The Ark IV

 

Okay, last one.

 

Yesterday I went with some friends to their Baptist church to visit its “Good Friday Experience.”

 

Inside the church lobby there was a huge line which meandered over the course of an hour, until we reached the “Experience” entrance. Over the next hour we moved through darkened corridors from one room to another, each room holding museum-quality exhibitions describing some key events of the Passion: the Last Supper, the Garden of Gethsemane, the Cross and the instruments of torture, the cloth and perfumes to anoint His body. And this, the Ark of the Covenant:

 

Now, as we know, the Ark was lost to history in the year 586 BC. The Ark was included in the exhibition to show us how the curtain inside the Temple – the one that separated the Holy of Holies, the Ark, from the outer Temple – was torn in two, from top to bottom. I took this stealth pic, and in hindsight I should have also taken one closer up from a side angle so you could sense its height and depth. If I stood on the stage, my hips and lowered hands would be equal to the poles extending from the sides. The ark in this picture, to the best of my reasoning, had the same dimensions and same design as the historical Ark.

 

The exhibitions really triggered your tactile senses deep down. I held a replica of the whip which scourged Christ – felt its weight and heft, touched the barbs of bone and stone tied to leather straps that tore into His flesh. I tried lifting the surprisingly heavy Cross. In the Garden a cool night breeze touched our skin – and the soft hooting of owls and other wildlife echoed past. It was an intriguing and worthwhile experience, and something that really furthered my understanding of the Passion.

 

Would definitely recommend.

The Ark III

 

So what happened to the Ark of the Covenant? Where is it, and if we don’t know where it is, well, what was its fate?

 

The short answer is that it’s been long lost to history, around the time the Babylonians conquered the Kingdom of Judah in the year 587 BC. Though it is not specifically mentioned during the passages describing the fall of Jerusalem and the pillaging of the Temple artifacts, one can make a good case that the Ark was taken to Babylon.

 

That’s the first possibility. And in Babylon, it could either have been destroyed (if God allowed such a thing), hidden, or transferred somewhere else. The trail runs cold.

 

Second, perhaps King Josiah from the previous post hid the Ark yet again as the Babylonians advanced on Jerusalem. Maybe in the First Temple, or in a catacomb or some other underground chamber beneath it.

 

Third, there is a mention in the Book of Second Maccabees 2:4-10 that the Prophet Jeremiah hid the Ark in a cave on Mount Nebo, the mountain where Moses overlooked the promised land before he passed on.

 

Fourth, the Ethiopian Orthodox Church claims that the Ark is housed in the northern city of Axum in Ethiopia, at the Church of Out Lady Mary of Zion. No one is allowed inside to view it, so we have little choice but to take them at their word.

 

Fifth, the Lemba people in southern Africa state that they posses the actual Ark, and keep a replica in Zimbabwe. The Lembas trace their lineage back to Yemeni traders and do practice a form a semitic religion.

 

Finally, there is a Samaritan tradition the holds the Ark is kept at a sanctuary on Mount Gerizim, about 35 miles north of Bethlehem. (However, there is also a Samaritan tradition that Abraham was to sacrifice his son Isaac on Mount Gerizim, when most biblical scholars believe the sacrifice was to take place on Mount Moriah).

 

So, in summary, the six most plausible (if such a word can describe the fate of a holy object lost nearly 2,600 years ago) locations for the Ark of the Covenant appear to be:

 

1)    1) The ruins of Babylon in Iraq

2)    2) Beneath the location of the First Temple in Jerusalem

3)    3) Mount Nebo in Jordan

4)    4) A church in Ethiopia

5)    5) A undisclosed location in southern Africa

6)    6) Mount Gerizim in Israel

 

But I’d like to think of a seventh possibility:

7)    7) A nondescript warehouse on the outskirts of Washington, D.C. …

 

(In all seriousness, my amateurish opinion probably lies with #2)

The Ark II

 

There are five “time periods” I used to sort the historical appearances of the Ark in the Bible:

 

Introductory Period

The Ark of the Covenant first enters history a year after Moses communes with God atop Mount Sinai after it is constructed by two master craftsmen under the direction of God through Moses. There is no way of scientifically dating this event, with scholarly estimates ranging from 1450 to 1250 BC. The Ark is with the Hebrews throughout their 40-year period of wandering in the wilderness.

 

The Promised Land Period

The Ark accompanies Joshua into Canaan, the Promised Land. When first crossing the Jordan, the river dries up as soon as the priests carrying the Ark touch its water, and it remains so bound until they leave the riverbed. During the Battle of Jericho, the Ark is carried around the city once a day for six days, preceded by armed men and seven priests sounding seven trumpets. On the seventh day, Jericho’s walls fall down and the Hebrews take the city.

The following battle at the city of Ai (ay-EYE) is a defeat and Joshua laments before the Ark. After the conquest of Canaan, the Ark is kept at Shiloh, then moved to Bethel, and later returned to Shiloh.

 

The Conflict with the Philistines

 

The Israelites are defeated by the Philistines at the battle of Eben-Ezer, losing 30,000 men – but worse than that, the Ark is captured. When hearing this, priest Eli falls dead and his daughter-in-law, in labor with a son when hearing the news, names the child “Ichabod” – “the glory has departed Israel” – and dies in childbirth.

The Ark is carried by the Philistines to their city of Ashdod and stored in the temple of their god, Dagon. After the first night the statue of Dagon is found prostrate and bowed down; upon being restored it is found broken the following morning. The people of Ashdod are smitten with tumors and a plague of rodents overwhelms the land. The Philistines move the Ark to the cities of Gath and then Ekron, but the affliction follows.

After the Ark was with the Philistines for seven months, they return it to the Israelites. It is set in a field and the people there offer sacrifices and burnt offerings. It remains in the city of Kireath-Jearim (KEER-ee-ath ye-REEM) for twenty years.

 

The Ark during the Kingdom

 

King Saul was with the Ark when he first confronts the Philistines, but he is too impatient to consult it. Later, King David removes the Ark from Kiriath-Jearim amongst great rejoicing.

On the way to Jerusalem, Uzzah, one of the drivers of the cart that carried the Ark puts out his hand to steady it and is struck dead by God for touching it. David, in fear, keeps it in the house of Obed-Edom the Gittite, where it remains for three months. When David finally brings the Ark to Jerusalem, he dances in front of it. His first wife, Saul’s daughter Michal, scornfully rebukes him for this.

David puts the Ark in a tent he has prepared for it and uses the tent as a personal place of prayer.     

Solomon worships before the Ark after his dream in which God promises him wisdom.           

During the construction of the Temple, a special inner room, the Holy of Holies, is prepared to receive and house the Ark. When priests emerge after first installing the Ark in the Holy of Holies, the Temple is filled with a cloud, “for the glory of the LORD had filled the house of the LORD.”

When Solomon marries Pharaoh’s daughter, he has her dwell in a house outside Jerusalem, as Jerusalem is consecrated because it contains the Ark.        

 

In Later Times

 

During a time of possible conflict with the Assyrians, King Hezekiah may have hidden the Ark and other treasures from the Temple in an unidentified spring or cistern.

King Josiah has the Ark returned to the Temple, from which it appears to have been removed by on of his predecessors. Josiah is the last biblical figure mentioned as having seen the Ark.

In 567 BC the Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar conquer Jerusalem, possibly taking away the “vessels of the ark of God,” though the Ark itself is not specifically mentioned.

The Ark of the Covenant is lost to history.

 

 

Next post: the possible fate and current location of the Ark.