacle. In which was…
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv2–4 Verse 2. For there was a tabernacle made; the…
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv2–4 Heb 9:2. For there was a tabernacle made —…
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv2–4 For there was a tabernacle made - The word…
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv2–4 First tabernacle. By this word is signified, the sanctuary…
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv2–4 Defining "the worldly tabernacle."
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv2–4 2. A tabernacle—Or tent, yet a different term in…
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv2–4 2. made] “prepared” or “established.” He treats of the…
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv2–4 (2) Tabernacle.—It must be carefully observed that the Epistle…
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv2, 4 Vers. 2-5. For there was a tabernacle made; the…
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv2–4 2. For there was a tabernacle made. The tabernacle…
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v2 (See Scofield "Exo 25:30").
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On v3 Behind the second curtain
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv2–4 9:2 Israel’s Tabernacle was a tent with two rooms…
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