Exodus 36

EasyEnglish Bible

36 Then Moses said, ‘Bezalel and Oholiab will do the work that the Lord has commanded us to do. Everyone that the Lord has helped to have special skills will work with them. They will help to build the tabernacle and all the other special things that the Lord has commanded.’

² Then Moses called Bezalel, Oholiab and all the other people who had special skills to come together. The Lord had given them these skills and they wanted to start the work. ³ They received from Moses all the gifts that the Israelites had chosen to bring. They had brought gifts that would help to build the tabernacle and the other special things. The Israelites continued to bring more gifts to Moses every morning. ⁴ Then all the workers who had special skills stopped doing their work. They left their work on the tabernacle and they went to speak to Moses. ⁵ They said to Moses, ‘The people are bringing many more gifts than we need to finish the tabernacle, as the Lord commanded us to do.’

⁶ So Moses sent a message to everyone in the whole camp. He said, ‘No man or woman must offer any more gifts for the work of the tabernacle.’ When the people heard Moses' message, they did not bring any more gifts. ⁷ The workers already had more things than they needed to finish all the work.

The tabernacle

⁸ All the workers who had special skills made the tabernacle with ten curtains. They used very good linen, as well as blue, purple and red material. They made beautiful pictures of cherubs on the curtains. ⁹ All the curtains were the same size: 12 metres long and 2 metres wide. ¹⁰ The workers joined five of the curtains together. They did the same thing with the other five curtains. ¹¹ They made rings of blue material along the edge of the last curtain in each set of five curtains. ¹² They put 50 rings along the edge of the first set. They put another 50 rings along the edge of the second set. The rings on one curtain were opposite to the rings on the other curtain. ¹³ They made 50 small gold hooks to join the curtains together. So a single piece of curtain made the whole tabernacle.

¹⁴ The workers used goats' hair to make 11 more curtains to cover the tabernacle, like a tent.

¹⁵ The curtains were all the same size: 13.5 metres long and 2 metres wide. ¹⁶ They joined five of the curtains together to make one set. They joined the other six curtains to make another set. ¹⁷ They used material to make 50 rings along the edge of the end curtain in each set. ¹⁸ They made 50 bronze hooks to join the two sets of curtains together. It made a single tent. ¹⁹ They used red leather from sheep's skins to cover the tent. They used another kind of good leather to cover the red leather.

²⁰ They used acacia wood to make the boards that would hold up the tabernacle. ²¹ Each board was 4 metres high and 65 centimetres wide. ²² Each board had two wooden pegs, beside each other. They made all the boards for the tabernacle like this. ²³ They made 20 boards for the south side of the tabernacle. ²⁴ They used silver to make 40 heavy bases to hold up the boards. Two bases would hold up each board. The pegs on the boards fitted into holes in the bases. ²⁵ They made 20 boards for the north side of the tabernacle. ²⁶ They made 40 silver bases, two bases under each board.

²⁷ They made six boards for the west side, at the back of the tabernacle. ²⁸ They made two boards for the corners at the back of the tabernacle. ²⁹ They fixed the two boards together, from the bottom to the top. They used a ring to fix them together at the top. They made both corners in the same way. ³⁰ So there were eight boards at the back of the tabernacle and 16 silver bases, two bases under each board.

³¹ They used acacia wood to make bars to fix across the boards. They made five bars for the south side of the tabernacle, ³² five bars for the north side, and five bars for the west side at the back of the tabernacle. ³³ The bar that would go across the centre of the boards would reach from one end of the tabernacle to the other end. ³⁴ They used gold to cover the boards and to make rings for the boards. The rings would hold the bars in place across the boards. They also covered the wooden bars with gold.

³⁵ The workers used blue, purple and red material, and good linen to make a special curtain. A worker used special skills to make pictures of cherubs on it. ³⁶ They used gold rings to hang the curtain from four poles of acacia wood. They covered the poles with gold. They made four silver bases to hold the poles. ³⁷ They made a curtain for the entrance of the tent. They used blue, purple and red material and good linen to make it. A worker used special skills to make it, so that it looked beautiful. ³⁸ They made five poles to hold up this curtain. They fixed gold hooks to the poles. They covered the tops of the poles with gold. But they used bronze to make five bases to hold up the poles.