Exodus 26:1
Exodus 26:11“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.
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.
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 (), the bronze serpent (), and Solomon's temple sculptures (, 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" () — 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 (, NWT: "torture stake") and called preaching about it "God's power" (). 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.