Exodus 38:8

And he made the laver of brass, and the foot of it of brass,.... Not of the brass of the offering, for of that were made the brazen altar, its grate and vessels, the sockets of the court and court

And he made the laver of brass, and the foot of it of brass, of the lookingglasses of the women assembling, which assembled at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation.

Looking-glasses, as now they are sometimes made of polished steel, so anciently were made of polished brass, as appears both from sacred and from profane writers. See , &c. The words following seem to note a company of religious women, who in a more peculiar manner devoted themselves to the service of God in or about his tabernacle, by fasting, prayer, &c. See . And whereas some object that the tabernacle was not yet built, it may be replied, either that this is to be understood of the tabernacle spoken of , which might serve for that purpose till this was built; or that here is a prolepsis or anticipation, and that he speaks not of what the women now did, but of what they did after the tabernacle was built, which was before Moses writ these words.

Exodus 38:8 And he made the laver [of] brass, and the foot of it [of] brass, of the lookingglasses of [the women] assembling, which assembled [at] the door of the tabernacle of the congregation.Ver. 8. Looking glasses.] Or, Brazen-glasses. These devout women that used to assemble by troops at the door of the tabernacle to pray and serve God, - see Luke 2:37 1 Timothy 5:5, - frankly gave the instruments whereby they dressed their bodies, to make the instrument whereby, through faith, they might sanctify their souls. Let those who view themselves oft in their looking glasses take his counsel who said, "Art thou fair? be not like an Egyptian temple, varnish without and vermin within. Art thou foul? let thy soul be like a rich pearl in a rude shell." Some such advice as this Pythagoras gave his scholars. St James would have men "look" often "into the perfect law of liberty," that crystal glass, "and continue therein." David did so, and got much good by it. I considered my ways: Heb., I viewed my ways on both sides. The curious works of the sanctuary were wrought on both sides, therefore called works with two faces. Common works are wrought only on one side, on the other full of ends and shreds. The prophet here strives to walk curiously, precisely, accurately, to turn his feet to God’ s testimonies: and hence he is so exact in his self-searching.

(8) He made the laver of brass.—Comp. Exodus 30:18-21, where the laver is commanded, and the uses whereto it was to be applied are laid down. By “brass” we must understand “bronze” in this place, as in others. Of the lookingglasses.—Rather, mirrors. The mirrors used in ancient times were not of glass, but of burnished metal. Bronze was the metal ordinarily employed for the purpose, and was in common use in Egypt, where mirrors were bronze plates, round or oval, with a handle, like our fire-screens. The Etruscan women employed similar articles in their toilets, and had them often delicately chased with engravings. Of the women assembling.—It would seem that these women—the women wont to frequent the “tent of meeting” which Moses had recently set up (Exodus 33:7), and to flock thither in troops—offered voluntarily for the service of God the mirrors, which were among the most highly prized of their possessions. Moses, to mark his approval of their devotion, formed their offerings into the most honourable of all the brazen vessels, and recorded the fact to the women’s credit.

Verse 8. He made the laver] See Clarke on Exodus 30:18, c. The looking-glasses] The word מראת maroth, from ראה raah, he saw, signifies reflectors or mirrors of any kind. Here metal, highly polished, must certainly be meant, as glass was not yet in use and had it even been in use, we are sure that looking-GLASSES could not make a BRAZEN laver. The word therefore should be rendered mirrors, not looking-glasses, which in the above verse is perfectly absurd, because from those maroth the brazen laver was made. The first mirrors known among men were the clear, still, fountain, and unruffled lake; and probably the mineral called mica, which is a very general substance through all parts of the earth. Plates of it have been found of three feet square, and it is so extremely divisible into laminae, that it has been divided into plates so thin as to be only the three hundred thousandth part of an inch. A plate of this forms an excellent mirror when any thing black is attached to the opposite side. A plate of this mineral, nine inches by eight, now lies before me; a piece of black cloth, or any other black substance, at the back, converts it into a good mirror; or it would serve as it is for a square of glass, as every object is clearly perceivable through it. It is used in Russian ships of war, instead of glass, for windows. The first artificial mirrors were apparently made of brass, afterwards of polished steel, and when luxury increased they were made of silver; but they were made at a very early period of mixed metal, particularly of tin and copper, the best of which, as Pliny tells us, were formerly manufactured at Brundusium: Optima apud majores fuerant Brundisina, stanno et aere mixtis. - Hist. Nat. lib. xxxiii., cap. 9. But, according to him, the most esteemed were those made of tin; and he says that silver mirrors became so common that even the servant girls used them: Specula (ex stanno) laudatissima Brundisii temperabantur; donec argenteis uti caepere et ancillae; lib. xxxiv., cap. 17. When the Egyptian women went to the temples, they always carried their mirrors with them. The Israelitish women probably did the same, and Dr. Shaw states that the Arabian women carry them constantly hung at their breasts. It is worthy of remark, that at first these women freely gave up their ornaments for this important service, and now give their very mirrors, probably as being of little farther service, seeing they had already given up the principal decorations of their persons. Woman has been invidiously defined by Aristotle, an animal fond of dress, (though this belongs to the whole human race, and not exclusively to woman.) Had this been true of the Israelitish women, in the present case we must say they nobly sacrificed their incentives to pride to the service of their God. Woman, go thou and do likewise.

8. The Bronze Laver (Exodus 30:18-21). V. 8a as Exodus 30:18 a; v. 8b is new. Exodus 30:18 b–21 is not repeated here (see Exodus 40:30-32). 8b. the serving women which served] The expression is peculiar, the word used (φαΰ) being (both times) not the ordinary Heb. for ‘serve,’ but the word which means properly and regularly to serve in a host, to war or fight. The same word is used by P of the service of the Levites in (particularly) the transport of the Tabernacle and its appurtenances (Numbers 4:1-33), Numbers 4:23 (RVm.) ‘Heb. to war the warfare’; cf. the cognate subst. warfare (EVV. ‘service’), vv. 3 (see RVm.), 35, 39, 43, Exodus 8:24-25 (see RVm.). Either, it seems, the Levites in Nu., and the women here, are pictured as performing their duties in organized bands, like soldiers in an army (cf. Ges. Thes., Di.), or (Gray, Numbers, pp. 32, 36) the word is one of those which in postexilic times, when the nation had become a church, acquired a religious connotation. The women were no doubt thought of as washing, cleaning, repairing, &c. Women ‘doing “warfare” at the entrance to the tent of meeting’ are also mentioned in 1 Samuel 2:22 b: but the passage is not expressed in the LXX., besides differing in representation from the context (the sanctuary a ‘tent,’ not a hκkβl, or ‘temple’); and is beyond question a late gloss. LXX. render νηστεύσασαι, ‘fasting,’ either paraphrasing, or misreading φαΰϊ as φξεϊ (‘fasting’). Onk. has who prayed. For other haggadic interpretations, see reff. in DI. The clause (8b) must (Di. al.) be a later addition to the original narrative; for it obviously presupposes the erection of the Tent of Meeting, which is not narrated till ch. 40. The metal mirrors are to be thought of as the terϋmβh, or ‘contribution,’ of the women; and the laver and its base, cast from them, as a ‘memorial’ of the gift. Comp. the explanation of the metal casing of the altar in Numbers 16:37-40.

See the marginal reference. The women who assembled at the entrance of the tent of meeting were most probably devout women who loved the public service of religion.

THE ALTAR OF BURNT , Exodus 38:1-7. See notes on Exodus 27:1-7. THE LAVER, Exodus 38:8. See notes on Exodus 30:17-21. THE COURT OF THE , Exodus 38:9-20. See notes on Exodus 27:9-19.