The Shekinah Glory of God in the Old Testament

In the Old Testament, the prophets would often mention the Face of God in their writings. But, what exactly does this mean? We know that God is a Spirit, so how can we see His face? One of the most famous passages in the Bible, which mentions the Face of God, is found in Numbers 6:24-26 (NASB version), it states:

The LORD bless you and keep you,

The LORD cause His face to shine on you and be gracious to you,

The LORD lift up His face to you and give you peace.

In this passage, the face of God is mentioned two times. These verses are called the Aaronic Blessing (or the High Priestly Blessing) because God instructed Aaron, the first High Priest, to speak this blessing over the children of Israel, after they had been delivered from bondage in Egypt. So what does it mean for God to ‘shine His face on you’ and to ‘lift up His face to you’. To understand these verses, we must go back to the Exodus.

The Exodus and God’s Presence

The children of Israel had been in bondage, in Egypt, for over 400 years when God sent Moses to deliver them from Pharoah. It was only after 10 terrible plagues were visited upon Egypt that Pharoah decided to let the millions of Israelites leave and return to their homeland. The Jewish people left, only to encounter the Red Sea in front of them as night approached and the Egyptian army behind them. Then, God intervened. Exodus 14:20 states ‘So it came between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel. Thus it was a cloud and darkness to the one, and it gave light by night to the other, so that the one did not come near the other, all that night.’

 It is interesting to note that scripture mentions two opposites, light and darkness. The Egyptian army saw a dark cloud and were terrified, but the children of Israel saw a bright light which gave them comfort, as the wind blew all night, creating a dry path through the Red Sea. The next morning, the children of Israel were able to walk through on dry land, with walls of water on each side. When the Egyptian army tried to follow, the water closed around them and the enemies of Israel were destroyed.

Mount Sinai and the Glory of God

The children of Israel then traveled to Mount Sinai, where God came down to speak with Moses. Exodus 19:9 states ‘The Lord said to Moses, “I am going to come to you in a dense cloud, so that the people may hear when I speak with you and so that they will always believe in you.” And Moses told the words of The Lord to the people. On the third day in the morning there was thunder and lightning and a dense cloud on the mountain, and the sound of a very loud horn; all the people who were in the camp trembled. The people kept their distance, but Moses drew near the thick darkness where God was.’ So scripture states that when God came down to earth for the first time, to make His presence visible to man, He came in a dark cloud.

Exodus 24:15-17 says ‘Then Moses went up into the mountain and a cloud covered the mountain. Now the glory of the LORD rested on Mount Sinai and the cloud covered it six days. the sight of the glory of the LORD was like a consuming fire on the top of the mountain in the eyes of the children of Israel.’ So, this early description of the manifested presence of the LORD, the glory of the LORD, describes this glory of God  like a cloud and a fire, at the same time! This is similar to the cloud that was seen at the Red Sea. It is important to understand that the fire, the lightning and the cloud were NOT God, but rather these elements were the way God manifested himself so the people could ‘see’ him. While Moses was on Mount Sinai, God gave him the Ten Commandments and also instructions for building the Tabernacle. 

The Tabernacle of Moses and the Shekinah Glory

So Moses had the portable Tabernacle built according to the specific instructions given by God. When the Tabernacle was set up for the first time, Exodus 40:34 states ‘Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. Moses was not able to enter the tent of meeting because the cloud settled on it and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.’ We can assume that this cloud was a dark cloud and that is why Moses was not able to enter the Tabernacle. This tent became known as the Tent of Meeting because this is where God met with humanity. For the next 40 years, God’s presence could be seen as a pillar of fire by night and a pillar of a cloud during the day, hovering over the Tabernacle.

During this time, the Jewish sages began to call this manifested presence of God the Shekinah Glory of God. The best explanation for the Shekinah presence of God is the unexplained, convincing manifestation of God. The Shekinah presence of God is a physical manifestation that totally convinces those in attendance, that they are IN the presence of the supernatural creator of the universe. The Shekinah presence of God can be terrifying and wonderful at the same time! While researching the Shekinah presence of God, most descriptions state that it was a very brilliant and glorious light which was enveloped or surrounded by a dark cloud. One scholar explained it this way; there was really only one cloud and it was a dark cloud with lightening and bursts of fire within the cloud. At night, you would not see the dark cloud, but rather the bright light within the cloud. In the day time, you would not notice the light, but rather the dark cloud. It is interesting to note that the Tabernacle was always placed in the middle of the tribes that camped around it, as ordained by God.

Solomon’s Temple and the Shekinah Glory

Many years later, Solomon built the first Jewish Temple in Jerusalem. At the dedication of this Temple, in I Kings 8:10-12 the scriptures state ‘Once the priests left the holy place, a cloud filled the Lord’s temple. The priests could not carry out their duties because of the cloud; the Lord’s glory filled his temple. Then Solomon said, “The Lord has said that he lives in thick darkness.” How interesting that Solomon described the Shekinah Glory of God as a dark cloud! The pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night was no longer visible to the children of Israel, but apparently the Shekinah Glory of God rested within the holy Jewish Temple, built by Solomon.

The Shekinah Glory and the Face of God

The presence of God hovered over the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies, inside the Jewish Temple. And because the Jewish people had seen the manifested presence of God as a dark cloud, as fire and lighting and as a bright light, the Jewish rabbis created an expression, the word ‘Shekinah’, to describe what they had observed. The word Shekinah is not found in the Bible, but it comes from a Hebrew word that is often used in the Old Testament. There is a Hebrew verb in the Old Testament called ‘shakan’, it is a word which is often translated as “to dwell” for a period of time, not just to visit. So, the rabbis took the verb ‘shakan’, which meant ‘to dwell’ and changed it to a noun, ‘shikinah’, which meant “God’s visible presence dwelling“. The word Shekinah signifies a divine habitation or dwelling of the visible, presence of God on the earth. Also, the verb ‘shakan’ implies  that you ‘DWELL IN THE MIDST OF A NEIGHBORHOOD OR A GROUP OF PEOPLE for a long period of time”. There is another Hebrew verb “yashav” which also means ‘to dwell’, but that verb can mean the person who is ‘dwelling’ can be alone, and WITHOUT reference to others or to duration. So, God was very specific, when he used ‘shakan’ to describe His habitation on earth among His people, in the midst of his people.

When the Presence of God was visible as a cloud, a fire or as a light, the rabbis called this ‘the FACE of God’. If the people of Israel sinned, the Shekinah cloud of God’s presence, God’s glory, would leave the Ark of the Covenant. Deuteronomy describes this as God hiding His face. And when God hides his face, trials, tribulations and terrible calamities came upon the people. Deuteronomy 31:17 says ‘Then my anger shall be kindled against them in that day, and I will forsake them, and I will hide my face from them, and they shall be devoured, and many evils and troubles shall befall them’.

There is another phrase in the Bible that is related to the presence of God, it is the phrase ‘the word of the LORD’ or ‘the word of God’. In I Chronicles 17:3-4, we read: “But that same night THE WORD OF GOD came to Nathan: ‘Go and say to My servant David: Thus said the LORD: You are not the one to build a house for Me to dwell in”. Some Jewish scholars believe when the ‘Word of The Lord’ came to a prophet, what really happened is that the presence of God appeared, as a dark cloud, and God spoke out of the cloud to the prophet, just as He spoke to Moses on Mt Sinai.

So, the manifested Shekinah presence of God, which could be seen by men, was also called the Face of God or the Word of the LORD. When God was pleased with His people or wanted to bless them, His face, the Shekinah cloud, would shine on them as a bright light. But, when God was displeased with His people, the cloud of His presence would leave; this meant He had turned His face away from them. The Shekinah presence of God, manifested as either as a bright light or fire in the midst of a dark cloud, would be visible (as a sign of favor or blessing) or the Shekinah presence of God would disappear (as a sign of displeasure or judgement).

The Shekinah Glory Leaves Solomon’s Temple

The Shekinah presence of God rested in Solomon’s temple, above the Ark of the Covenant, for more than 400 hundred years. But, over time, the people forgot about God and they did not keep His commandments. The only person who could enter into the Holy of Holies in the Temple and see the cloud of God’s presence was the High Priest, and that was only once a year. The fifth chapter of Hosea is a rebuke from God for the apostasy of the people of Israel. Then, in Hosea 5:15, God says ‘I will go away and return to My place’. Because of their sin, Israel was taken into captivity by the Babylonians and Solomon’s Temple was destroyed. But, just before the temple was destroyed, Ezekiel had a vision about the Glory of God leaving the temple.

In Ezekiel 10:18-19, it states: ‘Then the glory of the Lord moved away from the threshold of the temple and stopped above the cherubim. The cherubim spread their wings, and they rose up from the earth while I watched. They stopped at the entrance to the east gate, of the Lord’s temple, as the glory of the God of Israel hovered above them.’ Then, in Ezekiel 11:23, the scriptures state ‘The glory of the Lord rose up from within the city and stopped over the mountain east of it.’ The mountain that is mentioned here is the Mount of Olives. 

Ezekiel saw the Shekinah glory cloud leave the Temple and move to the Eastern gate of Jerusalem and then, to the Mount of Olives. So, God ‘hid his face’ from the children of Israel, because of their sin. God’s visible presence (the cloud) left the Temple which had been built for him and the Israelites were taken captive for 70 years. I think this is one of the saddest moments in human history. The children of Israel saw God’s Shekinah glory, the manifested presence of God, His face, during their wilderness journey. God dwelt in the midst of His people. Once they arrived in their homeland, the pillar of fire by night and the cloud by day was no longer needed. Then, God’s presence was only visible in Solomon’s Temple by the High Priest. There is something about human nature that we sometimes only believe in what we can see. But to see the supernatural things of God requires faith in the unseen.