NADAB AND ABIHU BURNT. EIGHT days after the consecration of Aaron to the high priest's office, the venerable hierarch offered a burnt offering for himself and for the people, " and there came a fire out from before the Lord, and consumed upon the altar the burnt offering and the fat; which when all the people saw, they shouted, and fell on their faces. And Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took either of them his censer, and put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and offered strange fire before the Lord, which he commanded them not. And there went out fire from the Lord, and devoured them, and they died before the Lord *." The fire which had kindled Aaron's sacrifice was, by God's especial command, to be kept continually burning upon the altar, and no other was to be used in their burnt offerings. Nadab and Abihu, the two eldest sons of the high priest, in defiance of this prohibition, took common fire from some unhallowed place without the sanctuary, instead of from the altar of burnt offering, and whilst they were in the act of desecrating the altar of incense, by putting strange fire thereon, the wrath of God was awakened, and they were struck dead before they could consummate the unholy rite. The artist has taken quite an original view of this impressive subject. The two rash ministers are represented as in the act of kindling fire upon the altar of incense by some chemical process, when an explosion takes place, by which they are both destroyed, each being killed by his own censer. The picture exhibits the interior of the tabernacle, on either side of which, and on the roof, "cherubims of cunning work" are distinctly visible, an ornament expressly commanded by God to be wrought in the curtain of this moveable sanctuary. On one side of the altar, from which the sons of Aaron are struck dead, is the golden candlestick with six branches; on the other side is the table on which the twelve cakes, called the shew-bread, were deposited. This tablet was of pure gold, and the number of loaves was fixed according to the number of the tribes. *Leviticus, chap. ix., verse 24; and chap. x., verses 1 and 2. |