RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Aristotle
Ark of the Covenant
Epiphanius (Hcer., Ixviii. 7) compares his death to that of Judas the traitor. Socrates (Hist, eccl., i. 38) and Sozomen (Hist, eccl., ii. 30) give minute accounts with disgusting details. Arius's principal work, called Thalia (" the Banquet "), which he wrote during his stay with Eusebius at Nicomedia, was a defense of his doctrine in an entertaining popular form, half poetry, half prose; with the exception of a few fragments in the tracts of Athanasius, it is lost. A letter to Eusebius of Nicomedia, and one to Alexander of Alexandria, are extant (cf. Fabricius-Harles, viii., Hamburg, 1802, p. 309). It should be borne in mind that all knowledge of Arius is derived from the accounts of his enemies and opponents, written during the course of an exceedingly bitter controversy. See Ahianism; Athanasius; and consult the works there mentioned.
ARK OF THE COVENANT.
Description (§ 1). The Second Temple (§ 5).
Meaning of Kapporeth Character of the Accounts
(§ 2). in Exodus (§ 6).
Chests Used in Other Cults The First Period of the
(§ 3). Ark's History (§ 7).
Contents of the Ark (§ 4). The Second Period (§ 8).
According to the Pentateuchal narrative, the ark of the covenant was the receptacle of the tables of the law (called " tables of the covenant," Deut. ix. 9, 11, 15; " tables of the testimony," Ex. xxxi. 18, xxxii. 15, xxxiv. 29), attesting the divine will, the foundation of the community between God and Israel. It is so called in Num. x. 33, xiv. 44; Deut. x. 8. (cf. Heb. ix. 4); in Ex. xxv. 22, xxvi. 33-34 " ark of the testimony " is found. According to the description of Ex. xxv.
10-22, xxvi. 33-34, xxxvii. 1-9, xl.
i. Descrip- 20-21, it was a chest of shittim
tion. (acacia) wood, standing on four feet,
two cubits and a half (three feet nine inches) long, a cubit and a half (two feet three inches) wide and high; it was overlaid with gold inside and out, decorated with a golden crown (rim or molding), and had a gold ring at each of the four corners above the feet, through which passed staves overlaid with gold that the ark might be carried; these staves were never to be removed. The cover was a massive golden plate, at the end of which figures of cherubim were placed, facing each other and looking toward the cover, while their outspread wings extended over the latter. The place of the ark was at the rear of the Holy of Holies of the tabernacle.
These cherubic figures direct the thought to Yahweh as enthroned over the ark (Ps. lxxx. 1; Jer. iii. 16-17). As it contained the tables of stone upon which were written the ten commandments, God was enthroned over that which was binding upon the people to which nothing could be added
and from which nothing could be taken
2- Meaning away. The Hebrew word kapporeth
of Kappo- is best taken in the sense of " cover,"
reth. not as " expiatory vessel," as is often
done after the Septuagint, which translates it by hilasterion (Vulg. propitiatorium) . " sages like Lev. xvi. 14-15; I Chron. xxviii. 11,
do not necessarily require the latter interpretation. For when on the great day of atonement, according to the first passage, the high priest sprinkled the blood of atonement upon the first part of the kapporeth, he did it because it bore the throne of God, to which the blood was to be brought near; and in the same manner the designation of the Holy of Holies as beth ha-kapporeth in the passage in Chronicles, can be rejected as unsuitable to this interpretation only by those who overlook that the kapporeth is not to be thought of without the cherubim which bear the presence of God, which presence it is which makes the place of the ark the Holy of Holies.
With the chests used in the idol worship of some nations of antiquity, the ark of the covenant had
nothing at all in common. For those
3. Chests chests contained either images of
Used in gods or a mysterious symbolism like
Other Cults, the mystic chests used in the service
of the mysteries of Dionysius, Demeter, and Venus. In the strongest contrast to the heathen mystery, that which the ark contained was known and_ revealed to all the world; but it was also known to every one that it was as holy as the Word of God, spoken to Israel, and the protodocument of the fundamental conditions of the communion-relation existing between him and his chosen people.
According to the explicit statement in I Kings viii. 9, a passage which precludes the idea that Solomon made any change in the old Mosaic sanctuary, there was nothing in the ark save the
two tables of stone. When the 4. Contents author of the Epistle to the Hebrews of the Ark. (ix. 4) says that in the ark of the
covenant were the golden pot that had manna (Ex. xvi. 33) and Aaron's rod that budded (Num. xvii. 10), he follows a tradition which proceeded from an inaccurate conception of these passages. For when Aaron is commanded (Ex. xvi. 33) to put the pot with manna " before Yahweh," and when Moses is told (Num. xvii. 10) to bring Aaron's rod again " before the testimony," it does not follow that these things were kept inside of the ark. A comparison with other passages where similar expressions are used does not lead to the inference that the pot of manna and the rod were kept in the Holy of Holies, but rather that they were in the sanctuary.
At the destruction of Solomon's temple the ark seems to have been burned; at least the second
temple had an empty Holy of Holies. 5. The According to the Talmudic treatise Second Yoma (536), a stone three fingers Temple, above the ground was in the place of
the ark, on which the high priest put his censer on the yearly day of atonement. It is this stone to which, according to some expositors, Zech. iii. 9 refers. The prophet Jeremiah refers to a time of which he says (iii. 16-17) " m those days, said the Lord, they shall say no more, the ark of the covenant of the Lord, neither shall it come to mind; neither shall they remember it; neither shall they visit it; neither shall that be done any more. At that time they shall call
Ark of the Covenant Aries