Types of Christ · The Tabernacle's Furniture
The Mercy Seat
The lid of the ark was not a lid. It was the place God named as the spot where He would meet Israel — and when Paul wanted a word for what God made Jesus to be, he reached for its Greek name.
A Lid That Was Not a Lid
— Exodus 25:17-22 — one piece of gold, and the sentence that gives it its jobTHE ARTWORKTissot painted the object this page is about, not a scene containing it: the lid, the two winged figures, and the narrow space between them where nothing is drawn. He researched the Holy Land for a decade before he painted the series, and the restraint shows — he declines to fill the gap between the cherubim with anything at all, which is exactly what Exodus does.
Every other piece of furniture in the tabernacle stands on something. This one does not. It has no legs, no frame and no independent existence — it is described entirely in terms of the box it covers, cut to its dimensions, and made of one piece of hammered gold with the two cherubim rising out of it. And what is under it matters: inside the box are the tablets of a law Israel had already broken before Moses got down the mountain with them.
And you are to construct a mercy seat of pure gold, two and a half cubits long and a cubit and a half wide. Make two cherubim of hammered gold at the ends of the mercy seat,Pure gold, sized to the ark, with two cherubim of hammered work at the two ends of it.
And the cherubim are to have wings that spread upward, overshadowing the mercy seat. The cherubim are to face each other, looking toward the mercy seat.Wings spread upward, faces toward one another — and turned toward the mercy seat. They are looking down at it.
A mercy seat of pure gold - (Compare Exo 37:6-9.) In external form, the mercy-seat was a plate of gold with the cherubim standing on it, the whole beaten out of one solid piece of metal Exo 37:7; it was placed upon the ark and so took the place of a cover. mercy seat expresses well the distinct significance and recognized designation of the Hebrew name. Exo 25:18-20 The cherubim of the mercy-seat were human figures, each having two wings. They must have been of small size, proportioned to the area of the mercy-seat.
Albert Barnes· Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New TestamentsPresbyterian
Exodus 25:17
The mercy-seat was the covering of the ark, made exactly to fit the dimensions of it. This propitiatory covering, as it might well be translated, was a type of Christ the great propitiation, whose satisfaction covers our transgressions, and comes between us and the curse we deserve.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament, 1765Wesleyan
Exodus 25:17
And then verse 22. God does not say He will meet Israel at the tent, or in the room, or at the altar. He names a spot the size of a tabletop: above the mercy seat, between the two cherubim. A nation of two million people was given one address, and it was a gold lid over a box of broken commandments.
In allusion to this mercy-seat, we are said to come boldly to the throne of grace ( Heb. iv. 16 ); for we are not under the law, which is covered, but under grace, which is displayed; its wings are stretched out, and we are invited to come under the shadow of them, Ruth ii.
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710Puritan
Exodus 25:22
Henry is reading Exodus and hearing Hebrews 4:16 — the throne of grace a believer is told to come to boldly. Notice his reason: the law is covered, and grace is what is on display.
Set the mercy seat atop the ark, and put the Testimony that I will give you into the ark. And I will meet with you there above the mercy seat, between the two cherubim that are over the ark of the Testimony; I will speak with you about all that I command you regarding the Israelites.The lid on the ark, the testimony inside — and there I will meet with you, from above the mercy seat.
Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence — the verse Henry hears underneath Exodus 25:22.
Israel's name for God was built out of this piece of furniture1 Samuel 4:4
The title Israel used for the LORD in her most solemn moments was not an abstraction. He is the one who dwells between the cherubim — a phrase that only means anything if you know what object is being pointed at. It is the mercy seat, and the name is a piece of geography.
So the people sent men to Shiloh, and they brought back the ark of the covenant of the LORD of Hosts, who sits enthroned between the cherubim. And the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were there with the ark of the covenant of God.The LORD of Hosts, who is enthroned between the cherubim — the standing title, and its address.
What Happened There
— Leviticus 16 — once a year, one man, and blood put on the goldThe mercy seat had one appointment in the calendar. On one day a year the high priest came through the curtain carrying blood, and put it on the lid and then seven times before it. The rest of the year the room was shut and the gold was in the dark. The full order of that day — the two goats, the lots, the scapegoat sent into the wilderness — belongs to its own page and is not repeated here.
And the LORD said to Moses: “Tell your brother Aaron not to enter freely into the Most Holy Place behind the veil in front of the mercy seat on the ark, or else he will die, because I appear in the cloud above the mercy seat.Not at just any time, lest he die — because God appears in the cloud over the mercy seat.
And he is to take some of the bull’s blood and sprinkle it with his finger on the east side of the mercy seat; then he shall sprinkle some of it with his finger seven times before the mercy seat. Aaron shall then slaughter the goat for the sin offering for the people and bring its blood behind the veil, and with its blood he must do as he did with the bull’s blood: He is to sprinkle it against the mercy seat and in front of it.Sprinkled on the front of the mercy seat, and seven times before it — first for himself, then for the people.
Upon the mercy-seat - To teach us, that God is merciful to sinners only through and for the blood of Christ. With his face east-ward, or upon the eastern part, towards the people, who were in the court which lay east-ward from the holy of holies, which was the most western part of the tabernacle.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament, 1765Wesleyan
Leviticus 16:14
The ordinary sprinkling of the altar was sufficient to testify the reconciliation; but this annual ceremony more greatly influenced the people's minds. Again, by this sacrifice, which they saw only once at the end of the year, the one and perpetual sacrifice offered by God's Son was more clearly represented.
John Calvin· Commentaries, 1554Reformed
Leviticus 16:2
כַּפֹּרֶת
kapporet — the atonement cover
Seven of them are the construction order in Exodus 25:17-22. Seven more are the ritual in Leviticus 16:2, 16:13, 16:14 and 16:15 — the object is named where it is made and where blood is put on it, and almost nowhere else.
כָּפַר
kaphar — to make atonement
Sixteen of them are in Leviticus 16 alone — the densest chapter in the Bible for this verb. It also carries the ransom-money instruction of Exodus 30:10-16. Related to the noun above: the covering, and the act of covering.
But see what a blessed change is made by the gospel of Christ; all good Christians have now boldness to enter into the holiest, through the veil, every day ( Heb. x. 19, 20 ); and we come boldly (not as Aaron must, with fear and trembling) to the throne of grace, or mercy-seat, Heb. iv.
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710Puritan
Leviticus 16:2
Paul Reached for the Name of the Lid
— Romans 3:25 and Hebrews 9:5 — one Greek word, and the whole page is in itThis is not a correspondence somebody noticed later. The New Testament uses the mercy seat’s own Greek name of Jesus Christ, and it does it in the most theologically loaded sentence Paul ever wrote. The word occurs twice in the whole New Testament. Both are below.
One word, two verses, two English translations
The Greek word hilastērion appears in the New Testament exactly twice. Here are both, with the English each one is usually given.
ἱλαστήριον
HILASTĒRION · G2435
Hebrews 9:5
“mercy seat”
Hebrews is describing the furniture — the gold lid, with the cherubim of glory overshadowing it. The word is the object's name.
Romans 3:25
“a propitiation”
Paul is describing a Person. God set Him forth, publicly, in His own blood. The same word — and it has stopped being furniture.
Those are the only two. Translators give the same Greek word two different English words because the two sentences are doing two different jobs — and in one of them the word is applied to Jesus Christ. Nothing here has to be argued; it only has to be counted.
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. God presented Him as the atoning sacrifice through faith in His blood, in order to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance He had passed over the sins committed beforehand.All have sinned — and God presented Christ as the place of atonement, publicly, in His own blood.
Above the ark were the cherubim of glory, overshadowing the mercy seat. But we cannot discuss these things in detail now.The cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat — the same Greek word, used of the furniture.
ἱλαστήριον
hilastērion — the place of atonement
Hebrews 9:5, where the word floor glosses it 'mercy seat,' and Romans 3:25, where it glosses it 'a propitiation.' One Greek word, two English words, and in one of the two verses it is applied to a Person.
A mercy-seat - כפרת capporeth, from כפר caphar, to cover or overspread; because by an act of pardon sins are represented as being covered, so that they no longer appear in the eye of Divine justice to displease, irritate, and call for punishment; and the person of the offender is covered or protected from the stroke of the broken law. In the Greek version of the Septuagint the word ιλαστηριον, hilasterion, is used, which signifies a propitiatory, and is the name used by the apostle, Heb 9:5.
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible, 1832Methodist
Exodus 25:17
The mercy seat was gold-plated and placed on top of the ark. On each side was the figure of a cherub. When the high priest approached it, the holy kindness of God was revealed.The apostle teaches us that Christ is the true mercy seat, of …
Theodoret of Cyrus· Interpretation of the Letter to the Romans, 458Church Father
Romans 3:25
Clarke supplies the link the word floor cannot: the Greek Old Testament — the translation the New Testament writers read and quoted — renders the Hebrew name of the lid with this same Greek word. That is a fact about translation history, not a doctrine, and it is why Paul’s first readers would have heard the furniture in his sentence immediately.
"overshadowing the mercy seat." For above the ark, as if a square golden table, which was called the mercy seat, typifying Christ (Jn. 2:2), who is called to us the propitiation and redemption (1 Cor. 1:30). See the passage in Exodus, in the places concerning …
Oecumenius· The Pseudo-Oecumenian Catena on Hebrews, 550Church Father
Hebrews 9:5
In the inner place was set the Ark of the Propitiation, which was concealed behind the veil, and was not seen by any one. The Propitiatory was a type of the Lord Christ according to the flesh, as saith the Apostle: Whom God set forth …
Cosmas Indicopleustes· The Christian Topography, Book 5, 550Church of the East
Romans 3:25
Origen quoting Romans 3:25 in full, in the third centuryCommentary on the Epistle to the Romans
Worth reading once slowly in an ancient writer’s hands, because the sentence does something unusual: it says God set Christ forth publicly in order to demonstrate His own righteousness — not only His kindness. Both halves are in the verse.
Whom God set forth as a propitiation through faith in his blood, for the showing forth of his righteousness, through the remission of former offenses, in the forbearance of God, for the showing forth of his righteousness at this present time: that he himself may be just, and the one who justifies him who is of the faith of Jesus Christ.
Origen of Alexandria· Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans, 253Church Father
Romans 3:25
They were of one piece with the mercy seat, even as the Church is one with Christ: their sole standing is on the blood-sprinkled mercy seat; they gaze down at it as the redeemed shall for ever; they are "the habitation of God through the Spirit." of glory--The cherubim were bearers of the divine glory, whence, perhaps, they derive their name.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871Reformed
Hebrews 9:5
Whatever a reader makes of the comparison, the physical observation underneath it is exact and it is the design of the object: the cherubim have no footing of their own. They stand on the lid, and they look down at it.
That Long Word, in Plain English First
— what 'propitiation' is doing in Romans 3:25 — surface, then the depth, and no house verdictStart with the object and the word looks after itself. The mercy seat was the place where God said mercy would be given, and where the blood was put. When Paul uses that word of Jesus, he is saying: this is now the place. Not a room in a tent — a Person, publicly, in His own blood.
A reader who stops there has the sentence. Everything below is the detail underneath it, and it is genuinely disputed among Christians who love the same Bible.
And love consists in this: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as the atoning sacrifice for our sins.The sister word, and the direction of the love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son.
ἱλασμός
hilasmos — propitiation
1 John 2:2 and 1 John 4:10 — the sister noun to the word on the lid, and the only two places it appears. Both are John's, and both say that Christ Himself is it.
What the word carries — and why translators differthe depth beneath the surface
The Greek word has a range, and English has to pick. Translators reach for three different things in it:
- A covering. The Hebrew noun behind it is built on a verb meaning to cover — sins covered so that they no longer stand in view. Clarke takes it this way above.
- A wiping away. Not hiding the offence but cleansing it — the reading usually rendered expiation, and the reason some modern versions avoid the older word altogether.
- The turning aside of wrath.Something real is averted, because God’s opposition to sin is real. This is what propitiation means in older English, and it is the reading Wesley defends in the next quote.
These are not three mutually exclusive parties so much as three things a reader may think the sentence is chiefly doing, and serious Christians hold each. This page gives the readings; it does not stamp one as the site’s verdict.
But if, as some teach, God never was offended, there was no need of this propitiation. And, if so, Christ died in vain. To declare his righteousness - To demonstrate not only his clemency, but his justice; even that vindictive justice whose essential character and principal office is, to punish sin.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament, 1755Wesleyan
Romans 3:25
Wesley’s sentence is blunt and worth sitting with even if a reader ends up elsewhere: if nothing was ever wrong, nothing needed putting right, and the cross becomes decoration.
A truncated commentary line, left as we found itJamieson, Fausset & Brown on Exodus 25:17
This is one of the clearest one-phrase statements of the bridge in any public-domain commentary — the lid as the propitiatory cover— and the text as it survives in the digitised edition simply stops mid-citation. It is reproduced here exactly as it stands, unrepaired, because inventing the rest of a man’s sentence is not a service to anyone.
thou shalt make a mercy seat of pure gold--to serve as a lid, covering it exactly. It was "the propitiatory cover," as the term may be rendered, denoting that Christ, our great propitiation [1Jo 2:2;
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871Reformed
Exodus 25:17
What Later Readers Added, and What Scripture Never Says
— two beautiful things the text does not claim, and five things it does not tell usA reading, not the text’s claim
The two cherubim as the two Testaments
Bonaventure, in 1257, reads the two facing figures as the Old and New Testaments, both turned to look at Christ. It is a lovely thirteenth-century reading and it has preached well for eight hundred years. Exodus says the cherubim faced each other and looked toward the mercy seat, and says nothing whatever about what they stand for. Both sentences are true, and the page keeps them separate.
As a sign of Him, there are the two Cherubim turned toward each other, but with their faces looking toward the propitiatory. The two Cherubim are the two Testaments whose gaze is directed upon Christ. He opened their minds when they understood the Scriptures, meaning …
Bonaventure· Collations on the Hexaemeron, Collation 3, 1257Franciscan
Exodus 25:20
Where Scripture is silent
Five things the Bible does not tell us
- What the cherubim’s faces looked like, or how many wings each had. Exodus says wings spread on high and faces toward each other, and stops.
- What the high priest saw when he came through the curtain.
- Whether anything visible happened when the blood was applied.
- How long he stayed, or what he did while he was in there.
- What the mercy seat weighed, or what became of it with the ark.
One thing is not silence: the text does assert the presence. God says He appears in the cloud over the mercy seat, and Israel calls Him the One enthroned between the cherubim. What is missing is the description — and most of what people picture is supplied by painters, not prophets.
The artwork
This is the Western image type called the Throne of Mercy — the Father holding the crucified Son, with the Spirit as a dove between them. It is a later devotional form, worked out in medieval Europe, and it is NOT the Exodus object: there is no gold lid here, no cherubim, no ark. It is on this page because the English name it travels under is borrowed from the mercy seat, and a reader who meets the phrase in a museum should know that the picture is the church's meditation on Romans 3:25, not an illustration of Exodus 25.
Robert Campin, The Holy Trinity (c. 1410) — Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
What the lid finally means is not complicated, and the Bible does not make anyone assemble it. Underneath: a law that had been broken. On top: gold, and blood, and a promise to meet. The New Testament puts one name on that arrangement, and the name is a Person.