The tabernacle, according to the Bible, was a sort of temporary makeshift version of a temple, which the Israelites used for a few centuries, before and after settling in the promised land.

Have you ever tried to make sense of the Bible’s descriptions of the tabernacle? I gave it a try, and now I don’t think it’s possible to make sense of it. The Bible does not do a good job of describing the tabernacle. At all.

The tabernacle is also known as the tent of meeting. But it says they also made a tent to go over the tabernacle. So that’s a tent for a tent. Why does a tent need to have a tent over it?

It says the tabernacle has a courtyard. I’m pretty sure a courtyard is an open-air area surrounded by a building. But this “courtyard” is actually way bigger than the tabernacle, with the courtyard surrounding the tabernacle instead of the other way around. Which makes it just a yard, not a courtyard.

There are a bunch of upright frames, each 1.5 cubits by 10 cubits. These seem to be the main thing that forms the main structure of the main part of the tabernacle. The total length of the tabernacle is 20 frames long, and then the shorter rear wall / west side / far end is six frames plus two more frames on the corners. It says those two corner frames “must be double“, but I have no idea what that’s supposed to mean. As a result, I don’t know how wide the tabernacle is supposed to be.