The Appearance of the Ark of the Covenant

[patrick457]

In Exodus 25:10-22, we read:

"And they shall make an ark of shittim wood, two and a half cubits long, one and a half cubits wide, and a cubit and a half high; and you shall overlay it with pure gold, inside and outside shall you overlay it, and make a molding of gold around it.

And you shall cast four rings of gold for it, and fasten them on its four feet; two rings on its one side and two rings on the opposite side.

And you shall make poles of shittim wood and overlay them with gold. And you shall put these poles into the rings on the sides of the ark, that the ark may be borne with them. The poles must remain in the rings of the ark; they shall not be taken from it. And In the ark you are to put the commandments which I will give you.

You shall then make a propitiatory (kapporet) of pure gold, two cubits and a half long, and one and a half cubits wide. Make two cherubim of beaten gold for the two ends of the propitiatory, fastening them so that one cherub springs direct from each end.

The cherubim shall have their wings spread out above, covering the propitiatory with them; they shall be turned toward each other, but with their faces looking toward the propitiatory. This propitiatory you shall then place on top of the ark. In the ark itself you are to put the commandments which I will give you.

There I will meet you and there, from above the propitiatory, between the two cherubim on the ark of the commandments, I will tell you all the commands that I wish you to give the Israelites."

The Ark of the Covenant is traditionally depicted as in the picture below, with the Cherubim on the Kapporet (Propitiatory, aka ‘Mercy-Seat’) being depicted as human figures. The picture below is a replica of the Ark as depicted in Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark:

http://www.virginmedia.com/images/1indy-idol-ark-of-the-coven.jpg

However, recently some have suggested that the ‘cherubim’ as depicted (at least, in this period of time) might resemble the winged Sphinxes found in association with Canaanite and Phoenician thrones of the Late Bronze Age, perhaps also including Egyptian sphinxes. There are a lot of images in Near Eastern art which show winged sphinxes being depicted in thrones; since God describes that He will meet Moses ‘above’ the kapporet, between the two cherubim, what if these sphinxes/cherubim served as the sidearms of God’s throne in the Ark (for example, in Psalm 99:1 and 5 God is described as being ‘enthroned upon the cherubim’)?


An ivory piece found in Megiddo, dating from 1200 BC. Note the man (either a prince or a king) sitting on a sphinx-throne.

http://img65.imageshack.us/img65/6888/ahiramcherubthronegrayuw5.jpg
An image from a stone sarcophagus (12th century BC) depicting King Ahiram of Byblos sitting on a sphinx-throne.

Perhaps another influence might be bibleorigins.net/Amenhotep3ColorSphinxThrone.jpg, which are usually depicted"]Egyptian thrones, which usually have sidearms and legs in the form of a lion (or a sphinx).

As for the Ark itself, some have seen a connection between it and the portable thrones on which Egyptian gods and Pharaohs (themselves considered as living gods) are usually depicted as sitting on. The Ark thus served a double purpose: as a portable throne for YHWH, the true God, and as a receptacle of important relics (the Tablets of the Law, Aaron’s Staff, and the Manna for example).

Now, the question may arise: “Let’s say this interpretation is correct. Why did God base His ark on existing pagan designs?” The answer may be such that God is now ‘appropriating’ these things to their proper use, so that it would be for His greater glory. IMHO, this question (and its answer) is quite related to the question “Why did the Christians ‘borrow’ a few elements from pagans?” to which G.K. Chesterton once replied:

“It is often said by critics of the Christian origins that certain ritual feasts, processions or dances are really of pagan origin. They might as well say that our legs are of pagan origin. Nobody ever disputed that humanity was human before it was Christian; and no Church manufactured the legs with which men walked or danced, either in pilgrimage or ballet. What can be maintained is this, that where the church has existed it has preserved not only the processions but the dances; not only the cathedral but the carnival. One of the chief claims of Christian civilization is to have preserved things of pagan origin…”

If the Church can ‘borrow’ some things from pagans to use them for the glory of God, then why not the Head Guy Himself, since He (more specifically, His Son) founded that Church?

 

[ricko]

You have not proved that the Church “borrowed” any pagan things. All you have accomplished is to point out that there are similarities between religions/cultures. The cherubim and the sphinx have nothing in common except the wings. It has been tried many, many times before to prove that Christianity evolved from the pagan religions, it has always failed because it is not true. It may be fun to explore these things thinking, hoping that you will uncover some secret or conspiracy but it is always a dead end. We have answered these pagan origins many times specifically concerning the JWs who believe that every church, except theirs of course, has pagan origins.

 

[patrick457]

Just goes to show how much I know. Yes, I don’t believe that Christianity sprang up from paganism; what I meant is that it had, over the course of time, ‘adopted’ a few elements which came from or has some resemblance to some aspects of pagan cultures such as Aristotelian philosophy, the haloes in iconography (the resemblance between the Christian and Pagan haloes may be merely coincidental, however), or even the term Euaggelion (Good News or Gospel) itself. I hope that I clarified myself here.

As for the cherubim, while I am aware of Ezekiel’s vision of the Chayyot, I’ve heard that cherubim were earlier conceived as winged lions, sometimes with human faces. Though I’d be happy to find something that suggests otherwise.

 

[patrick457]

Just goes to show how much I know. Yes, I don’t believe that Christianity sprang up from paganism; what I meant is that it had, over the course of time, ‘adopted’ a few elements which came from or has some resemblance to some aspects of pagan cultures such as Aristotelian philosophy, the haloes in iconography (the resemblance between the Christian and Pagan haloes may be merely coincidental, however), or even the term Euaggelion (Good News or Gospel) itself. I hope that I clarified myself here.

As for the cherubim, while I am aware of Ezekiel’s vision of the Chayyot, I’ve heard that cherubim were earlier conceived as winged lions, sometimes with human faces. Though I’d be happy to find something that suggests otherwise.

This post was a bit too concise, so I’ll elaborate here:

-I, for one, don’t believe the popular assumption that Christianity or its beliefs sprang up from Paganism, despite some supposed (and thoroughly refuted) ‘similarities’.

What I do think though, is that Christianity, and perhaps Judaism before it, did have a few borrowings from other heathen cultures, such as Aristotelian philosophy, music or some such sort.

-Note that this thread is only my assumption. Feel free to disagree with me here, and if possible please provide the reasons as to why. I’m quite with an open mind here, the unlearned person that I am.

 

[colliric]

This thread simply helps confirm my understanding that in all Religions there is some “common” beliefs. There is some truth in all religions that search for higher knowledge, so naturally there are some basic things which are simular.

 

[ricko]

Well at least you’re very humble about it. I will say it appears that you have done a lot of research and also I can see that you can only come up with assumptions with no direct relations between Christianity and paganism. I believe that all you will find are things like the wedding band and throwing rice that Christianity has adopted from the pagans. Mind you, things like that have not been incorporated into Christianity or its worship but more as a social custom. Much like we have adopted pagan names for the days and months of the year not to mention the stars and planets. This is part of normal development for societies to adopt old customs into current times. If you want to save some time, Catholic Answers has a fine article about all this. I don’t have a link to it but a good search should pull it up. Good night.

 

[patrick457]

Well at least you’re very humble about it. I will say it appears that you have done a lot of research and also I can see that you can only come up with assumptions with no direct relations between Christianity and paganism. I believe that all you will find are things like the wedding band and throwing rice that Christianity has adopted from the pagans. Mind you, things like that have not been incorporated into Christianity or its worship but more as a social custom. Much like we have adopted pagan names for the days and months of the year not to mention the stars and planets. This is part of normal development for societies to adopt old customs into current times. If you want to save some time, Catholic Answers has a fine article about all this. I don’t have a link to it but a good search should pull it up. Good night.

Thank you very much. I will search for it later.

 

[Crumpy]

For my two cents, I will say that the Ark and various details were inspired, or so we take it to have been.

Lately I have been revising my perspectives on the Hebrew Scriptures and various details – not as being “Jewish” but as being “Catholic.”

I want to find a menorrah because I think it’s such a beautiful symbol, as it was, of the abiding presence of God, and at the very least, a visual reminder of the experience of God speaking to Moses through the burning bush, which it recalls. That was inspired, and it still inspires me.

 

[patrick457]

For my two cents, I will say that the Ark and various details were inspired, or so we take it to have been.

Lately I have been revising my perspectives on the Hebrew Scriptures and various details – not as being “Jewish” but as being “Catholic.”

I want to find a menorrah because I think it’s such a beautiful symbol, as it was, of the abiding presence of God, and at the very least, a visual reminder of the experience of God speaking to Moses through the burning bush, which it recalls. That was inspired, and it still inspires me.

Very good thoughts.

As an aside, there was actually a Jewish tradition which says that the Burning Bush grew and blossomed as God spoke to Moses. The Midrash ha-Gadol (The Great Midrash) says:

Moses saw a great miracle, for he saw the bush and it was blossoming and shooting up in the midst of the fire.

 

[ricko]

Patrick, here is that link catholic.com/library/is_catholicism_pagan.asp
There are more but they are more or less along the same line. Just type in “pagan”.

 

[patrick457]

Patrick, here is that link catholic.com/library/is_catholicism_pagan.asp
There are more but they are more or less along the same line. Just type in “pagan”.

Again and again, thank you.

 

[Spirithound]

This is some good research Patrick.
Two comments though. First, just realize you haven’t proven anything, not about pagan influences on Catholicism, and not about pagan influences on Judaism.
Second, God, in the OT, goes to great lengths to keep anything even potentially pagan from the Israelites. The Plagues, for example, are 10 assertions of YHWH over 10 Egyptian deities. The Israelites were not to intermarry with other peoples, and whenever Israel won a battle, they killed everyone and destroyed everything. God didn’t even want them to have a king, as the other tribes did. So, an important question would be, were the Hebrews ready to have something like a cherub that resembled a pagan symbol?
Of course, the body of a lion is certainly a symbol that might befit God…

 

[Chipper]

In Exodus 25:10-22, we read:

If the Church can ‘borrow’ some things from pagans to use them for the glory of God, then why not the Head Guy Himself, since He (more specifically, His Son) founded that Church?

Congratulations on all your research. I would like to state my thoughts on the “Borrowing” from pagans.

I just returned from a pilgrimmage to Italy. I saw a Pantheon, originally ancient greek, converted to a Catholic Church. I saw Obelisks from Egypt with a cross placed on top. There were many other ancient Roman/Greek buildings converted to Catholic Churches.

I think the word “Borrowed” would be better substituted with the word “Conquered”. I.e. Christians conquered the pagans and these ancient monuments serve to show this.

So If the Ark where built using sphinx like images, and God were sitting on top of them, then this would mean to me, that God has conquered the pagan Gods, - Not Borrowed from them.

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

In Exodus 25:10-22, we read:

The Ark of the Covenant is traditionally depicted as in the picture below, with the Cherubim on the Kapporet (Propitiatory, aka ‘Mercy-Seat’) being depicted as human figures. The picture below is a replica of the Ark as depicted in Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark:

http://www.virginmedia.com/images/1indy-idol-ark-of-the-coven.jpg

However, recently some have suggested that the ‘cherubim’ as depicted (at least, in this period of time) might resemble the winged Sphinxes found in association with Canaanite and Phoenician thrones of the Late Bronze Age, perhaps also including Egyptian sphinxes. There are a lot of images in Near Eastern art which show winged sphinxes being depicted in thrones; since God describes that He will meet Moses ‘above’ the kapporet, between the two cherubim, what if these sphinxes/cherubim served as the sidearms of God’s throne in the Ark (for example, in Psalm 99:1 and 5 God is described as being ‘enthroned upon the cherubim’)?

http://www.specialtyinterests.net/ivory_solomon4.JPG
An ivory piece found in Megiddo, dating from 1200 BC. Note the man (either a prince or a king) sitting on a sphinx-throne.

http://img65.imageshack.us/img65/6888/ahiramcherubthronegrayuw5.jpg
An image from a stone sarcophagus (12th century BC) depicting King Ahiram of Byblos sitting on a sphinx-throne.

Perhaps another influence might be bibleorigins.net/Amenhotep3ColorSphinxThrone.jpg, which are usually depicted"]Egyptian thrones, which usually have sidearms and legs in the form of a lion (or a sphinx).

As for the Ark itself, some have seen a connection between it and the portable thrones on which Egyptian gods and Pharaohs (themselves considered as living gods) are usually depicted as sitting on. The Ark thus served a double purpose: as a portable throne for YHWH, the true God, and as a receptacle of important relics (the Tablets of the Law, Aaron’s Staff, and the Manna for example).

Now, the question may arise: “Let’s say this interpretation is correct. Why did God base His ark on existing pagan designs?” The answer may be such that God is now ‘appropriating’ these things to their proper use, so that it would be for His greater glory. IMHO, this question (and its answer) is quite related to the question “Why did the Christians ‘borrow’ a few elements from pagans?” to which G.K. Chesterton once replied:

If the Church can ‘borrow’ some things from pagans to use them for the glory of God, then why not the Head Guy Himself, since He (more specifically, His Son) founded that Church?

There is no reason why the Israelites & Jews should not have borrowed from their neighbours, & every reason to think they did: or, to be exact, to think they had a great deal in common with the peoples around them. The question is not whether they did so, but, whether a supposed influence or borrowing has been properly identified.​

Whether they were influenced by other peoples - the sooner we can drop the word “pagan”, the better BTW - is a different issue entirely from the comparison of the
theological significance of Israelite religion with the theological significance of the religions of its neighbours. To borrow Syrian sphinx-imagery, & to adapt it to the religion of Israel, is not the same thing as for Israel to mean by it what the Syrians & Egyptians may have meant.

Another example of this: the Temple of Solomon was of a standard design - it was not unusual. It was different from a number of others, only in the ID of the deity worshipped in it.

We use bells - & so did the Assyrians: it does not follow we are of the Assyrian religion

I agree with you entirely - nice pictures BTW

 

[patrick457]

I think the word “Borrowed” would be better substituted with the word “Conquered”. I.e. Christians conquered the pagans and these ancient monuments serve to show this.

So If the Ark where built using sphinx like images, and God were sitting on top of them, then this would mean to me, that God has conquered the pagan Gods, - Not Borrowed from them.

Very good idea!

Yes, it does seem that God is now asserting His superiority over other (false) gods by this act of ‘appropriating’ or ‘conquering’ symbols from other cultures for His use. Thanks for all your comments everyone; you have given me a lot of things to think about and research on.

 

[CentralFLJames]

There is no doubt that in some things the Jews innovated or adopted from more ancient cultural art-forms, beliefs and practices. To do anything else would have been to deny their own ancient history and beginnings.

When I first discovered this myself I was horrified since it implied that everything we were lead to believe is true is just another case of man creating God in his own image and likeness as so many atheist accuse those who believe in God.

But over time I began to adapt a different perspective that recognizes that God is progressively revealing Himself to humanity. The Jews were just the first fruits of Divine Revelation to properly respond to God’s grace.

What the more ancient cultured believed were “imperfect” revelations. My theory is based on the assumption of God flooding all of Creation with His Universal grace to let humanity discover Him and to come to Him as Creator God. What we have in the ancient civilizations are thinkers, dreamers and philosophers and secular mystics who have all done just like the rest of us have done in our life - they have contemplated Creation and have tried to understand it. So lacking any teaching they have constructed from scratch their own imprecise “guesses” and conjectures that lead us to various kinds of partial truths, pagan beliefs and in many cases complete mythologies. But in each of these prior constructicons there are some few elements of God revealing Himself; even pagans and uneducated people can “hear” some of what God is trying to tell them if they are truly wanting to listen.

What we we have through Judaism and now Catholicism is God revealing Himself with ever increasing clarity. The Jews were the ones to discover the Just and Holy God. From the Jews we get past the limits of human invention to a God that was completely different than any prior religion - the first monotheistic religion. That seems trivial to us now - but back then that was a huge leap.

I see no real problem is seeing that some of our early Judaic and Christian beliefs have some elements and art forms that can be seen in some part in the ancient cultures. Note that even the Ten Commandments has some elements that can be seen in the Code of Hammurabi.

People tend to forget that Moses was raised as a royal Egyptian. As such he would have been taught in all the pagan beliefs of the Egyptians and have known the Code of Hammurabi. Few were literate in those days.

But why should this surprise or bother anyone? Does it really matter to anyone if God carved the 10 commandments with His own hand or through the chisel in the hand of Moses working through inspiration of Moses’ Egyptian teaching corrected with Divine Revelation?

Bottom Line:
Pagan influence is seen in every aspect of society even today. That should not be a cause for alarm though. God is more than capable of working with imperfect humans to correct the false beliefs and progressively reveal His true teachings.

James

 

[patrick457]

There is also a parallel between the tablets of the Law and treaty rites in Near Eastern/Egyptian cultures.

While we commonly imagine the two stone tablets as having five of the ten commandments written on each tablet, there is also a belief (held by some Jewish Sages) that each of the tablets contained all the Ten Commandments in full, ‘ten on one tablet and ten on the other.’

The parallel here is that in ANE/Egyptian cultures, treaties (such as those between the Pharaoh Ramses II and the Hittite Hattusilis III aka the Treaty of Kadesh, made in 1270 BC) were carved in stone, with each party receiving one copy, and the subordinate party placing their copy of the pact inside the main temple of his god, in oath to the king.

 

[Spirithound]

While we commonly imagine the two stone tablets as having five of the ten commandments written on each tablet, there is also a belief (held by some Jewish Sages) that each of the tablets contained all the Ten Commandments in full, ‘ten on one tablet and ten on the other.’

I’ve also heard that Commandments 1-3, how we relate to God were on one tablet, and the others, how we relate to others were on the other.

 

[patrick457]

I’ve also heard that Commandments 1-3, how we relate to God were on one tablet, and the others, how we relate to others were on the other.

Can you please give me some sources on this?

 

[patrick457]

It gets better. Jewish tradition has it that the Tablets were made of blue sapphire stone (as a reminder of the heavens and God’s Throne) and were either rectangle or square-shaped, with sharp corners and measuring six Tefachim (1 Tefach= 8.6 to 9 cm) long and wide, and three Tefachim thick. The letters were not merely engraved on the surface; they were fully bored through the tablets. In fact, while one would expect the reverse side to bear a mirror image since the letters were bored fully, both sides appeared normally; i.e. the back appeared identical to the front. Another is that the inner part of some Hebrew letters (either Samekh and the final Mem or Ayin, which in Paleo-Hebrew looked like an ‘O’) ‘hovered’ in place, despite the letters being graven fully.

God or the Tablets themselves were said to support their weight, enabling Moses to carry them. However, God or the Tablets withdrew their support when Moses saw the people worshipping the Golden Calf, causing him to drop them.