Art - UPDV Updated Bible Version

In Scripture, art is craftsmanship — the skilled hand at work in wood and metal, in stone and cloth, in dyes and perfumes and song. The biblical writers treat the trades not as a separate category from worship or wisdom but as one of its registers. The first artisans appear within a few generations of Adam; the tabernacle is built by men "filled with the Spirit of God, in wisdom, and in understanding, and in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship" (Ex 31:3); and Sirach, surveying the workshops of his day, calls the smith and the potter and the engraver indispensable to the fabric of the world.

The First Artisans

The earliest crafts in Genesis are gathered into a few quick verses of the line of Cain. Adah bore Jabal, "the father of such as dwell in tents and [have] cattle" (Gen 4:20). Then come Jubal, the inventor of music, and Tubal-cain, the inventor of metalwork: "Zillah, she also bore Tubal-cain, the forger of every cutting instrument of brass and iron" (Gen 4:22). Even before the flood, tent-making, music, and smithing are presented as inherited skills.

After the flood, the next great work of the hands is Noah's ark — the first piece of biblical carpentry. Yahweh tells Noah, "Make an ark of gopher wood. You will make the ark with a series of compartments, and will pitch it inside and outside with pitch" (Gen 6:14), with explicit dimensions and a three-storied frame (Gen 6:15-16). At Babel a different craft surfaces: brickmaking. "And they said one to another, Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly" (Gen 11:3). Hospitality, too, is a craft. When Abraham's three visitors arrive, he hurries Sarah: "Quickly prepare three seahs of fine meal, knead it, and make cakes" (Gen 18:6). Even the first sewing in Scripture is craft of a kind: after the eyes of Adam and his wife are opened, "they sewed fig-leaves together, and made themselves aprons" (Gen 3:7).

Bezalel, Oholiab, and the Tabernacle

The most extended treatment of craft in the Old Testament is the call of Bezalel and Oholiab. Yahweh names Bezalel by name — "See, I have called by name Bezalel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah" (Ex 31:2) — and fills him "with the Spirit of God, in wisdom, and in understanding, and in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship, to devise skillful works, to work in gold, and in silver, and in bronze, and in cutting of stones for setting, and in carving of wood, to work in all manner of workmanship" (Ex 31:3-5). Oholiab is paired with him: "an engraver, and a skillful workman, and an embroiderer in blue, and in purple, and in scarlet, and in fine linen" (Ex 38:23). The same gift extends to anonymous workers: "all who are wise-hearted, whom I have filled with the spirit of wisdom" (Ex 28:3); and "He has filled them with wisdom of heart, to work all manner of workmanship, of the engraver, and of the skillful workman, and of the embroiderer, in blue, and in purple, in scarlet, and in fine linen, and of the weaver, even of those who do any workmanship, and of those who devise skillful works" (Ex 35:35).

The work that follows is a full catalogue of the trades. The high priest's coat is woven "in checker work of fine linen" (Ex 28:39). The breastplate-stones are cut "with the work of an engraver in stone, like the engravings of a signet" (Ex 28:11), and the twelve are set "according to the names of the sons of Israel … like the engravings of a signet, every one according to his name" (Ex 39:14). The wise-hearted women "spun with their hands, and brought that which they had spun, the blue, and the purple, the scarlet, and the fine linen" (Ex 35:25). The anointing oil and the incense are made "after the art of the perfumer" (Ex 30:25; Ex 37:29). The screen for the door is woven "of blue, and purple, and scarlet" (Ex 26:36). The covering of the tent is of "rams' skins dyed red, and sealskins" (Ex 25:5; Ex 26:14). And the contrast piece is the golden calf, "fashioned with a graving tool" (Ex 32:4) — the same techniques turned to idolatry.

A counter-rule guards the altar itself: "if you make me an altar of stone, you will not build it of cut stones; for if you lift up your tool on it, you have polluted it" (Ex 20:25). Skill is gift, but it is not an end in itself.

The Temple and the Craftsmen of Tyre

When David and Solomon built in Jerusalem, the work crossed over into Phoenicia. Hiram king of Tyre supplied both materials and men: "Hiram king of Tyre sent messengers to David, and cedar-trees, and carpenters, and masons; and they built David a house" (2Sa 5:11; cf. 1Ch 14:1). Hiram "was ever a friend of David" (1Ki 5:1), and his alliance with Solomon brought cedar, fir, gold, and the navy that sailed for Ophir (1Ki 9:11; 1Ki 9:26-27; 1Ki 10:11; 1Ki 10:22).

Solomon also fetches Hiram the master craftsman — distinct from Hiram the king — out of Tyre (1Ki 7:13). He is "the son of a widow of the tribe of Naphtali, and his father was a man of Tyre, a worker in bronze; and he was filled with the wisdom and the understanding and the knowledge to work all works in bronze. And he came to King Solomon, and wrought all his work" (1Ki 7:14). His Chronicler portrait is even fuller: "the son of a woman of the daughters of Dan; and his father was a man of Tyre, skillful to work in gold, and in silver, in bronze, in iron, in stone, and in timber, in purple, in blue, and in fine linen, and in crimson, also to engrave any manner of engraving, and to devise any device" (2Ch 2:14). His pillars are eighteen cubits high and twelve cubits in circumference (1Ki 7:15); his molten sea, ten cubits across, "five cubits" high, with a thirty-cubit cordage (1Ki 7:23). The cedar inside the house is "carved with knops and open flowers: all was cedar; there was no stone seen" (1Ki 6:18). David himself amasses the labor force: "there are workmen with you in abundance, hewers and workers of stone and timber, and all men who are skillful in every manner of work: of the gold, the silver, and the bronze, and the iron, there is no number" (1Ch 22:15-16); and Solomon writes to Huram for "a skillful man to work in gold, and in silver, and in bronze, and in iron, and in purple, and crimson, and blue, and who knows how to engrave [all manner of] engravings" (2Ch 2:7). Music is built into the same complex: David appoints four thousand to praise Yahweh "with the instruments which I made" (1Ch 23:5; cf. 1Ch 16:42; 2Ch 35:15), and the Levites are set to play "psalteries and harps and cymbals, sounding aloud and lifting up the voice with joy" (1Ch 15:16). Even the chariot of the cherubim is wrought of gold "by weight" (1Ch 28:18).

When the temple is later repaired under Joash and again under Josiah, the same trades return: "they paid it out to the carpenters and the builders … and to the masons and the hewers of stone, and for buying timber and cut stone to repair the breaches of the house of Yahweh" (2Ki 12:11-12; cf. 2Ki 22:6). After the exile, Ezra likewise gives "silver also to the masons, and to the carpenters" (Ezra 3:7), and Nehemiah's wall is rebuilt in part by the goldsmiths' guild (Neh 3:8; Neh 3:31-32).

The Catalogue of Trades

Beyond temple-building, the prophets and historians scatter a wide register of crafts across Israel's life.

Metal-work and smithing. "Iron is taken out of the earth, And copper is molten out of the stone" (Job 28:2). Under the Philistines, "there was no blacksmith found throughout all the land of Israel; for the Philistines said, Or else the Hebrews will make swords or spears" (1Sa 13:19). Isaiah personifies the smith twice: "Look, I have created the blacksmith who blows the fire of coals, and brings forth a weapon for his work" (Isa 54:16); and "The blacksmith [makes] an ax, and works in the coals, and fashions it with hammers, and works it with his strong arm" (Isa 44:12). The goldsmith "overlays it with gold, and casts for it silver chains" (Isa 40:19; cf. Isa 46:6; Isa 41:7). Coppersmiths can also be enemies — "Alexander the coppersmith did me much evil" (2Ti 4:14). A people taken into exile takes its craftsmen with it: "all the craftsmen and the blacksmiths" carried away to Babylon (2Ki 24:14).

Carpentry, masonry, and stonecutting. The trades cluster everywhere a building is going up: cedar carving "with knops and open flowers" (1Ki 6:18), masons paired with carpenters in the houses of David, Hezekiah, and Josiah, and the prophet's lament for the carved work of the sanctuary smashed "with hatchet and hammers" (Ps 74:6). Jeremiah's contemporaries build "wide house and spacious chambers" with windows "ceiled with cedar" and painted with vermilion (Jer 22:14). Asa is buried "in the bed which was filled with sweet odors and diverse kinds [of spices] prepared by the perfumers' art" (2Ch 16:14), in tombs "which he had cut out for himself in the city of David." Stone for an altar must remain uncut (Ex 20:25); no tool may pollute it.

The potter. The potter's craft becomes one of Scripture's controlling images. Jeremiah is told, "Arise, and go down to the potter's house, and there I will cause you to hear my words" (Jer 18:2). Isaiah prays, "But now, O Yahweh, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you our potter; and all of us are the work of your hand" (Isa 64:8). Lamentations grieves that "The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold, How are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter!" (Lam 4:2). Zechariah throws back "the goodly price that I was prized at by them" — thirty shekels of silver — "to the potter, in the house of Yahweh" (Zech 11:13). Paul takes up the same image: "has not the potter a right over the clay, from the same lump to make one part a vessel to honor, and another to shame?" (Rom 9:21). Revelation completes the figure with the rod of iron that breaks the nations "as the vessels of the potter are broken" (Rev 2:27).

Cloth and dyeing and embroidery. The wise-hearted women spin (Ex 35:25); Bezalel weaves the high-priestly coat (Ex 28:39); Oholiab is the embroiderer (Ex 38:23). The proverbial wife "lays her hands to the distaff, And her hands hold the spindle" (Prov 31:19), "makes for herself carpets of tapestry; Her clothing is fine linen and purple" (Prov 31:22), and "makes linen garments and sells them, And delivers belts to the merchant" (Prov 31:24). The adulteress in Proverbs spreads her couch "with carpets of tapestry, With striped cloths of the yarn of Egypt" (Prov 7:16). The royal bride is "led to the king in embroidered work" (Ps 45:14). Isaiah's combed-flax workers and weavers are confounded under judgment (Isa 19:9). The figure of the dyer recurs in the question, "Who is this that comes from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah?" (Isa 63:1). And in the New Testament, the soldiers at the cross divide Jesus' garments but find "the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout" (John 19:23). Mark notes the older custom: "No man sews a piece of undressed cloth on an old garment" (Mark 2:21). The fuller's craft is registered too — the "fuller's field" outside Jerusalem (2Ki 18:17), and the garments at the Transfiguration "exceedingly white, so as no fuller on earth can whiten them" (Mark 9:3).

Bakers, perfumers, and the kitchen trades. Pharaoh's baker (Gen 40:1) and the daughters Samuel warns will be taken "to be perfumers, and to be cooks, and to be bakers" (1Sa 8:13) belong to the same register. Sarah kneads cakes (Gen 18:6); Elijah eats one baked on the coals (1Ki 19:6); the woman of Endor bakes unleavened bread (1Sa 28:24); "ten women will bake your⁺ bread in one oven" under famine (Lev 26:26). The anointing oil is "compounded after the art of the perfumer" (Ex 30:25), and the incense "after the art of the perfumer" (Ex 37:29). Hosea compares Israel's adulterous heart to "an oven heated by the baker" (Hos 7:4).

Music. Music is treated as a craft from Jubal onward (Gen 4:21). Women come out "with timbrels, with joy, and with instruments of music" to greet David (1Sa 18:6); David appoints the Levites with "psalteries and harps and cymbals" (1Ch 15:16); Heman and Jeduthun lead "trumpets and cymbals … and instruments for the songs of God" (1Ch 16:42); the Asaphite singers stand at every gate of Josiah's Passover (2Ch 35:15). The end of all craft sounds in Revelation's silenced city: "the voice of harpers and minstrels and flute-players and trumpeters will be heard no more at all in you" (Rev 18:22).

Other trades. The barber's razor (Isa 7:20; Eze 5:1). The brickmaker, set to harder labor in Egypt (Ex 5:7). The caulker of ships (Eze 27:9), the rower of Sidon, the pilot of Tyre (Eze 27:8), and the merchants who trade "your handiworks" — "emeralds, purple, and embroidered work, and fine linen, and coral, and rubies" (Eze 27:16). The shipbuilder (1Ki 9:26). The armorer, conscripted to make the king's "instruments of war, and the instruments of his chariots" (1Sa 8:12). The ropemaker (Judg 16:11). The gardener (Jer 29:5). The winemaker treading the press (Neh 13:15; Isa 63:3). The fisherman washing his nets (Luke 5:2). The tentmaker (Gen 4:20). The carpenter, named so by Jesus' Nazareth neighbors: "Isn't this the son of the carpenter and Mary, and the brother of James, and Joses, and Judas, and Simon?" (Mark 6:3). And Jeremiah's own court of the guard is supplied with bread "out of the bakers' street" (Jer 37:21).

Yahweh as Refiner and Potter

Several of these crafts double as figures for Yahweh's own work. The refiner's fire belongs to the day of his coming: "he is like a refiner's fire, and like fullers' soap: and he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi, and refine them as gold and silver" (Mal 3:2-3). The potter is invoked in the same way: clay in his hands (Isa 64:8), nations smashed as pitchers (Lam 4:2; Rev 2:27), Israel reshaped on the wheel (Jer 18:2). The masterbuilder image is taken up by Paul: "as a wise masterbuilder I laid a foundation; and another builds on it. But let each take heed how he builds on it" (1Cor 3:10). The "engraved on stones" of the old service points forward and away in 2Cor 3:7. Even the stone over which Joshua the high priest stands is itself an engraver's work: "on one stone are seven eyes: look, I will engrave its engraving, says Yahweh of hosts" (Zech 3:9).

Sirach on the Workshop

Sirach gathers much of this into a sustained reflection on the trades. He starts from the wise hand: "The wise of hands controls his work; And a ruler [who controls] his people is wise" (Sir 9:17). The artisans' chapter then walks through the workshops one by one. "Likewise the engraver and craftsman, Who passes his time by night as by day; They cut gravings of signets, And his diligence is to make variety" (Sir 38:27). "So the blacksmith sitting by the anvil, And considering the unwrought iron; The vapor of the fire cracks his flesh, And in the heat of the furnace he glows" (Sir 38:28). "So the potter sitting at his work, And turning about the wheel with his feet" — "With his arm he fashions the clay, And he bends its strength before his feet; He applies his heart to finish the glazing" (Sir 38:29-30).

The summing up cuts both ways. "All these rely upon their hands, And each is wise in his handiwork" (Sir 38:31). Without them no city stands: "Without them a city cannot be inhabited, And they do not sojourn, neither do they walk up and down" (Sir 38:32). And yet "in the council of the people they are not sought for, And in the assembly they will not be exalted" (Sir 38:33). Their station is not the seat of judgment but the bench of work: "But the fabric of the world, they will maintain, And their thoughts are on the handiwork of [their] craft" (Sir 38:34). Even the physician, in this same chapter, is said to lift up his head by his skill, "So that he stands in the presence of princes" (Sir 38:3).