TABERNACLE, the portable sanctuary of Israel in the wilderness wanderings. Critical analysis of the Pentateuch (γ.-v.) teaches us to draw a sharp line between the old notices of the tabernacle contained in the pre-Deutero-nonιic history book (JE) and the account given by the post-exilic priestly narrator. The latter throws back into the time of Moses the whole scheme of worship and ritual of which the second temple was the centre, and, as this scheme necessarily implies the existence of an elaborate sanctuary on the pattern of the temple, he describes a tabernacle of extraordinary splendour pitched in the middle of the camp, with an outer and inner chamber and a courtyard, and all the apparatus of sacrificial and atoning ritual, just as in the temple, only constructed of boards, posts, and curtains so that it could be taken down and moved from place to place. The whole description is ideal, as appears not only from the details but from the fact that the old history knows nothing of such a structure. The Chronicler indeed, who had before him the Pentateuch in its present shape, assumes that after the Israelites entered Canaan the tabernacle continued to be the one legitimate place of sacrifice until it was superseded by Solomon’s temple, and represents it as standing at Gibeon in the days of David and his son (1 Chron. xxi. 29 sq.; 2 Chron. i. 3). But the book of Kings knows Gibeon only as “the greatest high place” (1 Kings iii. 4)....

in Hebrew, אהל, in Greek, σκηνἠ, a word which properly signifies _a tent_, but is particularly applied by the Hebrews to a kind of building in the form of a tent, set up by the express command of God, for the performance of religious worship, sacrifices, &c, during the journeyings of the Israelites in the wilderness; and after their settlement in the land of Canaan made use of for the same purpose, till the temple was built in Jerusalem. The tabernacle was covered with curtains and skins. It was divided into two parts, the one covered, and properly called the tabernacle, and the other open, called the court. The covered part was again divided into two parts, the one called holy, and the other called the holy of holies. The curtains which covered it were made of linen of several colours embroidered. There were ten curtains, twenty-eight cubits long, and four in breadth. Five curtains together made two coverings, which, being made fast together, enveloped all the tabernacle. Over the rest there were two other coverings, the one of goat’s hair, and the other of sheep skins. These vails or coverings were laid on a square frame of planks, resting on bases. There were forty-eight large planks, each a cubit and a half wide, and ten cubits high; twenty of them on each side, and six at one end to the westward; each plank was supported by two silver bases; they were let into one another, and held by bars running the length of the planks. The holy of holies was parted from the rest of the tabernacle by a curtain, made fast to four pillars standing ten cubits from the end. The whole length of the tabernacle was thirty-two cubits, that is, about fifty feet; and the breadth twelve cubits, or nineteen feet. The end was thirty cubits high; the upper curtain hung on the north ...

TABERNACLES, Feast of. The original character of this Hebrew feast, celebrated at the close of the agricultural year as a thanksgiving for the produce of the seasons, but especially for the vintage and olive harvest, has been explained in Pentateuch, vol. xviii. p. 511. As such it is described in the old law of Exod. xxiii. 16, under the name of “the feast of ingathering, at the end of the year” (which, in the old Hebrew calendar, ran from autumn to autumn), “when thou hast gathered in thy labours out of the field” (comp. Exod. xxxiv. 22). The same feast is spoken of in Deut. xvi. 13 as “the feast of booths” (E.V. “tabernacles,” whence the current name of the feast), when “thou hast gathered in thy corn and wine” from the corn-floor and the wine-press. No explanation is here given of the name “feast of booths”; but after the exile it was understood that during this feast the people assembled at Jerusalem were to live in booths constructed of branches of trees (Lev. xxiii. 39 sq.; Neh. viii. 14 sqf The passage in Nehemiah, describing the celebration of the feast in 444 b.c., serves as a commentary on the post-exilic law in Leviticus, and from it we learn that the use of booths on that occasion had no foundation in traditional usage, but w as based directly on the law, which then for the first time became generally known. According to the law in question, the booths were to be a memorial of the wilderness wandering (Lev. xxiii. 43), but of this there is no hint in Deuteronomy; and, while it is quite in the style of the later law to attach a new historical reference to an old name like “feast of booths,” it is certain from Exodus that the feast had originally agricultural and not historical significance. As such it is exactly parallel to the ...

FEAST OF, a solemn festival of the Hebrews, observed after harvest, on the fifteenth day of the month Tisri, Lev. xxiii, 34–44. It was one of the three great solemnities, wherein all the males of the Israelites were obliged to present themselves before the Lord; and it was instituted to commemorate the goodness of God, who protected them in the wilderness, and made them dwell in tents or booths after they came out of Egypt. (See _Feasts_.) This feast continued eight days, of which the first and last days were the most solemn, Lev. xxiii, 34, &c. It was not allowed to do any labour on this feast, and particular sacrifices were offered, which, together with the other ceremonies used in celebrating this festival, were as follows: The first day of the feast, they cut down branches of the handsomest trees, with their fruit, branches of palm trees, and such as were fullest of leaves, and boughs of the willow trees that grew upon the sides of brooks, Neh. viii, 16. These they brought together, and waved them toward the four quarters of the world, singing certain songs. These branches were also called hosanna, because when they carried them and waved them, they cried Hosanna; not unlike what the Jews did at our Saviour’s entry into Jerusalem, Matthew xxi, 8, 9. On the eighth day they performed this ceremony oftener, and with greater solemnity, than upon the other days of the feast. They called this day _hosanna rabba_, or “the great hosanna.”