What Does Exodus 25:4 Mean?

(4) **And blue, and purple, and scarlet.**—The colours intended are probably a dark blue produced from indigo, which was the only blue known to the Egyptians, a purplish crimson derived from the *murex trunculus, *the main source of the “Tyrian dye” of the ancients, and a scarlet furnished by the *coccus ilicis, *or cochineal insect of the holm oak, which was largely employed in antiquity, though now superseded by the brighter tint obtained from the *coccus cacti *of Mexico. Linen yarn of the three colours mentioned seems to have been what the people were asked to furnish (Exodus 35:25; Exodus 39:1). **Fine linen**—i.e., white thread spun from flax, which is found to be the material of almost all the Egyptian dresses, mummy cloths, and other undyed fabrics. It is of a yellowish white, soft, and wonderfully fine and delicate. (See Wilkinson in Rawlinson’s *Herodotus, *vol. ii., p. 233). **Goats’ hair.**—The covering of an Arab tent is to this day almost always of goats’-hair. An excellent fabric is woven from the soft inner hair of the Syrian goat, and a coarse one from the outer coat of the animal. Yarn of goats’-hair was to be offered, that from it might be produced the first of the three outer coverings of the Tabernacle (Exodus 26:7-14).