paintings. This would be a more decisive reason, if the forms of the cherubim over the ark had been as complex as the forms of those seen in the prophet's vision; but having only one face, as Bähr himself admits, it is hard to see why there must have been any more difference between the inwrought and upright cherubim than must be in the case of any other form, represented now in statue, now in painting. But Bähr farther asserts, that if at any time the cherubim had taken on a fixed form, they would have become objects of idolatrous worship. Yet not only did similar forms, but the same forms, raise aloft and spread abroad their wings in the tabernacle and in the temple for centuries, without becoming idols.

But it lay in their nature to have no fixed form, and therefore no fixed representation of form." This is the cherubic nature only according to Bähr's theory; and to what lengths his theory carries him remains to be more clearly seen in the subsequent part of our discussion. These reasons seem to us unsupported and little satisfactory.

1. The truth with regard to the form of the Mosaic cherubim — and only with regard to it need changes of form puzzle us-is, we think, that it was a fixed form, and remained the same in all representations throughout history. We are not, however, on this account, to attempt to fix the details of the form any further than we have evidence.

Their general aspect and proportions were probably human, -"Specie maximam partem humana," as says Gesenius in his Thesaurus. To this view, however, there is no direct testimony, so far as the Mosaic cherubim are concerned. The cherubim of Solomon's temple, standing ten cubits high upon their feet, stretched out their wings so that they reached the same distance from tip to tip, which equality of proportion is that of the perfect human form. Of the cherubim standing upon the mercy-seat, which was two and a half cubits in length, and raised by the ark to the height of a cubit and a half (Ex. XXV. 17; xxxvii. 6), it may be said that the two with their pedestal are in best proportions if they are admitted to have

had those of the human form. These hints are, it is true, slender evidence, yet are all the evidence we have, unless we admit the statement of Ezekiel (i. 10) to stand in proof as to the form of the cherubim in Moses' time.1

The historic cherubim, except possibly those on the walls. and doors of Solomon's temple, had only one face. For of those upon the "mercy-seat," or, more properly, "cover" of the ark (, see Gesenius in his Thesaurus), it is said: "Their faces shall look toward one another, toward the mercy-seat shall the faces of the cherubim be" (Ex. xxv. 18 sqq.; xxxvii. 9). Of those in Solomon's temple, we are told (2 Chron. iii. 13) that "their faces were inward" (in Hebrew, ), or toward the house.

Spencer and others have argued, from Ezek. i. 10 compared with x. 14, that the distinctive face of the cherubim of Moses, as well as of Ezekiel, was that of the ox; but the conclusion is unwarranted.

The cherubim are always represented with wings, when any explanation accompanies the mention of them. Those in the tabernacle stretched their wings toward each other "on high," "covering" (or, as the Septuagint translates the passage, ovoκiálovтes éπi) the lid of the ark. The huge forms of the temple were ten cubits high, and "stretched forth" (1 Kings vi. 27), or "spread out" (1 Chron. xxviii. 18) their wings, and with their faces in one direction so covered (Sept., πepieкáλvπtov éπí) the ark.

The cherubim in the temple had feet (2 Chron. iii. 13) upon which they stood; but of those in the tabernacle nothing in this regard is said.

Gesenius thinks 2 that they had hands as well, and cites Gen. iii. 24 in proof, as though these guardians of abandoned Eden held their weapon; but this seems to be decidedly more of inference than the text will support, especially since the sword is represented by the Hebrew as turning of itself. The cherubim of Solomon's temple were, as their great size made necessary, constructed of olive-trees overlaid with

1 See Keil and Delitzsch, Pent. ii. p. 170. 2 See Thesaurus, in loco.

gold, and are called "image-work" (, 2 Chron. iii. 10, opus statuarium, Vulgate, and so Gesenius; čрyov èk úλwv, Septuagint). According to Gesenius and De Wette, those of the tabernacle were formed in like manner; but this conclusion is by no means universally received. The Hebrew word used to describe the construction of the cherubim of the tabernacle is ? (Ex. xxv. 18), which is rendered by some, as in our version, beaten, or "solid work"; but by others, among whom is Gesenius, opus tornatum, or "turned work"; by the Seventy, Xpuσоторevтá, "worked in relief," or "chased work"; and by Bähr, opus ductile, with which the Vulgate Meyer and others assert that they were of one piece with the "mercy seat; but Bähr, with more of probability, contends that they were only indissolubly joined to it. "Of the mercy-seat," our version reads, "shall ye make the cherubims."

agrees.

In the tabernacle these same forms were wrought upon the curtains (Ex. xxvi. 1; xxxvi. 8), and upon the vail before the oracle (Ex. xxvi. 31; xxxvi. 35); while in the temple they were found upon the walls of the holy place (1 Kings vi. 29). Upon the doors of the oracle and of the temple they are carved with palm-trees and open flowers. They appear, also, upon the borders to the bases of the sacred lavers, and on the plates of the ledges-mingled, in the former case, with lions and oxen, and in the latter, with lions and palm-trees. Thus mingled, the cherubim of the temple, unlike those of the tabernacle, bear witness to the influence of foreign workmen. Hiram, as a Tyrian sculptor, "did not scruple," says Stanley, "to introduce bulls in the greater laver, and bulls and lions and cherubs in the lesser, probably as the emblems of the two chief tribes." It is often assumed, because the cherubim upon the walls of Ezekiel's ideal temple have two faces, one "of a man" and the other of a young lion," that those upon the walls of Solomon's temple were also double-faced. But at this point we are again warned not to force details of the temple seen in vision upon the temple built in stone, wood, and gold. If the

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cherubim of the historic temple had had two faces, it is not likely that the historians would have failed to mention such an anomaly in their form. Besides, we should not expect two-faced cherubim, with one face "the face of a lion," mingled with lions upon the sacred lavers. In the cherubim of Ezekiel's temple, where they are represented as paintings upon a flat surface, only two faces of the four could, as a matter of course, well appear; but the other two are, according to Hengstenberg, Lightfoot, and others, to be considered as existing, though not in sight. The faces which are described as in sight are the two most important among the faces of the cherubim of prophetic vision.

It appears, then, to be tolerably clear that the form of the Mosaic historic cherubim, the component parts of which can be only partially described, was in its totality one and definite, and that this form was retained without considerable change throughout Jewish history. Herder has even understated the truth, when he says that the forms wrought in the tapestry and upon the walls, both of the tabernacle and temple, were probably the same as those which rose over the mercy-seat above the ark.

We shall soon, after making the attempt, discover that it is impossible to reconcile the forms of Ezekiel's vision with those which have been thus far described, and which were the tangible results of the workman's hand. The two have few points in common. Nor is it necessary to attempt the reconciliation. The "living creatures" of Ezekiel never had any existence outside of the prophetic vision, changed the ideal form of that ideal existence like the shifting costume of the theatre, and passed away with the fading of the vision. We have no need, then, to hold the opinion that the form of the cherubim varied in various times. The form of the cherubim, so far as the figures wrought in metal and tapestry are concerned, seems to have remained the same. The only variation which appears is between the cherubim of the artisan and the cherubim of the seer, and also among the several forms of this latter sort of cherubim. Nor need we

be forced by this gratuitous attempt to reconcile things normally different into the opinion-which has already been mentioned, and is credited by Meyer, Bähr, and othersthat the cherubim never had any fixed, conventional form. If its delineation varied even in unimportant details, we have no evidence for the assertion that it did thus vary. It does not follow, however, from what has just been said, that we are to go to the other extreme of fixing for ourselves those details upon the nature of which we have no evidence. "The complete delineation of the Mosaic cherubim," says Winer, "is forever to be renounced."

When Solomon's temple was finished, assembled Israel, chiefs of fathers and people, looked on while the priests "brought up the ark of the Lord," and brought it in "unto his place" under the wings of the gigantic cherubim. Whether the smaller figures, which had crouched over the ark in the tabernacle, remained upon it in the temple of Solomon, we are not told. But they probably had already disappeared, no mention being made of the more important cherubim, while a minute account of what was done with the staves is given; and all the sacred relics having gone from the inside. of the sacred chest. It is also to be noted that two pair of cherubim over the ark would seem incongruous.

2. The form of the cherubim of vision differs almost completely from that of the Mosaic cherubim, and changes its own details according to the demands of the prophet's imagination.

From the time that the gigantic cherubim received the long wandering ark to a resting-place beneath their outspread wings, no further historical mention is made of them. If the eighteenth Psalm is, as Ewald supposes, Davidic, and the eightieth belongs to the exile, then only in the prayer of Hezekiah (2 Kings xix. 15) and in Ps. xcix. 1 (written perhaps in the time of Chaldean oppression) is even incidental and figurative mention made of the cherubim, until the prophecy of Ezekiel introduces to us, under the same name, a very different thing.