Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

ARK OF THE COVENANT

The chest of acacia wood that contained the two tablets of the Ten Commandments and, according to the NT (Heb. 9:4), Aaron’s budding rod (Num. 17:1-11[MT 16-26]) and a golden urn filled with manna (Exod. 16:33-34); also called “the ark of God,” “the ark of the Lord,” and “the ark of testimony.” The shape of the ark was rectangular, measuring 2.5 × 1.5 × 1.5 cubits, or roughly 114 cm. × 69 cm. × 69 cm. (45 in. × 27 in. × 27 in.). It was suspended on poles that passed through rings on its sides and by which it could be carried (Exod. 25:10-22; 37:1-9).

Many scholars agree that the oldest textual source that mentions the ark is the so-called Song of the Ark in Num. 10:35-36. If so, then from the time of our earliest attestations the ark was presumed to represent God’s presence in the cult and, in fact, was virtually synonymous with the deity. Thus, according to the Song, whenever the ark was lifted up to lead the Israelites forward in their wanderings in the wilderness, Moses said, “Arise, O Lord”; similarly, whenever the ark was set down in a new camp, Moses said, “Return, O Lord.” This simultaneity of ark and deity is also indicated in what is usually considered to be the fullest and most archaic name of the ark, “the ark of the covenant of the Lord of Hosts who is enthroned upon the cherubim” (1 Sam. 4:5; cf. 2 Sam. 6:2). What seems to be imagined here is a throne whereby the deity sits invisibly above the ark, on the outstretched wings of cherubim, with the ark itself serving as God’s footstool. This image of a cherub throne with footstool is frequently found in West Semitic art, and biblical texts explicitly refer to the ark as a footstool (1 Chr. 28:2; Ps. 99:5; 132:7; Lam. 2:1) and describe cherub wings unfolded above the ark after it is housed in Solomon’s temple (1 Kgs. 6:23-28; 8:6-7).

The Song of the Ark and the old liturgical name associating the ark with the Lord of Hosts also both stress that God is associated with the ark as a warrior deity and that the ark itself functions for the Israelites as a palladium or shield. In the Song of the Ark Moses follows his command to the ark to “Arise, O Lord” with an exhortation that God’s enemies should then scatter and the deity’s foes flee. In the liturgical name “the ark of the covenant of the Lord of Hosts who is enthroned upon the cherubim,” the “hosts” are most likely the “heavenly hosts,” the cosmic army that fights on God’s behalf to ensure an Israelite victory in battle (e.g., Judg. 5:20, “the stars fought from heaven”). This understanding of the ark’s military function also illuminates narratives such as Josh. 6:1-21, where the city of Jericho falls to the Israelites after the warriors circumambulate its walls for seven days, blowing trumpets and carrying the ark. The same military motif is present in the Ark narrative of 1 Sam. 4–6, where the ark is brought from its then shrine in Shiloh to be present as the Israelites go to war against the Philistines.

The military efficacy of the ark in the Ark narrative, however, is initially called into question, as the ark is captured by the Philistines and taken by them to the temple of the god Dagon in Ashdod (1 Sam. 5:1-2). Yet this failure of the ark to bring about an immediate military victory on earth is just prologue to an ultimate recounting of the military superiority of the ark in the cosmic realm. During the ark’s sojourn in Ashdod, the cult statue of Dagon and, by implication, Dagon himself is destroyed; the citizens of Ashdod are struck by plague, as eventually are the people throughout Philistia. The Philistines have no recourse but to return the ark to Israel, who thus become the “victors” in this battle without a sword being raised.

As the ark moves from place to place as part of Israel’s military campaigns and as a part of the people’s general settlement in the land, it is most commonly described as being housed in a tent (although there are some indications of an actual shrine in Shiloh). Scholars have often compared the qubbāh, a portable tent shrine of pre-Islamic Arabs which contained two stones and which was used during times of battle and also for divination (cf. Judg. 20:27-28). Eventually, however, the ark ended up permanently in Jerusalem, in the innermost chamber of the temple. The story of how it got there is found in 2 Sam. 6 and also in Ps. 132, , one of the very few explicit mentions of the ark outside the Pentateuch and the historical books (cf. otherwise only Jer. 3:16). According to the Samuel and Psalms materials, the ark disappeared after being returned to the Israelites by the Philistines; e.g., between the end of the Ark narrative in 1 Sam. 7:1-2 and 2 Sam. 6, , it is mentioned only once (1 Sam. 14:18), and this reference is often assumed to be textual error. The reasons for the ark’s oblivion at this point are unclear; we can only presume that, for whatever reasons, it was not regarded as important by Saul, the ruler whose monarchy is established beginning in 1 Sam. 8.

Whatever the cause of its temporary oblivion, 2 Sam. 6; Ps. 132 are both quite clear that the ark re-emerges in Israelite religion when Saul’s successor David sought to establish it as the cult symbol of his newly-captured capital of Jerusalem. Consistent with older tradition, David housed the ark in Jerusalem in a tent. The building of a temple and the enshrining of the ark in its holy of holies are left to David’s son Solomon. Yet even in Solomon’s temple, there is a nod to custom, as 1 Kgs. 8:4 seems to indicate that the older tent abode is erected over the ark in the holy of holies.

With Solomon, the ark’s story ends rather abruptly. Jewish tradition and most scholars presume that it remained in the temple for almost 400 years, until the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians in 586 b.c.e., yet it is not mentioned in the list of spoils the Babylonians took from the temple (2 Kgs. 25:13-17). Perhaps this indicates that the ark was taken from Jerusalem already in the late 10th century, as part of the military campaigns undertaken by Pharaoh Shishak during the reign of Solomon’s son Rehoboam. Or perhaps the ark’s fate after Solomon remains unknown because its chroniclers found it of little interest. Certainly in the book of Deuteronomy, whose authors also provide our primary accounts of the post-Solomonic monarchy, the ark is of much less significance than it is in, e.g., the Priestly traditions of Exod. 25:1–31:11; 35:1–40:38.

Bibliography. F. M. Cross. “The Priestly Tabernacle,” in BA Reader 1, ed. G. E. Wright and D. N. Freedman (Garden City, 1961), 201-28; Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic (Cambridge, Mass., 1973); R. E. Friedman, “The Tabernacle in the Temple,” BA 43 (1980): 241-48; P. D. Miller and J. J. M. Roberts, The Hand of the Lord: A Reassessment of the “Ark Narrative” of 1 Samuel (Baltimore, 1977); C. L. Seow, Myth, Drama, and the Politics of David’s Dance. HSM 44 (Atlanta, 1989); R. de Vaux, Ancient Israel (1961, repr. Grand Rapids, 1997); M. H. Woudstra, The Ark of the Covenant from Conquest to Kingship (Philadelphia, 1965).

Susan Ackerman

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

ARK OF THE COVENANT

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)