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Blue is intimately connected with the high priest by the "ephod all of blue"
(Exod. 28: 31), and with the separation of Israel unto God (Numb. 15: 38). Purple is
the colour of kings (Judges 8: 26 and Esther 8: 15). Scarlet speaks of redemption
(Josh. 2: 18). The great Babylonian travesty seizes upon these symbols for its own ends.
"The woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour" (Rev. 17: 4).
"Alas, alas, that great city, that was clothed in fine linen, and purple, and scarlet"
(Rev. 18: 16).
The cherubim speak of the great goal of the ages, the restoration of man, and his
dominion in and through Christ. This subject is too vast for a note of this character: the
interested reader is referred to a fuller exposition of the mater in Volume XV, page 181.
The tabernacle and its symbolism sets forth the only possible way whereby the lost
paradise of Gen. 3: with its cherubim and flaming sword, its curse and its death, can
ever be exchanged for the paradise of God with its river of life, where there shall be no
more curse or death. That way was shown to our first parents before they left the garden,
their covering of skin being perpetuated in the covering of rams' skins dyed red, a symbol
too patent to need much proof. The fabric of the tabernacle therefore speaks of
redemption and restoration, a king and a priest, and we have not found any New
Testament passage that would lead us to alter the testimony.
The tent of goats' hair could never be, in the mind of an Israelite, dissociated from the
great offerings that occupied so large a place in the daily life of the people. Goats were
used as well as lambs for the passover (Exod. Xii.5); they were also used for the burnt
offering, the peace offering, thee sin offering, and for the great day of atonement,
Lev.i.10, iii, 12, 4: 23, and 16: 5, & 100: It was the purpose of God that the glorious
prophecy of the tabernacle should ever be seen beneath the shadow of atonement, the tent
of the goats' hair.