---
title: Exodus 26:1
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/exodus-26-1/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/exodus-26-1.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: Exodus 26:1
testament: OT
section: Law
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# Exodus 26:1

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> “You are to construct the tabernacle itself with ten curtains of finely spun linen, each with blue, purple, and scarlet yarn, and cherubim skillfully worked into them.

## JW Usage

JWs acknowledge that the tabernacle curtains contained woven cherubim imagery but treat this as a unique, divinely commanded exception to the second commandment — not a general principle permitting religious art. The images were integral to the tabernacle design and were never venerated in themselves. Modern Christians have no comparable divine command authorising representational religious art.

## Protestant Usage

Exodus 26:1 records God commanding cherubim to be woven into the tabernacle curtains — representational images of heavenly beings integrated into the very fabric of God's dwelling place. Combined with the golden cherubim on the ark (Exodus 25:18-22), the bronze serpent (Numbers 21:8), and Solomon's temple sculptures (1 Kings 6:29, 7:25), the OT presents a consistent pattern: God himself commissioned representational art for worship spaces. The second commandment prohibits making images "to bow down to them and serve them" (Exodus 20:5) — the sin is in the worship, not in the making. Second Kings 18:4 confirms: Hezekiah destroyed the bronze serpent not because it was an image but because people "burned incense to it." Paul boasted in the cross (Galatians 6:14, NWT: "torture stake") and called preaching about it "God's power" (1 Corinthians 1:18). If Paul could boast in the instrument of Christ's death, the Watchtower's claim that displaying a representation is pagan contradicts Paul's own attitude.

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [The Cross Is Not Pagan — And Paul Boasted In It](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/cross-pagan-symbol-rebuttal.md) — Galatians 6:14 / 1 Corinthians 1:18 / Colossians 2:14 [Practice]
- [Images Are Not the Problem — Worship Is](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/images-in-worship-protestant-response.md) — Numbers 21:8 / 2 Kings 18:4 / Exodus 25:18 [Practice]