Catholic Commentary
The Inner Linen Curtains of the Tabernacle
8All the wise-hearted men among those who did the work made the tabernacle with ten curtains of fine twined linen, blue, purple, and scarlet. They made them with cherubim, the work of a skillful workman.9The length of each curtain was twenty-eight cubits, and the width of each curtain four cubits. All the curtains had one measure.10He coupled five curtains to one another, and the other five curtains he coupled to one another.11He made loops of blue on the edge of the one curtain from the edge in the coupling. Likewise he made in the edge of the curtain that was outermost in the second coupling.12He made fifty loops in the one curtain, and he made fifty loops in the edge of the curtain that was in the second coupling. The loops were opposite to one another.13He made fifty clasps of gold, and coupled the curtains to one another with the clasps: so the tabernacle was a unit.
Exodus 36:8–13 describes the skilled craftsmen constructing the Tabernacle's inner curtains from fine linen in blue, purple, and scarlet with woven cherubim, each measuring twenty-eight by four cubits. Ten curtains are divided into two sets of five, joined by blue loops and fifty gold clasps that unite them into a single, indivisible sanctuary, symbolizing God's perfect and complete dwelling place.
Two separate curtain-sets become one temple through fifty gold clasps—the same number as Pentecost—teaching us that unity is not uniformity, but distinct parts held together by a sacred bond.
Commentary
Exodus 36:8 — "All the wise-hearted men… made the tabernacle with ten curtains" The repetition of "wise-hearted" (Hebrew: ḥakham-lēb) is deliberate and theologically charged. This is not ordinary craftsman's skill; Exodus 31:3 and 35:31 establish that Bezalel and his co-workers received this wisdom as a gift of the Spirit of God. The ten curtains of fine twined linen (šēš mošzār) — white linen twisted for strength and brilliance — form the innermost visible ceiling and walls of the Tabernacle's holy interior. The colors blue (tĕkēlet), purple (argāmān), and scarlet (tôlaʿat šānî) are the same triad used throughout the priestly garments and the veil of the Holy of Holies (Exodus 28:5–6; 26:31), creating a visual theology of unity across the whole sanctuary. The cherubim woven into the fabric are not decorative flourishes; they mark this space as the throne-room of God, echoing Eden (Genesis 3:24) and anticipating the cherubim of the Ark itself. The worshipping priest, standing inside, would look up and see angelic figures in the ceiling — a reminder that the liturgy on earth participates in the eternal liturgy of heaven.
Exodus 36:9 — "The length of each curtain was twenty-eight cubits, and the width four cubits" Exact measurement matters in sacred architecture. Twenty-eight cubits (approximately 42 feet) and four cubits wide (approximately 6 feet) gives each curtain a proportion of 7:1 — seven, the number of completion and covenant in Hebrew thought. Nothing about the Tabernacle is accidental; the dimensions encode theology. All ten curtains share "one measure," a phrase that quietly insists on the uniformity and equality of each part. No curtain is subordinate to another; each is identically formed before being united into the whole.
Verses 10–11 — "He coupled five curtains to one another… He made loops of blue" The ten curtains are divided into two sets of five, then joined. The loops of blue (tĕkēlet) — the same heavenly blue of the priestly robe and the tassels (Numbers 15:38) — run along the outermost edge of each set. Blue in Israelite symbolic vocabulary consistently evokes the heavenly realm and divine commandment. That the joining happens through this heavenly color is significant: what binds the two halves together is oriented toward God.
Exodus 36:12 — "Fifty loops in the one curtain… The loops were opposite one another" Fifty loops on each side, perfectly aligned — "opposite to one another" — so that each loop faces its counterpart exactly. This mirroring language is precise: there is no slippage, no misalignment in the house of God. The number fifty resonates with Pentecost (Shavuot, the fiftieth day) and the Jubilee year (Leviticus 25:10), both moments of divine abundance and liberation. The symmetry of the loops also suggests the reciprocity of covenant: God's side and the people's side, facing each other in perfect correspondence.
Exodus 36:13 — "Fifty clasps of gold… so the tabernacle was a unit" The climax of the passage is this single, magnificent phrase: wayhî hamiškan eḥād — "the tabernacle was one." The gold clasps (qarsê zāhāb) do not merely hold fabric together; they make the Tabernacle a theological reality. Gold, the most precious and incorruptible of metals, is the medium of this unity. The fifty loops meet the fifty clasps in a moment of perfect correspondence. The two groups of five curtains, each complete in themselves, become indistinguishably one. This is not administrative convenience; it is a statement about the nature of the holy: God's dwelling is not fragmented but whole, not loosely assembled but organically united.
Catholic Commentary
The Catholic interpretive tradition has consistently read the Tabernacle as a multi-layered sign. At its most immediate level, this passage illustrates what the Catechism calls "the collaboration of man with God" in worship (CCC 2570) — skilled human craft ordered entirely toward the glory of God. The "wise-hearted" artisans are icons of the Christian vocation: gifts of the Holy Spirit deployed in service of the sacred.
At the typological level, the unity achieved by the fifty gold clasps in verse 13 has fascinated the Fathers. Origen (Homilies on Exodus, IX) sees the joining of the two halves as the union of the Old and New Testaments into a single divine revelation — two testaments, one Word. Jerome similarly understood the Tabernacle's structured beauty as an image of Scripture's harmony. The clasps of gold that hold the curtains together become an image of Christ himself, in whom the two covenants are not abolished but fulfilled (Matthew 5:17).
More profoundly still, the Church Fathers — particularly Cyril of Alexandria — read the Tabernacle as a figure of the Incarnation: the divine glory dwelling within a veil of created matter, just as the eternal Word dwelt within human flesh. The linen, woven with heavenly colors and angelic figures, becomes an image of Christ's humanity — pure, artfully crafted by the Holy Spirit (Luke 1:35), suffused with the divine. The Catechism affirms that the Temple/Tabernacle "prefigures… his own body" (CCC 586), and John 1:14 — "the Word became flesh and dwelt (eskēnōsen, 'tabernacled') among us" — seals the connection.
Finally, wayhī hamiškan eḥād — "the tabernacle was one" — is the prototype of the Church's unity. Pope Pius XII in Mystici Corporis (1943) and the Second Vatican Council's Lumen Gentium (§1) describe the Church as a sign and instrument of unity, joined by the golden bond of charity and the Holy Spirit, who is, as it were, the divine clasp. The fifty gold clasps anticipate the gift of the Spirit at Pentecost — the fiftieth day — who makes the Body of Christ, once and for all, one.
For Today
Contemporary Catholics can feel the fragmentation of the Church acutely — polarization across theological and political lines, parishes divided, families estranged over matters of faith. Exodus 36:13's declaration that "the tabernacle was a unit" speaks directly into this wound. Unity in the Church is not achieved by suppressing difference — the curtains remain distinct, each with its own dimensions — but by the gold clasps of charity and the Spirit, which hold the distinct parts in a single, purposeful whole.
There is also a practical invitation in the image of the "wise-hearted" craftsmen. Your professional expertise, artistic gift, or technical skill is not spiritually neutral. Bezalel's wisdom was a gift of the Holy Spirit poured out for the sake of sacred work. Catholics today are called to bring this same consecrated intentionality to their own labor: the architect designing a church, the musician composing liturgical music, the catechist preparing lessons, the parent arranging a home. All skill, when offered to God with love and precision, participates in the great project of building a dwelling place for the divine in the world.
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