Words in italic type have been added for clarity. They are not found in the original Hebrew or Aramaic.

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{2 of 2} BIBLE: Exodus Chapter 28 [“The Chosen”]

Exodus 28

Garments for the Priesthood

Exodus 28:1-4

Exodus 28:¹ “Now take Aaron your brother, and his sons with him, from among the children of Israel, that he may minister to Me as priest, Aaron and Aaron’s sons: Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar, and Ithamar.

• The firstborn male became the authority of the family after the death of the father serving the family tribe as head (chief/patriarch/priest), receiving the major part of the inheritance at the death of the family’s father. They were charged with being shepherds over the families, providing for them, sacrificing for them, and keeping them safe. They were types of Jesus, who became the Shepherd of men.
  
  • Exodus 13:1 Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Consecrate to Me all the firstborn, whatever opens the womb among the children of Israel, both of man and beast; it is Mine.” (The firstborn is the “wave offering” to God.)
    
  • Genesis 4:4 Abel, the son of Adam made a sacrifice of the firstborn of his flocks to God and it pleased God. But God rejected the sacrifice of vegetables by Cain. Cain killed his brother in jealousy and was cursed by God.
    • The sacrifice was the blood of the firstborn.
      • Cain was “religious”. He offered a sacrifice to God, but being religious doesn’t save anyone. Abel also offered a sacrifice; the blood saves.
      • “Blood” IS the gospel: Christ shed His blood for the forgiveness of sins, was buried and rose again the 3rd day.
      • The “Red Blood” of Christ saves. Religion does not.
      • When Adam sinned, he covered himself with a fig leaf. The fig leaf, like religion, cannot save. Religion is man trying to save himself by his own works. God replaced Adam’s fig leaf with the skin of an animal, shedding its blood.
        
  • Likewise, Esau was the firstborn of Isaac. His twin brother, Jacob came out of the womb holding on the Esau’s heal. When Esau sold his birthright for a bowl of Jacob’s soup, he denigrated his relationship with God and everything that came with it; the inheritance, the blessing, the authority, and the relationship with God. Esau swore he would kill Jacob. Esau is associated with a demonic mountain; Seir.
    • Malachi 1:^2-3  “I have loved you,” says the Lord. “Yet you say, ‘In what way have You loved us?’
      Was not Esau Jacob’s brother?”
      Says the Lord.
      “Yet Jacob I have loved; But Esau I have hated, and laid waste his mountains (Seir) and his heritage for the jackals of the wilderness.”
      
  • Jesus was the firstborn male who opened the womb; His mother Mary being impregnated by the Holy Spirit. The consecration of the firstborn points to the coming Messiah.
    
  • The Levites were set aside as servants to Aaron’s line of priesthood. The Levites replaced and represented the firstborn of Israel (Ex. 13:2; Num. 3:11–13). In that sense, the entire tribe of Levi served a priestly function, but ONLY Aaron and his descendants had the priestly office.
    
    • The Levites were not priests per se; they served as a “Wave Offering” to the Aaronic Priests.
    • Numbers 8:16b “I have taken them (the Levites) for Myself instead of all who open the womb, the firstborn of all the children of Israel.

Exodus 28:² And you shall make holy garments for Aaron your brother, for glory and for beauty.

Exodus 28:³ So you shall speak to all who are gifted artisans, whom I have filled with the spirit of wisdom, that they may make Aaron’s garments, to consecrate him, that he may minister to Me as priest.

Exodus 28:⁴ And these are the garments which they shall make: a breastplate, an ephod, a robe, a skillfully woven tunic, a turban, and a sash. So they shall make holy garments for Aaron your brother and his sons, that he may minister to Me as priest.

• Some suggest the Jews no longer exist today, that they are “fake jews”. DNA evidence proves this statement as being a false belief:
  
  • “Despite the evident diversity displayed by the world’s distinct Jewish populations, both culturally and physically, genetic studies have demonstrated most of these to be genetically related to one another, having ultimately originated from a common ancient Israelite population that underwent geographic branching and subsequent independent evolutions.
    
    A study published by the National Academy of Sciences found that “the paternal gene pools of Jewish communities from Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East descended from a common Middle Eastern ancestral population”, and suggested that “most Jewish communities have remained relatively isolated from neighboring non-Jewish communities during and after the Diaspora”. Researchers expressed surprise at the remarkable genetic uniformity they found among modern Jews, no matter where the diaspora has become dispersed around the world. Moreover, DNA tests have demonstrated substantially less inter-marriage in most of the various Jewish ethnic divisions over the last 3,000 years than in other populations.
    
    The findings lend support to traditional Jewish accounts accrediting their founding to exiled Israelite populations. The scientists estimated the date of the original priest (Aaron, the brother of Moses) based on genetic mutations, which indicated that the priest (Aaron) lived roughly 106 generations ago, between 2,650 and 3,180 years ago depending whether one counts a generation as 25 or 30 years.”
    
    • ^{Hammer MF, et al. (June 2000). “Jewish and Middle Eastern non-Jewish populations share a common pool of Y-chromosome biallelic haplotypes”. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 97 (12): 6769–74. Bibcode:2000PNAS…97.6769H. doi:10.1073/pnas.100115997. PMC18733. PMID10801975.
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_ethnic_diversity}

The Ephod

Exodus 28:⁵ “They shall take the gold, blue, purple, and scarlet thread, and the fine linen,

Exodus 28:⁶ and they shall make the ephod of gold, blue, purple, and scarlet thread, and fine woven linen, artistically worked.

Exodus 28:⁷ It shall have two shoulder straps joined at its two edges, and so it shall be joined together.

Exodus 28:⁸ And the intricately woven band of the ephod, which is on it, shall be of the same workmanship, made of gold, blue, purple, and scarlet thread, and fine woven linen.

Exodus 28:⁹ “Then you shall take two onyx stones and engrave on them the names of the sons of Israel:

Exodus 28:¹⁰ six of their names on one stone and six names on the other stone, in order of their birth.

Exodus 28:¹¹ With the work of an engraver in stone, like the engravings of a signet, you shall engrave the two stones with the names of the sons of Israel. You shall set them in settings of gold.

Exodus 28:¹² And you shall put the two stones on the shoulders of the ephod as memorial stones for the sons of Israel. So Aaron shall bear their names before the Lord on his two shoulders as a memorial.

Exodus 28:¹³ You shall also make settings of gold,

Exodus 28:¹⁴ and you shall make two chains of pure gold like braided cords, and fasten the braided chains to the settings.

The Breastplate

Exodus 28:¹⁵ “You shall make the breastplate of judgment. Artistically woven according to the workmanship of the ephod you shall make it: of gold, blue, purple, and scarlet thread, and fine woven linen, you shall make it.

Exodus 28:¹⁶ It shall be doubled into a square: a span shall be its length, and a span shall be its width.

Exodus 28:¹⁷ And you shall put settings of stones in it, four rows of stones: The first row shall be a sardius, a topaz, and an emerald; this shall be the first row;

Exodus 28:¹⁸ the second row shall be a turquoise, a sapphire, and a diamond;

Exodus 28:¹⁹ the third row, a jacinth, an agate, and an amethyst;

Exodus 28:²⁰ and the fourth row, a beryl, an onyx, and a jasper. They shall be set in gold settings.

Exodus 28:²¹ And the stones shall have the names of the sons of Israel, twelve according to their names, like the engravings of a signet, each one with its own name; they shall be according to the twelve tribes.

Exodus 28:²² “You shall make chains for the breastplate at the end, like braided cords of pure gold.

Exodus 28:²³ And you shall make two rings of gold for the breastplate, and put the two rings on the two ends of the breastplate.

Exodus 28:²⁴ Then you shall put the two braided chains of gold in the two rings which are on the ends of the breastplate;

Exodus 28:²⁵ and the other two ends of the two braided chains you shall fasten to the two settings, and put them on the shoulder straps of the ephod in the front.

Exodus 28:²⁶ “You shall make two rings of gold, and put them on the two ends of the breastplate, on the edge of it, which is on the inner side of the ephod.

Exodus 28:²⁷ And two other rings of gold you shall make, and put them on the two shoulder straps, underneath the ephod toward its front, right at the seam above the intricately woven band of the ephod.

Exodus 28:²⁸ They shall bind the breastplate by means of its rings to the rings of the ephod, using a blue cord, so that it is above the intricately woven band of the ephod, and so that the breastplate does not come loose from the ephod.

Exodus 28:²⁹ “So Aaron shall bear the names of the sons of Israel on the breastplate of judgment over his heart, when he goes into the holy place, as a memorial before the Lord continually.

Exodus 28:³⁰ And you shall put in the breastplate of judgment the Urim and the Thummim, and they shall be over Aaron’s heart when he goes in before the Lord. So Aaron shall bear the judgment of the children of Israel over his heart before the Lord continually.

Other Priestly Garments

Exodus 28:³¹ “You shall make the robe of the ephod all of blue.

Exodus 28:³² There shall be an opening for his head in the middle of it; it shall have a woven binding all around its opening, like the opening in a coat of mail, so that it does not tear.

Exodus 28:³³ And upon its hem you shall make pomegranates of blue, purple, and scarlet, all around its hem, and bells of gold between them all around:

Exodus 28:³⁴ a golden bell and a pomegranate, a golden bell and a pomegranate, upon the hem of the robe all around.

Exodus 28:³⁵ And it shall be upon Aaron when he ministers, and its sound will be heard when he goes into the holy place before the Lord and when he comes out, that he may not die.

Exodus 28:³⁶ “You shall also make a plate of pure gold and engrave on it, like the engraving of a signet:

Exodus 28:³⁷ And you shall put it on a blue cord, that it may be on the turban; it shall be on the front of the turban.

Exodus 28:³⁸ So it shall be on Aaron’s forehead, that Aaron may bear the iniquity of the holy things which the children of Israel hallow in all their holy gifts; and it shall always be on his forehead, that they may be accepted before the Lord.

Exodus 28:³⁹ “You shall skillfully weave the tunic of fine linen thread, you shall make the turban of fine linen, and you shall make the sash of woven work.

Exodus 28:⁴⁰ “For Aaron’s sons you shall make tunics, and you shall make sashes for them. And you shall make hats for them, for glory and beauty.

Exodus 28:⁴¹ So you shall put them on Aaron your brother and on his sons with him. You shall anoint them, consecrate them, and sanctify them, that they may minister to Me as priests.

Exodus 28:⁴² And you shall make for them linen trousers to cover their nakedness; they shall reach from the waist to the thighs.

Exodus 28:⁴³ They shall be on Aaron and on his sons when they come into the tabernacle of meeting, or when they come near the altar to minister in the holy place, that they do not incur iniquity and die. It shall be a statute forever to him and his descendants after him.