A Portable Sinai
Seeing an Important Connection Between the Mountain and the Tabernacle
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When the Israelites left Egyptian captivity, they did not take a direct route to the promised land. A lot happened between their exodus and their inheritance. On the third month after leaving Egypt, the Israelites arrived at the wilderness of Sinai (Exod. 19:1). And they remained at Sinai for the next eleven months (from Exodus 19 to Numbers 10).
The morning of the third day consisted of a theophanic experience. There were “thunders and lightnings and a thick cloud on the mountain and a very loud trumpet blast, so that all the people in the camp trembled” (Exod. 19:16). Mount Sinai was “wrapped in smoke because the LORD had descended on it in fire. The smoke of it went up like the smoke of a kiln, and the whole mountain trembled greatly” (19:18).
This was the mountain from which the Lord spoke the Ten Commandments (Exod. 20:1–17). This was the mountain Moses ascended in order to receive more instructions from the Lord. Never was there a mountain like this. When the Israelites departed in Numbers 10, too bad they couldn’t take Sinai with them. Or…could they…did they?
In Exodus 25–31 and Exodus 35–39, the Israelites received and followed the instructions for building the tabernacle. The tabernacle was God’s dwelling place, a portable tent of meeting. The people were to depart Sinai with the tabernacle, setting up the portable tent wherever they camped and then disassembling it when they were ready to move on.
The climax of the book of Exodus was the descent of God’s presence upon the tabernacle. According to Exodus 40, “the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle” (40:34). Indeed, “the cloud of the LORD was on the tabernacle by day, and fire was in it by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel throughout all their journeys” (40:38).
In Exodus 19, God’s glory was evident in the fire and cloud upon Sinai. And in Exodus 40, God’s glory was evident in the fire and cloud upon the tabernacle.
The tabernacle was the new Sinai, a portable Sinai.1 The Lord had spoken from Sinai, and the Lord would now speak from the tent of meeting.
Consider the degrees of approach for both Sinai and the tabernacle. The Israelites were to remain at the bottom of the mountain (Exod. 19:17, 23), a select few were permitted to travel partway up the mountain (24:1, 9–10, 13–14), and Moses alone went all the way to the top of the mountain (24:2, 15–16). Regarding the tabernacle, the Israelites were able to come to the courtyard, the priests were permitted to enter the Holy Place, and the high priest alone was allowed to enter the Most Holy Place. As was the case with Moses, the movement into the tabernacle was an ascent to the presence of God.
The importance of the Sinai experience is reinforced by the sheer amount of literary space devoted to what happened there. From Exodus 19 to Numbers 10, the Israelites were at this glorious mountain on which the power and presence of God had descended.
In leaving the mountain, however, the Israelites didn’t leave glory behind. God was with them, among them. They traveled with the tabernacle, their new Sinai.
For more on the notion of the tabernacle being a portable Sinai, check out L. Michael Morales’s tremendous book Who Shall Ascend the Mountain of the Lord?