A White Stone – 4
[This has been posted previously but it makes sense to include it under this banner. In fact, the article itself might now make more sense!]
Gold, Onyx and Bdellium
(The Tabernacle imagery is as much fun as it is grand and terrifying. I was thinking about rainbow striped onyx. In “Behind the Scenes”, James Jordan wrote:)
“These glorious gems represent the sons matured into tribes. A baby has not yet matured into anything specific. We don’t know if a child will become a good person or a bad one. We don’t know if he will be a musician or a minister or a farmer or a sailor or a computer engineer. As we grow, we grow from being “striped onyx” into a specific glory, which each of us has unique to himself. Thus, as the twelve sons of Jacob matured into tribes, each tribe took on a distinct glory of its own, represented by its gemstone.”
Gold, onyx and bdellium were raw materials from the original World. The white capstone in Zechariah was bdellium, representing glorified bread. With the correspondence between manna and bdellium, there is perhaps the idea that the white stone is the bread of obedient priesthood finally glorified as metal—an eternal priesthood. The root word for bdellium also means “to divide”. The bread is a sacrifice, but the white stone is bread resurrected, or bread and wine, service and glory, united. A white stone is a metal (robed) man with a new, more glorious name (Revelation 2:17). He is lifted up between heaven and earth as a human firmament.
With a golden forehead (Word) and onyx shoulders (angelic proto-Government), the High Priest himself was the bdellium-bread (Sacrament) (John 6:48-51). The twelve “rainbow” gems on his breastplate were the resulting mature “offspring” of rivers (fulfilled human Government) that flowed down to glorify the World. This supports the view that Revelation shows the matured saints leaving Abraham’s bosom and entering the bosom (breastplate) of Christ.
Also, if bdellium is the Table (hidden manna), the rainbow striped onyx-elders are the Incense Altar (Aaron’s rod), and of course the gold forehead would be the seven-eyed Lampstand (the Law). (Edit: Actually, I got this a bit wrong. The gold is Word, the bdellium is Sacrament, and the onyx is Government. It works top down and also left to right: Ark/Incense/Altar and Lampstand/Incense/Table.)
Havilah, the prototype World, was for “Holy Place” commerce, for worship asbuying and selling (Revelation 3:18; 13:17; 18:11). As the saints carry the rainbow waters in baptism, the New Covenant economy puts the world into God’s cloud.
WHITSTON4
