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This article compares two biblical accounts: the description of the construction of the Tabernacle (Ex. 25–40), and its connection to the myth of Eve’s creation (Gen. 2). I aim to reveal the literary and symbolic links between “feminine” attributes in these two formative accounts, from their development in biblical literature to their appearances in rabbinic midrash and medieval Kabbalah. My reading seeks to combine gender, myth, and literary study, to explore how erotic images of the sacred were developed and proliferated over generations.

The position of the prescriptive unit regarding the construction of the incense altar (Exod 30:1–10) has been identified in previous scholarship as problematic. In support of Julius Wellhausen’s diachronic solution to this problem, several additional irregularities in this unit can be adduced, as well as indications in the larger Priestly texts in the Pentateuch that an independent altar for incense was not in use. An explanation for the entire array of irregularities is based on the suggestion that the incense altar was meant to replace another vessel, the menorah. The current command regarding the function of the menorah (Exod 25:37b) raises doubts regarding its originality. Based on other features in the menorah unit (Exod 25:31–38) an alternative, original command designating the menorah for burning incense can be reconstructed. When the incense altar replaced the menorah in that role, the author of its prescriptive unit had to argue in favor of its legitimacy through direct polemics with the menorah’s function, and through the incorporation of it in the highly esteemed annual ritual of atonement.

This article proposes a new paradigm for coordinating altarpiece painting and Eucharistic devotion after Trent. By both accepting the demotion of painting's holy efficacy and the establishment of the Eucharist as the most important sacrament, a new order of priorities on the high altar began to develop. Painting in this era could no longer provide an authoritative source of divine matter, and its relational function was increasingly reinforced. However, there was a complex phenomenological and theological accommodation of the divinity and relationality as painting (on the side altars, that is, because the high altar was increasingly reserved for the Host) sought to regain or substitute the presence that came to be associated with the space above the altar. By examining a series of paintings--featuring reproduced sculptures, miraculous images, and visions--one is able to fully appreciate how painting either told stories to arouse devotion or, in order to compete with the Host, to charge the central part of the altarpiece with a holy substitute.

The end of the book of Exodus centers on the construction of the tabernacle, both the divine commands and the descriptive fulfillment. While several studies have attempted to explain the form and function of the descriptive fulfillment, the form-critical features of the divine commands have eluded explanation. In this article, I present a form-critical reanalysis of the tabernacle instructions, suggesting that the most salient features of the instructions (second-person directives, technical vocabulary, and descriptive nonrestrictive clauses) accord well with the features of the procedural genre known from Akkadian literature. I compare grammatical, lexical, and pragmatic aspects of the tabernacle instructions to the central features of a variety of “instruction manuals,” which include glassmaking and perfume-production manuals. I argue that the similarities between the tabernacle instructions and these manuals from Mesopotamia evidence a shared genre background, making the tabernacle instructions a tabernacle “manual” of sorts. The consistency in features additionally presents new evidence for the formal unity of a broad core of texts throughout Exod 25:1–30:10, shedding new light on various segments of the text broadly considered secondary (29:10–46; 30:1–10, 11–17, 23–38; and 31:2–6). The conclusion of the study presents avenues for future inquiry.

Choirs in female monastic and convent communities are spaces whose complexity has been highlighted because of their multipurpose and multifunctional nature. Although they are within the community’s private sphere of prayer of the divine office, it has also been noted that they play a liturgical role as the space from which the nuns ‘hear’ and follow the celebrations taking place in the church and even in the choral altars. The devotional–liturgical binomial is joined by other contrasting terms, like esglesia dintra–sgleya de fora, indicating a duality, as follows: the claustration (as an enclosed, internal and private space of the nuns) and the external church accessible to priests and laypeople, as well as private devotion versus community devotion. The Poor Clares of the monastery of Sant Antoni i Santa Clara actually mentioned the choir altar as nostro altar, underscoring the close bonds that joined them to a liturgical table in this private space, as opposed to those of the esglesia defora. The objective of this article is to study the choirs of three female monasteries in Barcelona during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries—Sant Pere de les Puel·les (Benedictines), Sant Antoni i Santa Clara and Santa Maria de Pedralbes (both Clarissan)—from a holistic standpoint, including spaces, functions, goods, furnishings and decorations.

A first-of-its-kind history, The Mormon Tabernacle Choir tells the epic story of how an all-volunteer group founded by persecuted religious outcasts grew into a multimedia powerhouse synonymous with the mainstream and with Mormonism itself. Drawing on decades of work observing and researching the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, Michael Hicks examines the personalities, decisions, and controversies that shaped \"America's choir.\" Here is the miraculous story behind the Tabernacle's world-famous acoustics, the anti-Mormonism that greeted early tours, the clashes with Church leaders over repertoire and presentation, the radio-driven boom in popularity, the competing visions of rival conductors, and the Choir's aspiration to be accepted within classical music even as Mormons sought acceptance within American culture at large. Everything from Billboard hits to TV appearances to White House performances paved the way for Mormonism's crossover triumph. Yet, as Hicks shows, such success raised fundamental concerns regarding the Choir's mission, functions, and image.

Examination of Exodus 25–31 and 35–40 shows that preciousness and aesthetic considerations were not the main precipitants of the use of gold in the tabernacle. Rather, the distribution of this metal in both the tabernacle and the priestly garments reveals a theological criterion for its use and distribution. It is suggested here that this criterion is rooted in pre-Israelite Yahwism, and that it emanates from the parallel of gold, approached as the metal produced by YHWH, and copper, its human-made counterpart. Accordingly, YHWH’s residence within the tabernacle is associated with pure gold, whereas the function of communion with the Israelites in this facility is attached to a gold-copper alloy (ordinary gold). It is shown that the theological significance of gold related in Exodus contrasts with the considerations of prestige and magnificence associated in Kings with the use of gold in the Jerusalem temple. These observations reveal a divergence between the Priestly and the Deuteronomistic sources in regard to the status of gold and, by extension, of the pre-Israelite background of Yahwism. It is concluded that the description of the tabernacle in Exodus challenges the abandonment of the theological dimension of gold and metallurgy in the Jerusalem temple in the late monarchic period or, alternately, serves as fundament for a theodicy that justifies the fall of the city.

Both Revelation’s apocalyptic opening of heaven, and its portrayal of heavenly space in cultic terms, have been extensively studied by scholars. The intersection of these two features, however, has not received significant attention. This article examines references to the opening of the heavenly sanctuary in Revelation, arguing that they relate primarily, though not only, to judgment. It then turns to Revelation 21, where there is a striking change in cultic language, in particular the statement of the sanctuary’s absence (Rev 21:22). It argues that this shift is a coherent development from open sanctuary language earlier in Revelation, but one that lays the emphasis on salvation. Finally, comparison to heavenly openings in other biblical and apocalyptic texts uncovers parallel motifs whilst suggesting that Revelation stands apart in the extent of its emphasis upon first judgment and then salvation.

Abstract Students of Chronicles have long been perplexed by the extensive treatment of the ark in the Chronicler's narratives, which is surprising, given the general assumption that the ark was not part of the paraphernalia of the postexilic temple. Following a brief review of the ark's depiction in Chronicles and earlier views regarding the implications of the ark's absence for the Chronicler, the present essay proffers a new approach to the place of the ark in the Chronicler's Weltanschauung.