(16) For the gate of the court—i.e., the entrance.

An hanging.—The word is the same as that similarly translated in Exodus 26:36 and Exodus 26:37 of Exodus 26; and the description of the “hanging” is also, word for word, the same. It would contrast strongly with the plain white “sail-cloth” round the rest of the enclosure, and would clearly point out to all the place of entrance.

27:9-19 The tabernacle was enclosed in a court, about sixty yards long and thirty broad, formed by curtains hung upon brazen pillars, fixed in brazen sockets. Within this enclosure the priests and Levites offered the sacrifices, and thither the Jewish people were admitted. These distinctions represented the difference between the visible nominal church, and the true spiritual church, which alone has access to God, and communion with him.An hanging - An entrance curtain, which, unlike the hangings at the sides and back of the court, could be drawn up, or aside, at pleasure. The words are rightly distinguished in our Bible in Numbers 3:26.

Wrought with nedlework - The work of the embroiderer. See Exodus 26:36; Exodus 35:35. On the materials, see Exodus 25:4.

9-19. the court of the tabernacle—The enclosure in which the edifice stood was a rectangular court, extending rather more than fifty yards in length and half that space in breadth, and the enclosing parapet was about three yards or half the height of the tabernacle. That parapet consisted of a connected series of curtains, made of fine twined linen yarn, woven into a kind of network, so that the people could see through; but that large curtain which overhung the entrance was of a different texture, being embroidered and dyed with variegated colors, and it was furnished with cords for pulling it up or drawing it aside when the priests had occasion to enter. The curtains of this enclosure were supported on sixty brazen pillars which stood on pedestals of the same metal, but their capitals and fillets were of silver, and the hooks on which they were suspended were of silver also. No text from Poole on this verse.

And for the gate of the court shall be an hanging of twenty cubits,.... Which, with the fifteen on each side, make the fifty cubits, the breadth of the court eastward, Exodus 27:13, this hanging was better than the rest, much finer and richer:

for it was of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen, wrought with needle work: and was of the same as the hangings for the door of the holy place, Exodus 26:36 this was a figure of Christ, and of the graces of the Spirit in him, and of his bloodshed, sufferings, and death; who is the door into the church, and to the ordinances of it, and leads on to the holy place, and even to the holy of holies, see John 10:9.

their pillars shall be four, and their sockets four: so that the pillars of this court at both sides and each end were sixty, twenty on each side, south and north, and ten at each end, west and east.

And for the gate of the court shall be an hanging of twenty cubits, of blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine twined linen, wrought with needlework: and their pillars shall be four, and their sockets four.