a cake (as usually punctured) · definite article + noun, common feminine singular absolute
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Exodus 25:30 And thou shalt set upon the table shewbread before me alway.
Exodus 40:23 And he set the bread in order upon it before the LORD; as the LORD had commanded Moses.
1 Samuel 21:4-5 And the priest answered David, and said, There is no common bread under mine hand, but there is hallowed bread; if the young men have kept t…
1 Kings 18:31 And Elijah took twelve stones, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob, unto whom the word of the LORD came, saying, Isra…
Matthew 12:4 How he entered into the house of God, and did eat the shewbread, which was not lawful for him to eat, neither for them which were with him,…
Acts 26:7 Unto which promise our twelve tribes, instantly serving God day and night, hope to come. For which hope’s sake, king Agrippa, I am accused o…
James 1:1 James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad, greeting.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Leviticus 24:1-9
Care is here taken, and orders are given, for the decent furnishing of the candlestick and table in God's house.
I. The lamps must always be kept burning. The law for this we had before, Exo 27:20, Exo 27:21. It is here repeated, probably because it now began to be put in execution, when other things were settled. 1. The people were to provide oil (Lev 24:2), and this, as every thing else that was to be used in God's service, must be of the best, pure olive-oil, beaten, probably it was double-strained. This was to cause the lamps to burn; all our English copies read it lamps, but in the original it is singular in Lev 24:2 - to cause the lamp to burn; but plural in Lev 24:4 - he shall order t…
take fine flour, and bake twelve cakes--for the showbread, as previously appointed (Exo 25:30). Those cakes were baked by the Levites, the flour being furnished by the people (Ch1 9:32; Ch1 23:29), oil, wine, and salt being the other ingredients (Lev 2:13).
two tenth deals--that is, of an ephah--thirteen and a half pounds weight each; and on each row or pile of cakes some frankincense was strewed, which, being burnt, led to the showbread being called "an offering made by fire." Every Sabbath a fresh supply was furnished; hot loaves were placed on the altar instead of the stale ones, which, having lain a week, were removed, and eaten only by the priests, except in cases of necessity (Sa1 21…
Bake twelve cakes - See the whole account of the shew-bread in the notes on Exo 25:30 (note); and relative to the table on which they stood, the golden candlestick and silver trumpets carried in triumph to Rome, see the note on Exo 25:31.
John Gill on Leviticus 24:5
And thou shalt take fine flour,.... Of wheat, and the finest of it:
and bake twelve cakes thereof; answerable to the twelve tribes, as the Targum of Jonathan, which were typical of the spiritual Israel of God:
two tenth deals shall be in one cake; that is, two tenth parts of an ephah, which were two omers, one of which was as much as a man could eat in one day of the manna: so that one of these cakes was as much as two men could eat of bread in one day; each cake was ten hands' breadth long, five broad, and seven fingers its horns, or was so high (g).
(g) Menachot, c. 11. sect. 4.
The Church Fathers
The Old Covenant had its loaves of proposition, but they, as belonging to that covenant, have come to an end. The New Covenant has its heavenly bread and cup of salvation to sanctify both body and soul. For as the bread is for the body, the Word suits the soul.
In the first place, the figure of the twelve apostles is clearly foretold here in the very number of the loaves, for when the Lord appeared in flesh he chose them to be the first of those by whose ministry he gave the food of life to all nations. And then to these same disciples of his (that is, to our apostles), he says in reference to the multitudes hungering in the wilderness, "You give them something to eat." And when five thousand men had been satisfied from the five loaves, they "gathered twelve baskets of fragments," doubtless because those sacraments of the Scriptures which the multitudes are not able to receive belong to the apostles and the apostolic men.
The twelve loaves on the table of the tabernacle then are the twelve apostles and all those in the church who follow their teaching. Since until the end of time they do not cease to renew the people of God with the nourishment of the word, they are the twelve loaves of proposition which never depart from the table of the Lord. And those same loaves are properly ordered to be made not from just any flour but from the finest wheat, doubtless because all those who minister the word of life to others must first devote themselves to the fruits of virtue. [Thus] they may commend by their actions those things that they counsel in their preaching, being conformed to the example of him who says concerning himself, "Unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone." Those same loaves are also properly commanded to be set on the table in two rows of six for the sake of concord (that is to say, charity and fellowship), for the Lord is also said to have sent his disciples out to preach two by two. This suggests figuratively that the holy teachers never disagree with one another in either their defense of truth or their ardor for love.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Shewbread — Ex. 25:30 (R.V. marg., “presence bread”); 1 Chr. 9:32 (marg., “bread of ordering”); Num. 4:7: called “hallowed bread” (R.V., “holy bread”) in 1 Sam. 21:1-6. This bread consisted of twelve loaves made…
Measure · 9. A tenth — 9. A tenth
Priests · Services of: Placing and removing show-bread — Services of: Placing and removing show-bread
Shewbread · Twelve cakes of fine flour — Twelve cakes of fine flour
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
John Calvin on Leviticus 24:5-9
Leviticus 24:5-9
5. And thou shalt take fine flour, and bake twelve cakes thereof: two tenth-deals shall be in one cake.
5. Accipies similam, et coques ex ea duodecim placentas: duarum decimarum sit unaquseque placenta.
6. And thou shalt set them in two rows, six on a row, upon the pure table before the LORD.
6. Et pones eas in duobus ordinibus: seni ordines super mensam mundam coram Jehova.
7. And thou shalt put pure frankincense upon each row, that it may be on the bread for a memorial, even an offering made by fire unto the LORD.
7. Pones quoque super ordinem utrunque thus purum, eritque pani in memoriale et incensum Jehovae.
8. Every sabbath he shall set it in order before the LO…
The preparation of the shew-bread and the use to be made of it are described here for the first time; though it had already been offered by the congregation at the consecration of the tabernacle, and placed by Moses upon the table (Exo 39:36; Exo 40:23). Twelve cakes (challoth, Lev 2:4) were to be made of fine flour, of two-tenths of an ephah each, and placed in two rows, six in each row, upon the golden table before Jehovah (Exo 25:23.). Pure incense was then to be added to each row, which was to be (to serve) as a memorial (Azcarah, see Lev 2:2), as a firing for Jehovah. על נתן to give upon, to add to, does not force us to the conclusion that the incense was to be spread upon the cakes; bu…
Traditionally called the “shewbread” (kjv), twelve flat loaves (see Exod 25:30) of this bread, the “Bread of the Presence,” were to be placed on the table in the Holy Place each Sabbath (Exod 25:23-30). This bread was considered part of the priest’s portion of the offerings. David and his men ate this bread while fleeing from Saul (1 Sam 21:1-6; see Matt 12:1-8).
Rashi on Leviticus 24:4
המנרה הטהרה THE PURE CANDELABRUM — It was so called because it was made of pure gold. Another explanation is: he shall set the lights in order upon the purity of the candlestick, implying that he must first purify (cleanse) it and remove its ashes beforehand (the words therefore mean: on a clean candlestick; cf., however, Sifra, Emor, Section 13 12 where the word is explained differently).
