The Ark of the Cross

God makes Himself present to us always and everywhere as the eternal sacrificial victim.

Nov 01, 2024

*Disputation of the Holy Sacrament* by Frans Francken the Younger (ca. 17th century)

I adore Scripture. By virtue of my Protestant upbringing I’ve been instilled with a profound sense of how marvelous and wondrous this often leatherbound book we jampack full of annotations or hand down as an heirloom to new believers can be. Indeed, the Book of Psalms begins by declaring that one “finds pleasure in obeying the Lord’s commands…[meditating] on His commands day and night” (‭1‬:‭2‬). Then, much later, in a sense bookending the sacred hymnal but also comprising its lengthiest psalm, it is said that “[God’s] words are sweeter in my mouth than honey!” (‭119‬:‭103‬).1 Truly, to be a Christian means to share in this delight and succor of God’s revealed truth, and all our dogmas and traditions about the Bible to the side, this remains true: Christ built a Church, and that Church is built on the rock of Peter’s confession, words that Peter received not from himself but from on high (Mt. 16:16-18); Christianity is the witness to the word of God (cf. Jn. 17:17). One of the things that has contributed to my deep reverence toward Scripture, beyond the sheer appropriateness of it, is that in continuously studying it I’ve found myself never exhausted. In a more juvenile hubris I admit I occasioned the thought that the necessities had sufficiently revealed themselves to me and I had it figured out (ugh), only for a week or two of time required to unsettle me from my self-assurance. Scripture kept revealing itself to me, echoing the (perhaps apocryphal?) words of St. Jerome, that

The Scriptures are shallow enough for a babe to come and drink without fear of drowning and deep enough for theologians to swim in without ever touching the bottom.

An example of this can be seen in my essay “The Liturgical Nature of Christianity.” In the months prior to that when I was first growing interested in the concept of liturgy and what it meant, I was at a loss to figure out where I’d find its biblical foundations. It seemed, or had been hammered into me by my perhaps too biblicist upbringing, that such practices were so “out there” in contrast to “biblical Christianity.” Yet, a few realizations struck me, which would be reflected in the final essay, such as how the Old Testament Israelite religion clearly was liturgical and regulated in its worship and that rather than the New Testament’s relative silence on how to worship (contra what and why) being a hindrance to liturgy it was actually a boon because if man’s creativity was to be heavily limited (per the “Regulative Principle”) then nothing would get done, reducing the faith to naught but bumbling nothingness, certainly undeserving of the Triune God, so the silence had to be instead a warrant to find out the ways to “Ascribe unto Jehovah the glory due unto His Name; [worshiping] Jehovah in holy array” (‭‭Ps. ‭29‬:‭2‬) in our sundry human ways and circumstances. Following these, Scripture would begin to speedily demonstrate for me just how much it had to offer in this regard, hopefully guided along by the Spirit. This continues to happen for me, guided often by people far wiser and attentive than me, and constitutes strong personal proof that these writings are no mere words of men, but owing to their majesty, impact, endurance, interwovenness, intrigue, hope, and power can only be the handiwork of one truly great Author.

You will hear me refer to this whenever I speak of the “scriptural tapestry” or a “through-line in Scripture,” meaning some discernible motif that intersects the whole canon of Scripture and illuminates various darkened corners. As I continue to probe Scripture and discover its treasures and hidden gems, I find it useful not just for intellectual refinement or sport, nothing so abstract, but rather to uncover further the profound truths about this faith I profess and the realities, cosmic and terrestrial, to which they speak. Today, as the culmination of a weeks-long study of mine, I present an awesome image woven out of the scriptural tapestry.

“The reality is Christ!” (‭‭Col. ‭2‬:‭17‬). This profound confession comes from Paul in declaring that anyone who submits to the regulations of the Old Law (summarized in v. 16) should not condemn another for not being submitted in kind. As I detail in “The Liturgical Nature of Christianity,” and then flesh out in “What a Biblical Liturgy Would Look Like,” the error is acting as if these lunar festivals or Sabbath days have anything to offer in themselves, which is false. Rather, as Paul says, whatever goodness these rituals (or, we may say, “traditions”) have is derived from their dedication to Christ, in Whom reality itself actually persists (as Paul professes earlier in 1:15-20). What we practice may be good for us, but it’s for us (cf. Mk. 2:27), and so we should respect what God’s gift of human creativity has moved others to practice for them, so that we shall “not let anyone judge [us] with respect to” an Ash Wednesday or a Feast of the Cross,2 although we may certainly share in discussing the beneficence and theology thereof. That’s applying the verse from the Christian retrospective, but if we shift to the intertestamental/Judaic prospective (which is more proximate to Paul’s context and intent) the meaning is that all the ornaments and decorum of the Old Law have been assumed into the Person and work of Christ Jesus, and the reality of them once veiled in shadow can be fully seen. This proves what I said, that our practices aren’t improper if they aren’t or are a New Moon or Sabbath, but rather whether or not they are dedicated to the reality of Jesus Christ. Is the New Moon important because our culture follows a lunar calendar and the renewal of the cycle is recognized to honor the Master of time Who puts the heavens in motion? Is a food or drink abstained from (such as meats for a forty day period, perhaps) because it is our heritage to deny ourselves such comfort out of religious devotion to the One Who lived off naught but the words of God? These are all licit, what isn’t is brandishing a (truly) pharisaic or imperialistic attitude over others for their customs of honoring Christ. It’s by understanding this that we can take a look at the vast treasure trove provided in Scripture to see what the story of God’s chosen people can provide for us in our lives, influencing or informing our habits.

Now, one of the ways to do this, and to understand the implications of what Paul says in Colossians, is to follow the thread of what was revealed in shadow under the Law, as it serviced mankind for a time (cf. Gal. 3:24), over to where the fullness of day illumines upon it. One particularly potent example of this, and which might be where a number of people get started in their fascination with biblical typology and symbolism and other related matters, is the prologue of John’s Gospel. Rich in so many ways, numerous readers lay and disciplined have noted what is said in verse 14: “Now the Word became flesh and took up residence among us.” It’s essentially unanimous, built on the unimpeachable basis of the very Greek word used, that John is making reference to the tabernacle here; some commentators or preachers will explicitly render the Greek as “He tabernacled among us,” while some translators get very close by using the wording “He took up residence” or “He made His dwelling,” or something similar.

For countless years this has opened a conceptual world to many theologians where now the various elements and installations of the Tabernacle take on added significance and are seen as Christotelic. If Christ is the (antitypal) Tabernacle, what does that mean for how we see Him, and for how we interpret the Tabernacle’s role in the Old Testament? Such questions are reasonable and relevant. John 1:14 is an excellent and prominent example, but there are many examples one can choose from, often found, as I’ve remarked, under the heading of “typology,” and ask the same questions concerning. We learn from typology, which is just a form of biblical theology, and so we learn from it for the benefit of the life, edification, and discipline of the Church just as we do on the basis of the biblical theology of 1 Timothy 3:16, Ephesians 5:19, 1 Corinthians 5, Titus 1:5-16, and others. Much of this parallels what Peter Leithart has talked about concerning the “ceremonial law” of the Old Testament (per the tripartite division of the Mosaic Law popularized in Reformed theology), which is often the most neglected aspect of the Law, containing, as it were, all the troublesome bowing and scraping. As Leithart summarizes, “the apostles did not believe that the ‘ceremonial law’ is merely typological, fulfilled in Jesus’ death and resurrection, but with no further practical import” and instead, just how we hold onto and cherish typological portions of the civil and moral laws and draw out theological riches from them, the ceremonial law, which was the “regulations for worship” (read: liturgy) of the Old Covenant “and its earthly sanctuary” (Heb. 9:1) can and should do the very same thing.

The result of this marveling and wonder is the profound view of Scripture I outlined at the start of this article. Now, in particular, where I think we can find a type of Christ, and thereby ask some important theological questions, is in none other than the Ark of the Covenant. This is the results of weeks of study, as I noted above, and I wish to take you through it.

God revealed what His eternal desire for mankind was to the Israelites through Moses early in His mission to deliver them from captivity: “I will take you to Myself for a people, and I will be your God” (Ex. 6:7), a sentiment that would echo throughout the rest of the history of the Israelites as God’s deepest desire (Gen. 17:7; Ezek. 34:24; 36:28; Jer. 7:23; 30:22; 31:33). This would ultimately be demonstrated through the God-Man, Christ Jesus, Who sought “that they [the saints of the New Covenant] will all be one, just as You, Father, are in Me and I am in You. I pray that they will be in Us, so that the world will believe that You sent Me” (Jn. 17:21). God’s desire is sharing the blessings of communion with His creatures, who were first created out of the love of God’s eternal, intrinsic communion of Persons.3 The purpose of the Mosaic Covenant was to work towards this goal, in creating “[His] special possession out of all the nations” (Ex. 19:5), providing them with laws “to be holy because [He is] holy” (Lev. 11:45), allowing them to dwell safely and prosperously in the presence of a holy and almighty God.4 Ultimately, through the Mosaic Covenant the true purpose of God’s salvation history would be unveiled, “the mystery that has been kept hidden from ages and generations” (Col. 1:26), in the arrival of God’s Messiah Who would reveal the Light to all peoples (a foundational hope incipient even in the Torah: Deut. 18:15; Gen. 12:3; 18:18; 22:18; cf. Deut. 4:6-8). Yet, even this Christotelic view still incorporates the vision of God having a people for Himself, because this is still what Christ came to reveal, not just the Father (Jn. 1:18), though primarily, but derivatively the formation of kingdom life with the Father.

Now, since this was the force that laid behind the covenant-making it was God’s intent to forge Israel’s identity upon the same. God instituted a Sabbath for His people so that they’d remember their slavery in Egypt, and that God had freed them from this captivity to be brought into the Promised Land to be His people (Deut. 5:15); He instituted the Feast of Tabernacles so that the Israelites would ritually recapitulate their exodus out of captivity into this Promised Land (Lev. 23:42-43); He provided them with sacrifices to make in order to restore the ritual purity of the Israelites so they could live undefiled and unhindered with their God (Lev. 1-7; cf. 17-26). One way God did this was in creating the Tabernacle, which served as a symbol of the Israelite polity.5 At the center of the Tabernacle, in the Holy of Holies, the Ark of the Covenant was placed (Ex. 26:33-34), the Tabernacle itself at the center of Israel (e.g., Num. 1:50-53; 2:17; 3:38), and several times when the Israelites are moving the Ark is mentioned as being the holy furnishing given the honor of going before all Israel (Num. 10:33; Josh. 3:3, 14; 6:6). The Ark of the Covenant contained the very covenant of communion within itself and, therefore, given the foregoing information, meant that this covenant was at the center of Israelite life and represented it to all people.6 James Jordan mentions that the Tabernacle also symbolized the human person, the Holy of Holies being the innermost part of man (his head or heart), and thus the Covenant was to compose the inner fiber of the being of all Israelites (Deut. 6:6, 8; 11:18; 30:6; Prov. 4:21-23; cf. Mt. 22:37-39).7 In short, the Ark of the Covenant was the “heart” of Israel, and that heart was defined by the spirit of the Covenant: God’s eternal desire to be in a communion of lovingkindness with His children.

The Ark was at the center of the Tabernacle, which was symbolic of both Israel and an Israelite person, and it also went before Israel whenever the Tabernacle was on the move, signifying its primacy in the Israelite religion, and when the Temple was constructed it too would be placed at the center of the inner sanctuary (1 Kgs. 8:6). The Ark was essential to all this not just because it bore the Covenant itself, but because of its special liturgical function: being the place where God would meet with the High Priest on behalf of all Israel (Ex. 25:22).8 The Presence of God was with the Ark, His footstool on earth (1 Chr. 28:2), and this is clear from all we know about the Holy of Holies, which was so holy only the High Priest could enter it (annually), when it was full of incense that would smother the overwhelming Presence, and any unrightful entrants would die (Lev. 16:2, 13; cf. Ex. 33:20), and His Presence fulfills His desire to be among His human children.9

What else can we learn about the Ark? Well, we can study how it’s designed to figure this out. Two materials are used in the construction of the Ark per God’s instructions: acacia wood and gold. The first thing to note about these materials is that they’re what everything else in the Tabernacle is made of, including infrastructural elements of the tent (see Ex. 25-26). Why would this be? With all that we understand about Scripture and the Spirit Who breathed it out, could gold and (acacia) wood be merely arbitrary choices? Is God just very particular about the color of His drapes, nothing else to it? Reading through one of the best researchers of biblical typology, James Jordan, we can figure this out.10

Gold has two main qualities to it: first, it’s among the heaviest naturally occurring elements, and the interesting thing about this is that the Hebrew word for glory (כָּבוֹד, kabowd) is derived from the word for “heavy.” Second, gold is bright, and we know quite well, whether through scientific study or basic observation, that gold is one of the most reflective natural elements. More intriguing, brightness/luminosity/radiance is an ancient Near Eastern attribute associated with divinity, and while the direction of influence can be debated this association is derived from the stars, often seen as divine, and stars are bright (this is explained by Dr. Michael Heiser). These attributes of gold and their symbolic value manifest in all sorts of ways: gold is heavy and bright, and God’s glory is described as bright (Ezek. 1:28) and, as noted, the Hebrew word for glory derives from the word for heavy. The glory-cloud connection is important because it’s this glory-cloud that descended upon and filled the Tabernacle after it was finally set up (Ex. 40:34), and thus since gold has these symbolic attributes of glory and divinity we may conclude that the gilded manufacturing of the holy furnishings served to complement the Tabernacle’s divine Resident.

So, that’s gold, what about (acacia) wood? While I’m not sure if acacia had any significance in and of itself,11 wood certainly had symbolism.12 The significance of wood is identified by James Jordan through the concept of “arboreal theophanies,” as he remarks that “wood cut from trees can represent God’s presence among His people”13 on the basis of God’s manifestations amid/through arborescence in the Old Testament. Such a manifestation is, quite preeminently, the Burning Bush,14 as well as the patriarchal tree-altars (“Abram built a worship altar…at Shechem, and this is associated with a tree [Genesis 12:6; 35:4; Joshua 24:25; Judges 9:6]” and “the same is true of Abram at Mamre [Genesis 13:18; 14:13; 18:1], at Beersheba [Genesis 21:33], and of Jacob at Bethel [Genesis 28:18, 22; 35:7, 8, 14]”).15 Jordan also identifies an arboreal through-line in Scripture that substantiates this:

The burning wooden bush of glory on Mount Horeb becomes the burning glory atop Mount Sinai (same mountain), then the glory-cloud inside the wooden Tabernacle, and then the glory-cloud inside the wooden Temple on Mount Moriah (Zion). Thus, God reveals Himself in connection with trees and wood frequently in the Bible, because the Tabernacle and the Temple, made of wood, are themselves arborescent theophanies.16

So, in this sense “wood” bears the significance of arboreal theophany, and what the wood-gold design of the Tabernacle means is this. Wood, which we can take as metonymic for “tree,” becomes gilded with the radiance and heaviness (glory) of divinity, which represents how God’s Presence sanctifies His people as well as His inhabitation of the Tabernacle (Ex. 40:34). The wood-gold architecture of the Tabernacle fashioned by Bezalel and Oholiab, then, is an artistic rendition of an “arboreal theophany.”17

So, whereas all the holy furnishings in the Tabernacle bear symbolic value, and are all wood-gold constructs, we shall emphasize here the Ark, not just because it’s what we’re talking about right now, but, as I spent time demonstrating, it bears the Covenant itself and it’s explicitly given right of precedence among the furnishings. Thus, among the holy relics and items in the ancient Israelite religion the Ark of Covenant is the preeminent one and thus was the preeminent arboreal theophany. But this is important to understand, because there’s to some degree a metonymy between the Ark and the Tabernacle. As I’ll explain later, all the holy furnishings serve to recapitulate the construction of the Tabernacle, especially when its deconstructed to become mobile, so the Tabernacle as a whole is a wood-gold artifice, with the furnishings, prominently the Ark, being miniatures, in a sense. This will take on added significance as well when we come to exploring the typological significations.

Now what? Well, let’s break down the two components of “arboreal theophany.” “Arboreal” of course means tree, and “theophany” is a manifestation of divinity. Where do we see theophanies elsewhere in Scripture? One of the earliest theophanies is the Burning Bush, where God speaks to Moses from the Bush. Another theophany is God in the pillars of fire and cloud leading the Israelites. What we may note is that the pillar of fire and the Burning Bush reflect that luminescent aspect of divinity I mentioned above; the pillar of cloud wasn’t luminescent, but it still bears other classic attributes of divine manifestation: titanic scale, elements of nature, power and might, et al. Do you know what the typological significance of either of these theophanies is? They are considered Christophanies. This will be much easier if you already understand the matter of the Angel of Yahweh, so I invite you to watch this video by The Bible Project before continuing to keep on track with me if you aren’t.18 The Apostle Jude writes in his epistle that it was “Jesus… [Who] saved the people out of the land of Egypt” (v. 5), which is interesting because what we’re told in Exodus is that it was the Angel of the Lord Who led the Israelites (23:20-22). Similarly, this Angel is said to be Who appears to Moses in the Burning Bush (Ex. 3:2), contrary to how most may remember that story, even though it is true that God is Who Moses speaks with, one indication that the Angel and God are closely related entities.

The Angel of the Lord is also connected with the pillar of cloud (Ex. 14:19), adding further depth to what Jude said about Jesus leading the Israelites (as both the Angel and pillar are known to be what led the Israelites) as well as providing us another avenue by which to unravel this mystery. In Luke 4, Christ applies selections from Isaiah (58:6; 61:1-2) to Himself with great implications.19 Now, in the wider context of the narrative Isaiah is unfolding here the language of the pillars of cloud and fire is invoked and closely connected to what Christ will later quote, and Isaiah says that the Israelites will again experience these wonders if they turn back to Yahweh, being secured and led by their God. Isaiah alludes strongly to the language of Exodus 13:21-22 and Exodus 19:14-22 in what he says, and let us note that in Exodus 13 it is Yahweh Who is named as the leader of the Israelites, whereas in 19 it’s the Angel, adding to the co-identification of these entities, but furthermore adding intrigue to the fact that Jesus applies this to Himself. While understanding the Christological and typological implications of the Angel is advanced material in and of itself, it’s a bit more advanced to know about the ancient Judaic notion of “the Visible Yahweh,” the consubstantial20 entity conceptualized to explain the theophanic episodes of the Old Testament, constituting the immanent and tangible manifestation of the transcendent and invisible.21 The Visible Yahweh could identify with the material Creation and reveal invisible divinity to mortal man. Interestingly enough, this is precisely what Jesus Christ is described as doing in His earthly mission (Jn. 1:1-18). The Incarnation itself was a theophany, one that didn’t burst out from nowhere and dazzle us, but indwelt mortal flesh so that we could “[see] His glory—the glory of the One and Only, full of grace and truth, Who came from the Father” (1:14). In a sense, then, we can (and shall) say that all theophanies are Christophanies.

There’s more, however. Remember that based on the research of James Jordan trees have important symbolic attributes, and indeed they can be seen as theophanic. If I just introduced the notion that manifestations of divinity are all fundamentally Christophanic, does this mean arboreal imagery would also have a Christotelic aspect? I believe the answer is an emphatic yes, and it’s surprisingly easy to see why. For this, it might seem easy enough to point to a group of verses in the New Testament that establish the idea that the Jews “killed [Christ] by hanging Him on a tree” (Acts ‭10‬:‭39‬), meaning that the Crucifixion has an arborescent quality to it. Yet, it may be said that this isn’t speaking about Christ and His being necessarily, as the Cross was extrinsic to Him; we will return to the “ontological” relationship between Christ and the Cross later. Still, there’s a curious through-line that can be found in the scriptural tapestry that has Christ intersect with arboreal imagery. Where to begin? Let’s begin with the Parable of the Mustard Seed (Mt. 13:31-32; cf. Mk. 4:30-32; Lk. 13:18-19) as a rather inconspicuous starting point. As I’ve already explored the imagery to be found in this parable elsewhere, we will not recapitulate that too heavily here. Suffice to say, this Parable can be seen as depicting Christ and His burial and Resurrection, blossoming into the world-tree Who unites heaven and Earth. Just how Christ was without “stately form or majesty that might catch our attention” (‭‭Isa. ‭53‬:‭2‬) the mustard seed is a small and unsuspecting seed (the very point of the parable it’s employed in), and Christ likewise fell into the ground buried like a seed which then rose up and bore much fruit (Jn. 12:24). (The fascinating key to all this is to note that the Song of the Suffering Servant just quoted above begins with the language of a sprouting seed.) Now this isn’t the seed of a bush or crop, but of a tree, as the parable states. A Messianic prophecy with explicit arboreal imagery is found in Isaiah 11, a quite popular one: “A shoot will grow out of Jesse’s root stock, a bud will sprout from his roots” (v. 1‬). Indeed, Isaiah seems to have been the prophet of arborescence as he has several moments where he notably employs arboreal imagery. Later, in 37:31, he says that “the surviving remnant of the house of Judah shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward” which reflects what’s said before this in 27:6, that “Jacob shall take root, Israel shall blossom and put forth shoots and fill the whole world with fruit.”22 As mentioned above, Isaiah 53 compared the Suffering Servant to a growing seed. It’s curious to think why such imagery plays such a common role. Hosea later sings a similar tune, using explicit imagery in 14:5-8, which while used of Israel is also applied to God in vv. 7 and 8: “They shall return and dwell beneath My shadow…23 I am like an evergreen cypress; from Me comes your fruit.”

In light of what we’ve seen it’s wise to now consider how it all relates to our earlier discussion of the wood-gold design of the holy furnishings, and of course to Christ.24 It’s been demonstrated that Christ is the nexus of arboreal imagery in Scripture, taken up most explicitly in the through-line culminating with the Parable of the Mustard Seed. On the other hand we learned that Christ is inherently theophanic through the mystery of the Incarnation. In other words, (drum roll please) Christ is an arboreal theophany. Now, isn’t that an interesting claim? We certainly have the ingredients to make this work, the arboreal and the theophanic, which I’ve worked to establish. The most difficult part of this, however, is establishing when (or how) the types are fulfilled in the antitype. The Exodus type, for example, is fulfilled through Christ’s own exodus to the Crucifixion (Lk. 9:31). The Passover type is fulfilled, well, on Passover, by the Paschal sacrifice of Christ (1 Cor. 5:7; Jn. 1:29). There seems to be moments when an action by Christ achieves fulfilment for a typological reality, so if this is true where is it for the arboreal theophany? As Ezekiel 17:23 certainly seems to allude to, an excellent candidate is the Crucifixion, because owing both to tradition as well as textual details25 Christ can be said to have been executed on a high place, and, as mentioned earlier, some verses say He was killed on a tree; further, the Crucifixion is the defining feature of Christ, He is defined by the sacrifice He made for all men (cf. 1 Cor. 2:2), and the Israel of God in fulfillment of Ezekiel’s vision certainly drew near to the Lord through what He has done on “the mountain height of Israel” (Ezek. 20:40; cf. Jn. 12:32), and as it concerns the theophanic element if you’ve followed me long enough to witness me discuss “cruciform theology” you’d know that a major principle of that system is that the fullness of divinity was revealed on the Cross: the Crucifixion was a manifestation of divinity.26 However, there is a detail that complicates this: there is an explicit theophany recorded in the Gospels, the Transfiguration. This theophany has all the hallmarks: radiance and dazzling light, the cloud of glory, elements of nature, and most obviously the Father Himself speaking from the cloud. It also occurs atop a mountain. So, the Tree, while atop a mountain, is subject to a theophany, wherein His true divine glory is revealed. Yet, we still miss a few details here, such as all that we gain in the Crucifixion being identified as the arboreal theophany. What do we say? As I see it there are three possible identifications for the antitypal event:

The Crucifixion
The Transfiguration
The totality of the Christ-event, since Christ, as the One in Whom all Scripture is revealed, and the Incarnate Godhead, is always ever the Tree and the theophany.

Merits and demerits can be identified in either option, and I absolutely invite discussion on this, yet I think it can still be said that, in whatever way it’s fulfilled, Christ is indeed the antitypal arboreal theophany.27

But, remember what also was (typally) an arboreal theophany? The Ark of the Covenant. My claim, let me clarify, is not that the Ark was the arboreal theophany, because, one, typology is covenantally conditioned28 so this can certainly shift over time,29 and, two, the Ark was an element, a portion, of the Tabernacle, and later the Temple, either of which Jordan identifies primarily as arboreal theophanies. Repeating what I said earlier, “the gilded manufacturing of the holy furnishings serves to complement the Tabernacle’s divine Resident.” The Ark was a “subordinate” arboreal theophany, and we can also observe that since the Tabernacle was often deconstructed and not fully manifested the reason why these furnishings recapitulated the design and purpose of the Tabernacle was to recapitulate the design of the Tabernacle when that very design couldn’t be observed by the Israelite encampment. Do you see what I’m saying? Hopefully.

So, the Ark of the Covenant finds its meaning in “subtypality,” complementing the divine, as well as bearing the divine. That latter point is made clear when we understand an interesting biblical concept that the Presence of God is found in His words. This is detailed by Timothy Ward with explicit reference to the Ark:

At the heart of the tabernacle (and then subsequently at the heart of the more permanent temple in Jerusalem) sat the ark of the covenant, containing the stones inscribed with the summary of the covenant law (Exod. 25:10-22). Moreover it was directly over this ark, containing God‘s covenant words, that God promised to meet with Moses and speak to him (Exod. 25:22). This was a powerful illustration of all God’s covenant-based relationship with his people. His words, literally written in stone, represented the place where he met with the leader of his people, at the center of their encampment. This spoke powerfully of the fact that God‘s words were in some sense the mode in which he had chosen to be present among his people.
It also explains why people are regarded as having acted directly in relation to God, simply by acting in relation to the inanimate ark of the covenant, experiencing sometimes blessing and sometimes judgment as a result (as is especially narrated in 2 Sam. 6, where the Lord’s anger burns against someone who touches the ark irreverently, and his blessing falls on a household, in which the ark is placed). …God has in reality so linked himself with the words inscribed on the tablets in the ark that he is, in some sense, present in those words. Telford Work has explored this point well in the Old Testament: “It is in the ark of God and in the words said to reside there that ancient Israel sees God savingly present.”30

Now, I hold that there should be a certain degree of continuity between the different covenantal frameworks of typology, and while some may be subsumed into others that too should have a reasonable basis by which that occurs. For example, the Garden of Eden is subsumed into the Tabernacle and Temple through its paradiscal features being manifested as architectural symbolism and iconography. While I think it could certainly be possible to do this for all the holy furnishings I will focus on the Ark for the sake of priority, simplicity, and clarity.

What is the cross-covenantal continuity of the Ark? Well, here’s the thing: through the Mosaic and Davidic covenants it’s quite consistent, the Ark remains in the centermost sanctum of God’s palace and it remains the same Ark designed in Exodus 37 by Bezalel. However, in the post-exilic period the Ark is destroyed and the Israelites no longer have God’s Presence manifestly residing among them. When they return to the land the Israelites are now confused as to how they will know God, which leads to a variety of the prophecies of the exile where a whole new way of knowing God is foretold.

This new way is also spoken about by Christ with reference to the Second Temple system, which had been constructed with the absence of several of the original elements (most important the Shekinah glory), to the Samaritan woman at the well:

Believe Me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. … But a time is coming—and now is here—when the true worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such people to be His worshipers. God is spirit, and the people who worship Him must worship in Spirit and truth. (Jn. 4:21, 23-24)

Jesus is the true temple and He represents the true temple system. While the Temple might’ve been destroyed and then rebuilt as a simulacrum, the True Temple may be torn down but “in three days [He] will raise it up again” (Jn. 2:19; cf. v. 21) and “what is raised is imperishable” (1 Cor. 15:42). God has given us a way to worship that’s not contingent on place, but on person, and has promised to make that Person eternally and abundantly present to us. Immanuel, God with us.

The typality of the Tabernacle/Temple is fulfilled in Christ,31 but what about the “subtypality” of the Ark? The proposition I submit, in culmination of all we’ve discussed hitherto, is that the Ark finds its “antisubtypality” in the sacrament of the Eucharist. How do we see this? Well, note the point I emphasized above that the Ark was complementary to the divine presence in the Tabernacle, that it bore the presence of God itself as His footstool, that it carried in it the Covenant that was grounded on God’s communion with His people, and that the Ark was the preeminent symbol of the Israelite religion by having right of precedence among the cultus’ relics. I hold that every single one of these attributes is applicable to the Eucharist. Christ introduces the Eucharist during the Last Supper saying that it’s symbolic of His covenant, of the blood spilt and the body broken for all mankind (Mt. 26:28), meaning that, like the Ark, the Eucharist conveys the New Covenant, which, as I established above, is the ultimate fulfillment of the communal desire of God. As Scott Hahn, the esteemed Catholic apologist, has pointed out, “the New Testament (Covenant)” is never biblically identified as a corpus of texts, but as the sacrament; “Do this,” Christ commands us, not “Read this.”32 Furthermore, the Eucharist, as Christians have always agreed (even the Reformers), contains the Real Presence of Christ within the elements of the Sacrament. This is one of the areas in which the connections between the Eucharist and Ark was first ever apparent to me, because I’ve been considering how for several weeks now that the mode of God’s Presence “within” the Ark is similar to the Eucharist: the Ark didn’t become God, but it’s material form was infused with the Presence of God’s Being and people were able to experience divinity as a result (both in the Ark bearing God’s presence [Ex. 25:22; 40:34] but also in defilement of the Ark resulting in death [2 Sam. 6]). The Eucharist is also the preeminent symbol of the Christian faith for while the other “symbols” (read: sacraments) are initiatory (baptism), one-off (ordination or marriage), or private (confession), the Eucharist is repeated, “expressive,”33 and constitutive (we as the Body of Christ partake of the Body).

There are other biblical-theological details that bear Eucharistic qualities and thus are worth bringing up. As Michael Heiser notes, building on the work of other Old Testament scholars and Assyriologists, there was a pattern for covenant-making within the ancient Near East that the establishment of the Sinaitic covenant follows, a key element of which was “a sacrificial meal between the parties involved.”34 The sacrament of the New Covenant, then, as a sacrificial meal, is a recapitulation of the covenant we have entered into with God through Christ. Given all this and more, the promise God makes to Moses that He will meet Him there “from above the atonement lid, from between the two cherubim that are over the ark of the testimony” (Ex. 25:22) becomes the blessing we receive from God in how He may be “known to [us] in the breaking of the bread” (Lk. 24:35).

The Ark of the Covenant, that which bore the Name (presence) of God,35 is to us the Blessed Sacrament revered and passed on for two thousand years by countless multitudes of saints. In the Old Covenant, the Ark contained the Rod of Aaron, a sign of his priestly calling and authority, the Manna, a sign of God’s preservation of His people through the wilderness which they received through faith, and the Tablets of Stone, the words of God’s divine law that structured the Old Covenant. In the New, we find the Messiah Who is our High Priest and comes not from the order of Aaron but of Melchizedek, Who is the living law of God, the Way, the Truth, and the Life, Who by His own authority (“Amen, amen, I say unto you”) establishes the New Law, and Who we feed on by faith in the wilderness of sin as exiles on the way to the Promised Land (Heb. 4; 1 Pet. 1:3-9). What a marvelous revelation this should be, oh how it makes sense of why Christians have revered the Eucharist for generations and generations! This is no cheap parlor-trick, not cardboard and grape juice, but the Body and Blood of our Lord, which we “take and eat…in remembrance that Christ died for [us], and feed on Him in [our] heart by faith, with thanksgiving” (BCP 338). In the same way the Israelites would fall before the Ark (Jos. 7:6), worshiped the divinity within (Ps. 98:5; 132:7-8), and understood it to be the place where they met their God (cf. Ex. 25:22), Christians for ages have fallen before the Eucharist, adored the divine Presence within, and have had profound experiences of the same in communicating with the elements of the sacrificial victim. This should affect our worship, it should affect our theology, it should affect our whole being, piercing our joints and marrow, for it did the very same to the Israelites. In the age of modernity, what better way to heal people of their wounds than show them God and let them worship Him in His presence?

The Ruminatrix

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