Exodus 25:5

And rams' skins dyed red, and badgers' skins, and shittim wood,

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(5) Rams’ skins dyed red.—North Africa has always been celebrated for the production of the best possible leather. Herodotus describes the manufacture of his own times (Hist. iv. 189). Even at the present day, we bind our best books in morocco. Brilliant colours always were, and still are, affected by the North African races, and their “red skins” have been famous in all ages. It is probable that the Israelites had brought with them many skins of this kind out of Egypt.

Badgers’ skins.—The badger is not a native of North Africa, nor of the Arabian desert; and the translation of the Hebrew takhash by “badger” is a very improbable conjecture. In Arabic, tukhash or dukhash is the name of a marine animal resembling the seal; or, perhaps it should rather be said, is applied with some vagueness to a number of sea-animals, as seals, dugongs, dolphins, sharks, and dog-fish. The skins here spoken of are probably those of some one or more of these animals. They formed the outer covering of the Tabernacle (Exodus 26:14).

Shittim wood.—That the shittah (plural, shittim) was a species of Acacia is now generally admitted.

It was certainly not the palm; and there are no trees in the Sinaitic region from which boards could be cut (see Exodus 26:15) except the palm and the acacia. The Sinaitic acacia (A. Seyal) is a “gnarled and thorny tree, somewhat like a solitary hawthorn in its habit and manner of growth, but much larger” (Tristram). At present it does not, in the Sinaitic region, grow to such a size as would admit of planks, ten cubits long by one and a half wide, being cut from it; but, according to Canon Tristram (Nat. Hist. Of the Bible, p. 392), it attains such a size in Palestine, and therefore may formerly have done so in Arabia. The wood is “hard and close-grained, of an orange colour with a darker heart, well adapted for cabinetwork.”

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

25:1-9 God chose the people of Israel to be a peculiar people to himself, above all people, and he himself would be their King. He ordered a royal palace to be set up among them for himself, called a sanctuary, or holy place, or habitation. There he showed his presence among them. And because in the wilderness they dwelt in tents, this royal palace was ordered to be a tabernacle, that it might move with them. The people were to furnish Moses with the materials, by their own free will. The best use we can make of our worldly wealth, is to honour God with it in works of piety and charity. We should ask, not only, What must we do? but, What may we do for God? Whatever they gave, they must give it cheerfully, not grudgingly, for God loves a cheerful giver, 2Co 9:7. What is laid out in the service of God, we must reckon well bestowed; and whatsoever is done in God's service, must be done by his direction.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Rams' skins dyed red - Skins tanned and colored like the leather now known as red morocco.

Badgers' skins - Rather, leather, probably of a sky-blue color, formed from the skins of the תחשׁ tachash (a general name for marine animals), which was well adapted as a protection against the weather.

Shittim wood - The word שׁטים shı̂ṭṭâm is the plural form of שׁטה shı̂ṭâh, which occurs as the name of the growing tree, Isaiah 41:19. The tree is satisfactorily identified with the Acacia seyal, a gnarled and thorny tree, somewhat like a solitary hawthorn in its habit and manner of growth, but much larger. It flourishes in the driest situations, and is scattered more or less numerously over the Sinaitic Peninsula. It appears to be the only good wood produced in the wilderness. No other kind of wood was employed in the tabernacle or its furniture. In the construction of the temple cedar and fir took its place 1 Kings 5:8; 1 Kings 6:18; 2 Chronicles 2:8.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

5. badgers' skins—The badger was an unclean animal, and is not a native of the East—rather some kind of fish, of the leather of which sandals are made in the East. [See on [23]Ex 39:34 and [24]Eze 16:10.]

shittim wood—or Shittah (Isa 41:19), the acacia, a shrub which grows plentifully in the deserts of Arabia, yielding a light, strong, and beautiful wood, in long planks.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

A kind of wood growing in Egypt and the deserts of Arabia, very durable and precious. See Exodus 35:24 Numbers 33:49 Isaiah 41:19 Joel 3:18.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And rams' skins died red,.... Of these were made a covering for the tent or tabernacle:

and badgers' skins, which were for the same use: the Septuagint version calls them hyacinth or blue skins; according to which, they seem to be the rams' skins died blue; and so Josephus (b) seems to have understood it; and it is much questionable whether the same creature is meant we call the badger, since that with the Israelites was an unclean creature; nor is its skin made use of for shoes, or well could be, as the skin of this creature is said to be, Ezekiel 16:10. Jarchi says it was a kind of beast only at that time; and Aben Ezra says, it was known in those days but not now: and

shittim wood; supposed by the Jewish writers, as Kimchi (c), and Ben Melech from him, to be the best and most excellent kind of cedar: Aben Ezra conjectures, and he delivers it but as a conjecture, that there might be near Mount Sinai a forest of "shittim" trees; and while the Israelites were there they cut them down for booths, which they might carry with them when they removed from thence; for, he says, Moses did not speak of the tabernacle till after the day of atonement: and since Acacia is by much the largest and the most common tree of the deserts of Arabia, as Dr. Shaw (d) observes, he thinks there some reason to conjecture, that the "shittim wood", whereof the several utensils of the tabernacle, &c. were made, was the wood of Acacia: and long ago it was the opinion of Cordus (e) that the "shittim wood" was the Acacia of Dioscorides; and it is the same with the Senton or Santon of the Arabians, which is the Egyptian thorn that grows in the wilderness, of which Herodotus (f) says, they cut wood of two cubits out of and make ships of burden of it: this is said to grow in the parts of Egypt at a distance from the sea; in the mountains of Sinai, at the Red sea, about Suez, in the barren wilderness; which circumstances seem to determine it to be the "shittim wood" (g): some places where it might grow in plenty seem to have had their names from it, see Numbers 25:1.

(b) Ut supra. (Antiq. l. 3. c. 6. sect. 1.) (c) Sepher Shorash. rad. (d) Travels, p. 144. Ed. 2.((e) Apud Drus. Heb. Adag. Decur. 3. Adag. 4. (f) Euterpe, sive, l. 2. c. 96. (g) Vid. Scheuchzer. Physic. Sacr. vol. 2. p. 204.

Geneva Study Bible

And rams' skins dyed red, and badgers' skins, and {c} shittim wood,

(c) Which is thought to be a kindred of Cedar, which will not rot.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

5. Skins and wood.

rams’ skins dyed red] These formed the second covering over the certains (Exodus 26:14).

sealskins] Heb. ‘skins of tĕḥâshim,’ a word of uncertain meaning. In Arab. tuḥas or duḥas means a dolphin, which makes it probable that the dugong (Malay duyong, a sea-cow) is meant, an animal in general appearance not unlike a dolphin, though with a larger and blunter nose (see ill. in Toy’s Ezekiel, in SBOT., p. 124), species of which are common in the Red Sea; their thick and hard skins supply the Bedawin of the Sin. Peninsula with material for sandals (NHB. 44 f.; EB. i. 450 f.). An alternative view has been propounded lately, which may also be right, that taḥash is a loan-word from the Egypt. tḥs, ‘leather’ (Bondi, Aegyptiaca, 1 ff., with a full discussion of different views). The third or outermost covering over the curtains forming the ‘Dwelling’ (Exodus 26:14, &c.), wrappings for the sacred vessels on transport (Numbers 4:6 ff.), and women’s sandals (Ezekiel 16:10), are mentioned as made of taḥash skins. AV. badgers, though some such animal is advocated in the Talm., lacks philological foundation, and has no probability. It is doubtful also whether either seals or porpoises (RV. and RVm.) are sufficiently common in either the Red Sea or the Medit. to be the animals intended.

acacia] Heb. shiṭṭim [for shinṭim], shewn to be acacia, from sanṭ, the Arab. name of that tree. Several species of acacia are found in Palestine, the Sin. Peninsula, and the Arabian desert (EB. s.v. Shittah tree): the Acacia seyâl flourishes in dry wâdys, and grows freely in the Peninsula, and along the W. shore of the Dead Sea: it is a gnarled and thorny tree, some 15–25 feet in height: and its wood is hard, close-grained, and durable (cf. the rend. of LXX. ξύλα ἄσεπτα). According to Doughty (Arab. Des. ii. 678, cited in EB. l.c.), another species is used for shipbuilding on the Arabian coast of the Red Sea. The wood of the tree is mentioned only in the Pent., in connexion with the Tent of Meeting: the tree itself is mentioned also in Isaiah 41:19. See further NHB. 390 ff., DB. Shiṭṭah tree, the illustration above, p. 181; and the note on Joel 3:18 in the Camb. Bible.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 5. - And rams' skins dyed red. The manufacture of leather was well-known in Egypt from an early date, and the Libyan tribes of North Africa were celebrated for their skill in preparing and dyeing the material (Herod. 4:189). Scarlet was one of the colours which they peculiarly affected (ibid.). We must suppose that the skins spoken of had been brought with them by the Israelites cut of Egypt. And badgers' skins. It is generally agreed among moderns that this is a wrong translation. Badgers are found in Palestine, but not either in Egypt or in the wilderness. The Hebrew takhash is evidently the same word as the Arabic tukhash or dukhash, which is applied to marine animals only, as to seals, dolphins, dugongs, and perhaps sharks and dog-fish. "Seals' skins" would perhaps be the best translation. (Compare Plin. H. N. 2:55; Sueton. Octav § 90.) Shittim wood. It is generally agreed that the Shittah (plural Shittim) was an acacia, whether the seyal (Acacia seyal) which now grows so abundantly in the Sinaitic peninsula, or the Acacia Nilotica, or the Serissa, is uncertain. The seyal wood is "hard and close-grained of an orange colour with a darker heart, well-adapted for cabinet work;" but the tree, as it exists nowadays, could certainly not furnish the planks, ten cubits long by one and a half wide, which were needed for the Tabernacle (Exodus 35:21). The Serissa might do so, but it is not now found in the wilderness. We are reduced to supposing either that the seyal grew to a larger size anciently than at present, or that the serissa was more widely spread than at the present day. Exodus 25:5

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

מאדּמים אלים ערת rams' skins reddened, i.e., dyed red. תּחשׁ is either the seal, phoca, or else, as this is not known to exist in the Arabian Gulf, the φῶκος equals φώκαινα of the ancients, as Knobel supposes, or κῆτος θαλάσσιον ὅμοιον δελφῖνι, the sea-cow (Manati, Halicora), which is found in the Red Sea, and has a skin that is admirably adapted for sandals. Hesychius supposes it to have been the latter, which is probably the same as the large fish Tn or Atm, that is caught in the Red Sea, and belongs to the same species as the Halicora (Robinson, Pal. i. p. 170); as its skin is also used by the Bedouin Arabs for making sandals (Burckhardt, Syr. p. 861). In the Manati the upper skin differs from the under; the former being larger, thicker, and coarser than the latter, which is only two lines in thickness and very tough, so that the skin would be well adapted either for the thick covering of tents or for the finer kinds of ornamental sandals (Ezekiel 16:10). שׁטּים עצי acacia-wood. שׁטּה for שׁנטה, the true acacia (acacia vera), which grows in Egypt and on the Arabian peninsula into a tree of the size of a nut-tree, or even larger;

(Note: See Abdallatif's Merkwrdigkeiten Aegyptens, and Rosenmller, Althk. iv. i. pp. 278-9. This genuine acacia, Sont, must not be confounded, according to Robinson (Pal. 2, 350), with the Acacia gumnifera (Talh). Seetzen also makes a distinction between the Thollhh, the Szont of the Egyptians, and the Szeil, and between an acacia which produces gum and one which does not; but he also observes that the same tree is called both Thollhh and Szeil in different places. He then goes on to say that he did not find a single tree large enough to furnish planks of ten cubits in length and one and a half in breadth for the construction of the ark (he means, of the tabernacle), and he therefore conjectures that the Israelites may have gone to Egypt for the materials with which to build the tabernacle. But he has overlooked the fact, that it is not stated in the text of the Bible that the boards of the tabernacle, which were a cubit and a half in breadth, were cut from one plank of the breadth named; and also that the trees in the valleys of the peninsula of Sinai are being more and more sacrificed to the charcoal trade of the Bedouin Arabs (see p. 366), and therefore that no conclusion can be drawn from the present condition of the trees as to what they were in the far distant antiquity.)

the only tree in Arabia deserta from which planks could be cut, and the wood of which is very light and yet very durable.