The Sacred Tent

25 The Lord said to Moses:

² Tell everyone in Israel who wants to give gifts that they must bring them to you. ³ Here is a list of what you are to collect: Gold, silver, and bronze; ⁴ blue, purple, and red wool; fine linen; goat hair; ⁵ tanned ram skins; fine leather; acacia wood; ⁶ olive oil for the lamp; sweet-smelling spices to mix with the oil for dedicating the tent and ordaining the priests; ⁷ and onyx^[a] stones for the sacred vest and the breastpiece. ⁸ I also want them to build a special place where I can live among my people. ⁹ Make it and its furnishings exactly like the pattern I will show you.

The Sacred Chest

The Lord said to Moses:

¹⁰ Tell the people to build a chest of acacia wood forty-five inches long, twenty-seven inches wide, and twenty-seven inches high. ¹¹ Cover it inside and out with pure gold and put a gold edging around the lid. ¹² Make four gold rings and fasten one of them to each of the four legs of the chest. ¹³ Make two poles of acacia wood. Cover them with gold ¹⁴ and put them through the rings, so the chest can be carried by the poles. ¹⁵ Don’t ever remove the poles from the rings. ¹⁶ When I give you the Ten Commandments written on two flat stones, put them inside the chest.

¹⁷ Cover the lid of the chest with pure gold. ^18-19 Then hammer out two winged creatures of pure gold and fasten them to the lid at the ends of the chest. ²⁰ The creatures must face each other with their wings spread over the chest. ²¹ Inside it place the two flat stones with the Ten Commandments and put the gold lid on top of the chest. ²² I will meet you there^[b] between the two creatures and tell you what my people must do and what they must not do.

The Table for the Sacred Bread

The Lord said:

²³ Make a table of acacia wood thirty-six inches long, eighteen inches wide, and twenty-seven inches high. ^24-25 Cover it with pure gold and put a gold edging around it with a border three inches wide.^{[c] 26} Make four gold rings and attach one to each of the legs ^27-28 near the edging. The poles for carrying the table are to be placed through these rings and are to be made of acacia wood covered with gold. ^29-30 The table is to be kept in the holy place, and the sacred loaves of bread must always be put on it. All bowls, plates, jars, and cups for wine offerings are to be made of pure gold and set on this table.

The Lampstand

The Lord said:

³¹ Make a lampstand of pure gold. The whole lampstand, including its decorative flowers, must be made from a single piece of hammered gold ³² with three branches on each of its two sides. ³³ There are to be three decorative almond blossoms on each branch ³⁴ and four on the stem. ³⁵ There must also be a blossom where each pair of branches comes out from the stem. ³⁶ The lampstand, including its branches and decorative flowers, must be made from a single piece of hammered pure gold. ³⁷ The lamp on the top and those at the end of each of its six branches must be made so as to shine toward the front of the lampstand. ³⁸ The tongs and trays for taking care of the lamps are to be made of pure gold. ³⁹ The lampstand and its equipment will require seventy-five pounds of pure gold, ⁴⁰ and they must be made according to the pattern I showed you on the mountain.

Curtains and Coverings for the Sacred Tent

The Lord said to Moses:

26 Furnish the sacred tent with curtains made from ten pieces of the finest linen. They must be woven with blue, purple, and red wool and embroidered with figures of winged creatures. ² Make each piece fourteen yards long and two yards wide ³ and sew them together into two curtains with five sections each. ^4-6 Put fifty loops of blue cloth along one of the wider sides of each curtain, then fasten the two curtains at the loops with fifty gold hooks.

^7-8 As the material for the tent, use goat hair to weave eleven sections fifteen yards by two yards each. ⁹ Sew five of the sections together to make one panel. Then sew the other six together to make a second panel, and fold the sixth section double over the front of the tent. ¹⁰ Put fifty loops along one of the wider sides of each panel ¹¹ and fasten the two panels at the loops with fifty bronze hooks. ^12-13 The panel of goat hair will be a yard longer than the tent itself, so fold half a yard of the material behind the tent and on each side as a protective covering. ¹⁴ Make two more coverings—one with ram skins dyed red and the other with fine leather.

The Framework for the Sacred Tent

The Lord said:

¹⁵ Build a framework of acacia wood for the walls of the sacred tent. ¹⁶ Each frame is to be fifteen feet high and twenty-seven inches wide ¹⁷ with two wooden pegs near the bottom. ^18-21 Place two silver stands under each frame with sockets for the pegs, so the frames can be joined together. Twenty of these frames are to be used along the south side and twenty more along the north. ²² For the back wall along the west side use six frames ^23-24 with two more at the southwest and northwest corners. Make certain that these corner frames are joined from top to bottom. ²⁵ Altogether, this back wall will have eight frames with two silver stands under each one.

^26-27 Make five crossbars for each of the wooden frames, ²⁸ with the center crossbar running the full length of the wall. ²⁹ Cover the frames and the crossbars with gold and attach gold rings to the frames to run the crossbars through. ³⁰ Then set up the tent in the way I showed you on the mountain.

The Curtain inside the Sacred Tent

The Lord said:

^31-33 Make a curtain to separate the holy place from the most holy place. Use fine linen woven with blue, purple, and red wool, and embroidered with figures of winged creatures. Cover four acacia wood posts with gold and set them each on a silver stand. Then fasten gold hooks to the posts and hang the curtain there.

³⁴ Inside the most holy place, you must put the sacred chest that has the place of mercy on its lid.^{[d] 35} Outside the curtain put the table for the sacred bread on the right side and the gold lampstand on the left.

³⁶ For the entrance to the tent, use a piece of fine linen woven with blue, purple, and red wool and embroidered with fancy needlework. ³⁷ Cover five acacia wood posts with gold and set them each on a bronze stand. Then put gold hooks on the posts and hang the curtain there.