Catholic Commentary
The Acacia Wood Frames, Sockets, and Bars (Part 2)
28He made two boards for the corners of the tabernacle in the far part.29They were double beneath, and in the same way they were all the way to its top to one ring. He did this to both of them in the two corners.30There were eight boards and their sockets of silver, sixteen sockets—under every board two sockets.31He made bars of acacia wood: five for the boards of the one side of the tabernacle,32and five bars for the boards of the other side of the tabernacle, and five bars for the boards of the tabernacle for the hinder part westward.33He made the middle bar to pass through in the middle of the boards from the one end to the other.34He overlaid the boards with gold, and made their rings of gold as places for the bars, and overlaid the bars with gold.
Exodus 36:28–34 describes the construction of the tabernacle's structural framework, including corner boards, foundation sockets, horizontal bars, and gold overlays that hold the walls together. The passage emphasizes that the tabernacle's strength comes from unseen internal elements, particularly the middle bar that runs hidden through the boards, binding the entire structure into a unified, durable dwelling for God's presence.
A hidden bar runs through the entire tabernacle, holding all its boards together—and that bar is Christ, binding His Church in invisible unity.
Commentary
Exodus 36:28 — The Corner Boards The two corner boards are structural anomalies: they serve a double function, binding the rear wall to the two long side walls simultaneously. The Hebrew term miqṣo'â (corner) connotes something that "cuts" or "closes off," and these pieces literally close the rectangular structure into a coherent whole. Their doubled, joined nature—described in verse 29 as "double beneath" and running as a unity "all the way to its top to one ring"—means each corner piece is not merely adjacent to the others but fused, sharing identity with both walls it joins. The tabernacle has no weak seam at its corners; the joints are its strongest points.
Exodus 36:29 — Double Below, One Ring Above The doubling "beneath" likely means the corner boards were mortised or twinned at the base for extra grip in the silver sockets, yet they converged into a single golden ring at the crown. This image of two becoming one at the top is architecturally significant: what appears as multiplicity at the ground level is resolved into unity at the highest point. The "one ring" crowning the corner is a quiet but powerful architectural metaphor.
Exodus 36:30 — Eight Boards, Sixteen Sockets The rear (western) wall consists of six standard boards (Exod 26:22) plus the two corner pieces, totaling eight. Each board rides on two silver sockets—'ăḏānîm, from the root meaning "base" or "lord" ('ādōn)—giving sixteen foundations for the eight boards of this wall. Silver in the tabernacle consistently derives from the census ransom money (Exod 38:25–27), so these sockets are literally coined from the redemption price of Israel. Every board of the rear wall stands not on bare ground but on redeemed silver.
Verses 31–32 — Five Bars on Three Sides The acacia-wood bars (bĕrîḥîm) run horizontally through gold rings set into the boards, cinching the vertical planks together into a unified wall surface. Five bars are assigned to each of the three sides—north, south, and west—for a total of fifteen. Five is the number of the Pentateuch, of the books of Moses, and its repetition here is frequently noted in rabbinic and patristic reflection. The bars do not merely hold the boards; they organize them.
Exodus 36:33 — The Middle Bar: From One End to the Other This is the architectural and symbolic apex of the passage. The middle bar (bĕrîaḥ hattîḵôn) is uniquely described as passing "through the middle of the boards from one end to the other"—a continuous rod running the entire length of the wall, invisible within the boards themselves (the boards were hollow, or the bar ran through interior rings). The Talmud and later tradition imagined this bar as miraculously fashioned from the same acacia tree Abraham planted at Beersheba. Whether or not that tradition is accepted, the theological point stands: there is a hidden, central, unifying element that holds the entire dwelling together—unseen from without, but indispensable.
Exodus 36:34 — Gold Over All The chapter closes this section as it opened it: gold. Boards, rings, and bars are all "overlaid" (ṣippâ) with gold—a coating that transforms acacia wood into a gleaming, incorruptible surface. The wood provides structure; the gold provides glory. The mortal frame is given an immortal face. This gilding is not cosmetic superficiality but a theological statement: what serves God must be conformed to God's glory, transfigured from its natural state into something radiant.
Catholic Commentary
Catholic tradition reads the tabernacle framework typologically as a figure of the Church and, more intimately, of the Incarnate Christ himself. The Church Fathers were especially attentive to the structural details.
The Corner Boards as Christ the Cornerstone: The doubled corner boards—binding two walls into one unified joint—evoke Psalm 118:22 and its New Testament fulfillment in Christ, the "cornerstone" (akrogōniaios, Eph 2:20) who unites Jew and Gentile into one Body. The corner boards are not decorative; they are load-bearing. Origen (Homilies on Exodus, Hom. 13) reads the structural elements of the tabernacle as figures of those who bear up the Church by their holiness and teaching.
The Middle Bar as the Unifying Bond: The hidden central bar running from end to end is perhaps the most theologically rich element. Catholic tradition, following Origen and later Bede (On the Tabernacle, Bk. 2), has identified this middle bar with Christ himself—the hidden, divine Word who pervades and unifies all of Scripture and all of creation from "one end to the other." The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that "the unity of the two Testaments proceeds from the unity of God's plan and his Revelation" (CCC 140). Christ is that unifying thread. The bar is tîḵôn—middle, central—and Christ is, as Colossians 1:17 declares, the one "in whom all things hold together."
Silver Sockets as Redemption: The silver bases rooted in the ransom-money of the census (Exod 38:25–27) prefigure the truth that the Church is founded not on human achievement but on the price of blood. "You were ransomed… not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ" (1 Pet 1:18–19). The sockets are the Church's very foundation: redemption.
Gold as Deification (Theosis): The gilding of wood in Catholic and Eastern Christian theology points to the doctrine of divinization—human nature (wood) clothed in divine glory (gold). The Second Vatican Council's Lumen Gentium speaks of the Church as "a people made one with the unity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit" (LG 4), a unity that is not merely organizational but participatory in divine life.
For Today
The hidden middle bar is a compelling image for the contemporary Catholic. In an age when the Church can appear fragmented—by scandal, theological dispute, cultural polarization, and generational divide—this passage asks: what is the hidden bar running through the whole? The answer Catholic tradition gives is Christ himself, present in the Eucharist, in the Scriptures, in the living Tradition, and in the communion of saints. He runs from "one end to the other"—from Genesis to Revelation, from the first martyr to the last.
For the individual Catholic, the doubled corner boards speak to every vocation of unity: the married couple who joins two families into one household, the priest who holds a parish together, the religious whose community life witnesses to unity in diversity. The corner is the hardest joint to hold—and it is also the strongest.
Practically: the next time you receive the Eucharist, consider the gilded frame. You are the acacia wood—created, finite, mortal. The grace poured into you is the gold. You are not replaced or destroyed; you are overlaid, transfigured, made to house the glory of God.
Cross-References