330: Sanctuary — Traversing the Mishkan

BEMA Episode Link: 330: Sanctuary — Traversing the Mishkan
Episode Length: 1:58:10
Published Date: Thu, 11 May 2023 01:00:00 -0700
Session 6
About this episode:

Brent Billings, Josh Bossé, and Elle Grover Fricks gather once again around the fire and wrestle with the radical implications of putting the Divine Image into practice.

Presentation for Sanctuary — Traversing the Mishkan (PDF)

“Man as the Image of God in Genesis in the Light of Ancient Near Eastern Parallels” by Edward Mason Curtis — University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons

Image of God — Wikipedia

BEMA 248: Joy and Lot’s Untitled Wife w/ Elle Grover Fricks

Notes

*Note: The following notes are handwritten by me, Adam, and I reserve the right to be wrong.

Title & Source Summary

Episode: BEMA 330: Mishkan, Day Six (Image, Likeness, and the Incense of Presence)
Hosts: Brent Billings, with guest teachers Josh Bosse and Elle Grover-Fricks
Focus: Genesis 1:24–31 (the sixth day of creation) and Exodus 30 (the golden altar of incense, the census half-shekel, the bronze basin, the anointing oil, and the sacred incense)

Josh and Brent continue their series reading the construction of the Mishkan (Tabernacle) alongside the seven days of creation, and Elle Grover-Fricks joins them. The episode centers on the creation of humanity on day six. It focuses on the difference between tselem (image) and demut (likeness), and on what it means to “rule” and “subdue” creation. The group then reads Exodus 30 as a mirror of day six. The golden altar of incense seems out of place in the text, much as humans stand out in the creation story. The census half-shekel and the bronze basin place human identity inside community. The anointing oil and the incense stand for God’s image and God’s likeness, two things we must never counterfeit for ourselves. The episode ends by applying all this to daily practice: a steady rhythm of meeting God so that, over time, we come to bear a real family resemblance to God.

Key Takeaways

God fills creation in threes. Day four has sun, moon, and stars. Day five has small sea creatures, birds, and great sea creatures. Day six has livestock, creeping things, and wild animals. When God fills space, God fills it with community.
Image (tselem) is given, but likeness (demut) has to be worked out. God plans to make humanity “in our image, in our likeness,” yet when God actually creates humans, only image appears, and it appears twice. Likeness is left for us to grow into.
Two verbs for creation. Bara (create something radically new) appears three times when humans are made, so image is simply given. Asah (make or work) goes with “image and likeness,” which suggests an ongoing process.
Ruling can mean “drawing out.” The Hebrew word for rule (radah) can mean trampling down. It is also used for drawing honey from a comb or bread from an oven. Good rulership draws out the good that is already there.
Hierarchy with shared nourishment. Humans rule over the animals, but God gives plants to humans and animals alike as food. Bodily needs are not beneath us. We rule from above while eating alongside.
The golden altar is out of place, like humanity. It is gold, which ties it to day one and light, when we would expect bronze on this day. It stands for humanity as a unique expression of God, with gold (image) on the outside and wood (unfinished likeness) inside.
The census half-shekel puts power in its place. Counting people was usually about military strength. The equal half-shekel “covering for the soul” reminds Israel what power is for, and that no one contributes more to God’s dwelling than anyone else.
You hold only half of it. The half-shekel suggests that no single person holds the full image of God. It is complete only in community.
The bronze basin reverses day three. On day three, water was gathered to form land. At the basin, humans made of earth pass through water. Priests wash going in and going out, which the hosts connect to being cleansed by “raw community.”
Anointing oil = tselem; incense = demut. The oil belongs to God and must never be copied or poured on ordinary flesh. The incense must not be made for our own enjoyment and is kept holy “for you, for the Lord.” We are responsible for keeping God’s likeness holy before the world.
A second daily rhythm. Beside the rhythm of repentance (the outer tamid burnt offering) is an inner rhythm of simply meeting God (the incense). It is tied to the lamps, not to sin, and it is about presence and transformation.

Main Concepts & Theories

1. Day Six: The Land Brings Forth Living Creatures (Genesis 1:24–25)

Nefesh chayah (living creatures): This phrase first appeared on day five. On day six the land brings them forth, echoing day three, when the dry land brought forth plants.
Day three as community: In the series, day three stands for community. Scattered waters are gathered, and solid ground “appears.” Day six then has the land-community bringing forth more living community.
Brent’s question: On day three, “the land produced vegetation.” On day six, God says “let the land produce…” but then God made the animals. Why the difference?
- Elle’s answer: the craftsman imagery. The earth supplies the raw material, and God, like a potter, shapes it into distinct kinds.
- Josh’s answer: animals, unlike plants, live and move independently of the ground, so they need a different kind of making.
Threes as community: Each filling day adds three things (sun, moon, and stars; small sea creatures, birds, and sea giants; livestock, creeping things, and wild beasts). These groups are “messy” and run on different cycles, yet they live together.

2. Image and Likeness (Genesis 1:26–27)

Hebrew term	Basic meaning	Interpretation offered
Tselem	Image, shadow, silhouette	General outline or shape. Shadow also means protection (“under the shadow of God’s wings”). Given and secure.
Demut	Likeness, resemblance	Family resemblance with specific features (Seth is made in Adam’s demut, Genesis 5:3). Worked out over time.

The disappearing demut: In God’s planning speech (v. 26), both words appear. In the act of creation (v. 27), only tselem appears, and it is repeated twice.
Bara ×3: The verb for radical new creation appears three times in verse 27. This emphasis is even stronger than the doubling found elsewhere in the chapter.
Asah vs. bara: “Let us make (asah) humanity in our image and likeness” uses the “squishier,” process-oriented verb. Josh’s reading is that God gives the image and invites us to work out the likeness in our own souls as we live.
Royal background (Elle): Ancient Near Eastern texts, likely Egyptian, use “image” language for kings as the representatives of a god. This makes humanity a co-regent with God on earth, a “royal priesthood.” We fully walk in that kingship only when we do the work of likeness.
Seth vs. Cain: Seth carries Adam’s likeness and legacy, while Cain drops out of the family line. Likeness implies inheritance and carrying on the family character.

3. Rule, Subdue, and Shared Food (Genesis 1:28–30)

Blessing: Be fruitful, multiply, fill, subdue, and rule over fish, birds, and every living thing. The three-part list shows all of creation again as community.
Rule as “walking over”: The basic image is a hierarchy with humans above the animals.
Equal nourishment (v. 29–30): Plants are given to humans and animals. Josh links this to the Jewish idea of the yetzer hara, the “evil inclination,” as opposed to a “sinful nature.” It is rooted in our animal needs, which are legitimate but can become twisted or overextended.
- We are to rise above those needs, yet honor them. Bodily needs are not inferior.
Elle on radah: Beyond “trample,” the word is used for drawing bread out of an oven and scraping honey from a comb (Judges 14:9).
- Trampling a hungry neighbor: “Why don’t you have food? Work harder.”
- Drawing out: “I see the honey in you. Let me help bring it out,” said without paternalism.
- Sometimes a “hard no” is still needed, but it should trample obstacles, not people.
Craftsmanship (Brent): Knowing when the bread is ready and when to draw out the honey is a skill. Humans now take the craftsman’s role in partnership with God.

4. The Golden Altar of Incense (Exodus 30:1–10)

Why here? Gold goes with day one (light: the ark, the menorah, the table), and all of those were described back then. We would expect bronze on this day. The altar “sticks out” of the pattern the same way humans stick out of the creation story.
Gold outside, wood inside: The ark is gold inside and out, and the menorah is solid gold. This altar is gold only on the outside, which fits tselem (surface image) versus demut (inner likeness still being formed).
Horns (Elle): Horns recall the ram caught by its horns in the Akedah (Genesis 22), an early image of deliverance painted in catacombs. Horns also connect to El/Elohim and a strength made of things twisted together. They point to God’s saving strength.
Location ambiguity: The rabbis place it in the Holy Place, outside the curtain. Hebrews 9 appears to place it with the Holy of Holies. The Hebrew “before the face of the curtain… before the ark” can be read either way. Josh welcomes the ambiguity: which side of the curtain are we on, and which side of the tselem/demut tension?
“Where I will meet (ya’ad) you”: The word means meet or appoint, and it is also used for betrothal (Exodus 21:8–9). Elle reads it as God saying, “Here I betroth myself to you,” with echoes of Hosea 2.
- Brent: God meets people at the entrance, in the Holy Place, and everywhere. “I’ll meet you wherever you’re at.”
Called “most holy” (kodesh kodashim): The same label was given to the bronze altar. God unsettles the spatial categories set up on day two.
The daily rhythm: Incense burns morning and evening when the priest “tends” the lamps. The Hebrew uses tov (“makes the lamps good”), an echo of Genesis 1.
- The outer tamid (burnt offering) = the rhythm of repentance and change.
- The inner incense = the rhythm of meeting God, tied to light, not sin. It recalls the burning bush, Sinai, and Pentecost (Shavuot).
“Throughout your generations” (l’dorotam): Elle notes that dor means eras or cycles, so the practice continues “era after era,” not only generation after generation.
Yearly atonement: This is the only place in the Mishkan instructions where an annual atonement is mentioned, even though Yom Kippur covers the whole Tabernacle.

5. The Census Half-Shekel (Exodus 30:11–16)

“Lift up the head” (ki tisa): This is the Hebrew idiom for taking a census. Nasa (lift or carry) is also a word for forgiveness, which means taking on a burden.
Kofer (ransom): It comes from the same root as kapporet (mercy seat) and means a covering. Literally, it is “a covering of his nefesh.”
Why a census invites a plague: Censuses were normally taken to measure military strength (men aged 20 to 60). Elle compares David’s census, which Satan provokes in 1 Chronicles 21. The half-shekel turns the census back toward the question of what power is for.
For the service of the Tent of Meeting: The money serves as a memorial (zikaron) and a covering.
Equality: Rich and poor give the same amount. At the start of the Mishkan project people gave freewill gifts of different sizes, but here no one’s share of God’s dwelling counts for more. There are no donor names on the building.
Half: A half, not a whole, means you are a portion that needs everyone else. Each person fully bears God’s image, and yet no one person shows all of it.

6. The Bronze Basin (Exodus 30:17–21)

An inverted bronze altar: The altar was a hollow box over earth and stones, shaped like water gathered around dry land. The basin holds water, and earth-made people (Aaron and his sons) are cleansed by it.
Washing both ways: Priests wash hands and feet when going into the tent and when coming out to the altar. Like Jacob’s ladder, both directions pass through water, which recalls the permeable heavens of day two.
The day-six application: Priests live “on dry land” with privilege and a high calling, but they must come down and pass through the “water” of ordinary, chaotic humanity. This parallels humans eating alongside animals.
Raw community: This means the people you happen to meet, not just your curated circle. It works like a baptism that checks and cleanses our service. Elle connects it to Isaiah and to Jesus washing the disciples’ feet.

7. The Anointing Oil: Tselem (Exodus 30:22–33)

Ingredients: Liquid myrrh 500, cinnamon 250, calamus 250, cassia 500, and a hin of olive oil. “Half as much” appears again, and this form of the word for half (machatzit) is rare in Torah.
God pausing to gather materials parallels the “Let us make…” pause before humanity is created.
Anointing everything: The tent, ark, table, menorah, both altars, the basin, and the priests all become “most holy,” and whatever touches them becomes holy.
“Holy to me”: The oil belongs exclusively to God.
“Not poured (yasach) on the flesh of adam”: This verb appears only here in the Hebrew Bible. Yet the oil is put on the priests. Elle suggests the priests occupy a middle space between heaven and earth.
“Cut off from his people” (karet): This is the first time the phrase appears in the Mishkan instructions. The penalty is exclusion from the family, not death.
Interpretation: The oil is God’s image. It covers the whole Mishkan, meaning the whole community and the whole person. It cannot be copied or added to, because humans already carry it.
- Elle compares Eden: all of creation is God’s delight, and the garden is only the part we were given. Likewise, God sees all of us as most holy, not just our “heads.”
- Ezekiel 47: holiness spreads outward and heals the unclean, so the kingdom is stronger than sin.

8. The Sacred Incense: Demut (Exodus 30:34–38)

Ingredients: Stacte, onycha, galbanum, and frankincense in equal parts, salted, pure, and holy. Some is ground and placed “where I will meet (ya’ad) you.”
Salt (melach): It sounds almost the same as melech (king), which ties back to rulership.
Brent’s observation: The oil “is sacred,” but the incense is to be “most holy to you” and “holy to the Lord.”
Josh’s reading: “Do not make it for yourselves. It shall be holy to you for the Lord.” Likeness is not said to belong to God the way the image does. Instead it is our job to keep it holy for God’s sake. We preserve God’s “face” to the world.
Taking the name in vain: Elle links this to the third commandment. Don’t “carry” God’s name or face to no purpose. Josh puts it this way: “My face isn’t your brand. I’m not your mascot.”
Both carry karet: Misusing God’s image or God’s likeness puts you outside the family.

Examples & Applications

Helping a hungry neighbor: The trampling response blames them (“Get a second job”). The drawing-out response affirms their worth and helps release the “honey” already in them.
Church culture and the half-shekel: The pastor, the person setting up chairs, and the person running slides make equal contributions before God. Compare buildings named after big donors, a practice with Greco-Roman roots.
Why we use power: Before taking inventory of our “fighting strength,” whether as nations, organizations, or individuals, we should ask whether we mean to protect or to expand our empire.
Two kinds of spiritual discipline (Elle): As a parent of a toddler and an infant, Elle describes prayer times done defensively (“If I skip this, my day goes worse”), which resembles the sin-management rhythm of the tamid. The incense invites a different kind of time: being near the Creator so we come to look more like God.
Meeting God in raw community: Look for the “smell of incense,” God’s presence, in a stranger on the sidewalk, a secular person, or someone of another faith.
Honoring the body: Bodily needs are not unholy. God can meet you anywhere, even in the most ordinary bodily moments. Fasting is valuable, but it should not become contempt for the body.
Personal practices: Josh uses meditation and burns incense as a physical reminder of the daily rhythm of meeting God.

Potential Areas for Further Exploration

The tselem/demut distinction: Trace demut through Genesis 5:3, Ezekiel 1, and Psalm 17:15. Compare Karl Barth and other theologians on the imago Dei.
Ancient Near Eastern royal “image” texts: Look at Egyptian and Mesopotamian inscriptions that call kings the image of a god, and at how Genesis 1 applies this to all humanity.
Radah and good leadership: Study Judges 14:9 and other uses of the word, and build a theology of servant rulership around “drawing out.”
The yetzer hara in Jewish thought: How does the “inclination” model compare with Christian doctrines of original sin?
Where the golden altar stands: Compare Exodus 30:6, 40:5, and Hebrews 9:3–4, along with rabbinic commentary.
Ya’ad and betrothal language: Follow meeting and appointment language through Exodus 21:8–9, Hosea 2:19–20, and the Tent of Meeting (ohel mo’ed).
Census narratives: Exodus 30, Numbers 1, and 2 Samuel 24 / 1 Chronicles 21. Why is counting people so dangerous?
Gematria of bronze and serpent: Josh noted that the Hebrew word for bronze (nechoshet) is related to nachash (serpent), which rabbinic tradition says has the same numerical value as Mashiach. Connect this to the bronze serpent (Numbers 21, John 3:14).
Incense and Keturah: Explore the root q-t-r (incense, qetoret) and its possible link to Keturah in the Abraham story.
Karet (“cut off”): What did this penalty mean in practice, and how does it relate to family and covenant identity?

Comprehension Questions

In Genesis 1:26–27, God speaks of making humanity in “image” and “likeness,” but only “image” appears when humans are actually created. How do the hosts interpret this, and how do the verbs bara and asah support their reading?
Elle points out that the Hebrew word for “rule” can also mean drawing bread from an oven or honey from a comb. How does this change our picture of what it means for humans to rule over creation?
Why does the golden altar of incense seem “out of place” in Exodus 30, and how does that parallel the creation of humanity on day six?
What does the equal half-shekel in the census teach about power, contribution, and the image of God within community?
According to Josh’s reading, how do the anointing oil and the sacred incense correspond to tselem and demut, and what responsibility does each place on us?

Personalized Summary

This episode shows that being made in God’s image is both a gift and an invitation. The tselem, God’s image, is given freely and securely. Like the anointing oil, it covers every part of us and every part of our community, and it cannot be counterfeited or added to. The demut, God’s likeness, is something we grow into over time. Like the incense, it is kept holy “for the Lord” through a steady, twice-daily rhythm of meeting God. Exodus 30 fills in the picture. We rule by drawing out the good rather than trampling it down. We each hold only half a shekel, so we need one another. We must pass through the waters of raw community going in and coming out. Beyond managing sin, God invites us to be present with God, and that presence can make us more like God than we think possible. The practical challenge is to find where that rhythm of meeting God already exists in your life and where it could take root: in prayer, in your body, and in the ordinary people around you.

Edit | Previous | Next

S6 330: Sanctuary — Traversing the Mishkan

The Image and Likeness of God [1:58:10]