Exodus 40 Study Notes

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 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.