Here is, 1. A table ordered to be made of wood overlaid with gold, which was to stand, not in the holy of holies (nothing was in that but the ark with its appurtenances), but in the outer part of the tabernacle, called the sanctuary, or holy place, Heb 9:2, Heb 9:23, etc. There must also be the usual furniture of the sideboard, dishes and spoons, etc., and all of gold, Exo 25:29. 2. This table was to be always spread, and furnished with the show-bread (Exo 25:30), or bread of faces, twelve loaves, one for each tribe, set in two rows, six in a row; see the law concerning them, Lev 24:5, etc. The tabernacle being God's house, in which he was pleased to say that he would dwell among them, he would show that he kept a good house. In the royal palace it was fit that there should be a royal table. Some make the twelve loaves to represent the twelve tribes, set before God as his people and the corn of his floor, as they are called, Isa 21:10. As the ark signified God's being present with them, so the twelve loaves signified their being presented to God. This bread was designed to be, (1.) A thankful acknowledgement of God's goodness to them, in giving them their daily bread, manna in the wilderness, where he prepared a table for them, and, in Canaan, the corn of the land. Hereby they owned their dependence upon Providence, not only for the corn in the field, which they gave thanks for in offering the sheaf of first-fruits, but for the bread in their houses, that, when it was brought home, God did not blow upon it, Hag 1:9. Christ has taught us to pray every day for the bread of the day. (2.) A token of their communion with God. This bread on God's table being made of the same corn with the bread on their own tables, God and Israel did, as it were, eat together, as a pledge of friendship and fellowship; he supped with them, and they with him. (3.) A type of the spiritual provision which is made in the church, by the gospel of Christ, for all that are made priests to our God. In our Father's house there is bread enough and to spare, a loaf for every tribe. All that attend in God's house shall be abundantly satisfied with the goodness of it, Psa 36:8. Divine consolations are the continual feast of holy souls, notwithstanding there are those to whom the table of the Lord, and the meat thereof (because it is plain bread), are contemptible, Mal 1:12. Christ has a table in his kingdom, at which all his saints shall for every eat and drink with him, Luk 22:30.

Thou shalt also make a table of shittim wood - The same wood, the acacia, of which the arkstaves, etc., were made. On the subject of the ark, table of shew-bread, etc., Dr. Cudworth, in his very learned and excellent treatise on the Lord's Supper, has the following remarks: -

"When God had brought the children of Israel out of Egypt, resolving to manifest himself in a peculiar manner present among them, he thought good to dwell amongst them in a visible and external manner; and therefore, while they were in the wilderness, and sojourned in tents, he would have a tent or tabernacle built to sojourn with them also. This mystery of the tabernacle was fully understood by the learned Nachmanides, who, in few words, but pregnant, expresseth himself to this purpose: 'The mystery of the tabernacle was this, that it was to be a place for the shechinah, or habitation of Divinity, to be fixed in;' and this, no doubt, as a special type of God's future dwelling in Christ's human nature, which was the True Shechinah: but when the Jews were come into their land, and had there built them houses, God intended to have a fixed dwelling-house also; and therefore his movable tabernacle was to be turned into a standing temple. Now the tabernacle or temple, being thus as a house for God to dwell in visibly, to make up the notion of dwelling or habitation complete there must be all things suitable to a house belonging to it; hence, in the holy place, there must be a table, and a candlestick, because this was the ordinary furniture of a room, as the fore-commended Nachmanides observes. The table must have its dishes, and spoons, and bowls, and covers belonging to it, though they were never used; and always be furnished with bread upon it. The candlestick must have its lamps continually burning. Hence also there must be a continual fire kept in this house of God upon the altar, as the focus of it; to which notion I conceive the Prophet Isaiah doth allude, Isa 31:9 : Whose fire is in Zion, and his furnace in Jerusalem; and besides all this, to carry the notion still farther, there must be some constant meat and provision brought into this house; which was done in the sacrifices that were partly consumed by fire upon God's own altar, and partly eaten by the priests, who were God's family, and therefore to be maintained by him. That which was consumed upon God's altar was accounted God's mess, as appeareth from Mal 1:12, where the altar is called God's table, and the sacrifice upon it, God's meat: Ye say, The table of the Lord is polluted; and the fruit thereof, even His Meat, is contemptible. And often, in the law, the sacrifice is called God's לחם lechem, i.e., his bread or food. Wherefore it is farther observable, that besides the flesh of the beast offered up in sacrifice, there was a minchah, i.e., a meat-offering, or rather bread-offering, made of flour and oil; and a libamen or drink-offering, which was always joined with the daily sacrifice, as the bread and drink which was to go along with God's meat. It was also strictly commanded that there should be salt in every sacrifice and oblation, because all meat is unsavoury without salt, as Nachmanides hath here also well observed; 'because it was not honorable that God's meat should be unsavoury, without salt.' Lastly, all these things were to be consumed on the altar only by the holy fire which came down from heaven, because they were God's portion, and therefore to be eaten or consumed by himself in an extraordinary manner." See Clarke on Exo 25:22 (note).

And thou shall make the dishes thereof,.... On which the shewbread loaves were set. Jarchi says they were of the form of the bread, and that there were two sorts, one of gold, and one of iron; in the iron one the bread was baked, and when they took it out of the oven, they put it into the golden one until the morrow of the sabbath, when they set it in order upon the table; and that form is called "Kaarah", which we render a dish:

and the spoons thereof; or rather "cups"; these, Jarchi says, were censers, in which they put the frankincense; and there were two of them for the two handfuls of frankincense, which they put upon the two rows of shewbread, Lev 24:7. Josephus (x) calls them vials, and says, that on the bread were put two golden vials full of frankincense:

and the covers thereof, and the bowls thereof, to cover withal; the one to cover the bread, and the other to cover the frankincense; or all the above said vessels were to cover the table, and with them all it must be pretty well covered with vessels. The Jews give a different account of these two last, and of their use, which we render "covers" and "bowls": the first of these Jarchi says were like the half of hollow reeds divided to their length, made of gold; and three of them were laid in order on the top of every loaf, so that one loaf rested upon these reeds; and they separated between loaf and loaf, so that the air could come in between them, and they did not become mouldy; the latter, he says, were props like stakes of gold standing on the ground, and they were higher than the table, even as high as the rows of bread; and they were forked with live forks, one above another, and the tops (or ends) of the reeds, which were between each loaf, rested upon these forks, that so the weight of the upper loaves might not be too heavy for the lower ones, and break them. A like account of them Ben Melech gives, and observes, that some make the first word to signify the props, and the second the reeds; and so they are interpreted by Maimonides (y); and, according to the Misnah (z), the props were four, and the reeds twenty eight. According to the Septuagint version, these were vessels used in libations, or drink offerings; and the last clause is rendered in it, "with which thou shall pour out": wine or oil, and so in some other versions; but it will be difficult to find any use for such libations or drink offerings at this table.

(x) Antiq. l. 3. c. 6. sect. 6. (y) Pirush in Misn. Menachot, c. 11. sect. 6. (z) Menachot, ib.

crown--the moulding or ornamental rim, which is thought to have been raised above the level of the table, to prevent anything from falling off.