And six branches shall come out of the sides of it; three branches of the candlestick out of the one side, and three branches of the candlestick out of the other side:
The lampstand was solid gold, not hollow, and magnificently wrought with ornamental knops and flowers, but far more than decoration, it spoke truth. The tabernacle had no windows because that old covenant dwelt in darkness; the sun of righteousness had not yet risen. Yet God did not leave them in silence: His Word was their lamp, the prophets were branches spreading its light through the ages. We have the same light still, though the world remains a dark place without it.
AI summary
Commenting on Exodus 25:31-40
And in the candlestick shall be four bowls,.... That is, in the trunk or body of it; the branches had but three apiece, but this being larger had four: and these were also made like unto almonds, with their knops and their flowers; as the bowls on the branches had with them.
The candlestick issued whole from a single mass of beaten gold: its pedestal, its hollow stem rising upward, its cups shaped like flower calyxes, its knobs round and polished, its petals bursting open, all one unified work, nothing added, nothing soldered. The form itself declares that whatever branches forth from the true stem must proceed organically from it, or it is not the Lord's handiwork.
AI summary
Commenting on Exodus 25:31-40