5574 tablet
Dictionary of Bible Themes

Dictionary of Bible Themes  »  5000 Humanity  »  5200 Human civilisation  »  5574 tablet

A flat, usually rectangular, surface used for writing. Stone tablets, symbolising permanence, were usually engraved with an iron tool. Tablets of moist clay and writing boards of wood or ivory containing a layer of wax were inscribed with a stylus. The term is also used figuratively to refer to the human heart.

Tablets engraved with an iron tool

Job 19:23-24 See also Jeremiah 17:1

The Ten Commandments were inscribed on stone tablets

The tablets were inscribed by God

Deuteronomy 9:9-11 In keeping with ancient Near Eastern practice, the two tablets may have been duplicates of a single covenant document. See also Exodus 24:12; Exodus 31:18; Deuteronomy 4:13; Deuteronomy 5:22

The tablets were broken

Exodus 32:15-19 See also Deuteronomy 9:15-17

New tablets were inscribed by God

Deuteronomy 10:1-4 See also Exodus 34:4,28-29

The new tablets were put into the ark

Deuteronomy 10:5 See also 1 Kings 8:9 pp 2 Chronicles 5:10; Hebrews 9:4

God's commands were copied onto altar stones

Deuteronomy 27:2-8 See also Joshua 8:30-32

Writing tablets

Tablets of unspecified material

Habakkuk 2:2 See also Isaiah 30:8; Luke 1:63

Other surfaces used for writing

1 Kings 7:36 The bases of the bronze lavers in Solomon's temple were engraved; Isaiah 8:1 Isaiah's inscription is with a pen on a scroll; Ezekiel 4:1 Ezekiel draws a plan of Jerusalem on a clay tablet. This was a common medium for plans in Babylon.

Tablets of the heart

The commands and teachings of Proverbs

Proverbs 3:3 See also Proverbs 6:21; Proverbs 7:3

The new covenant

Jeremiah 31:33 Under the new covenant God's law will be inward, written on human hearts rather than on tablets of stone. See also Ezekiel 36:26-27; 2 Corinthians 3:3; Hebrews 8:10; Hebrews 10:16

See also

1260  finger of God
1349  covenant at Sinai
1352  covenant, the new
4366  stones
5012  heart
5306  engraving
5352  inscriptions
5377  law, Ten Commandments
5439  pen
5638  writing
7306  ark of the covenant
7410  phylactery



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