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 TABERNACLE

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TABERNACLE

bishops are known: Marinus, present at the Confer- ence of Carthage (411), where his rival was Victor, also rival of the Bishop of Bisica; and Constantine, who signed the letter from the bishops of the province to Paul, Patriarch of Constantinople, against the Mono- thehtes (646).

TouLOTTE, Geog. de VAfrique Chretienne: Proconsulaire (Paris, 1892), 257.

S. PETRinfes.

Tabernacle (Tabeknaculum) signified in the Middle Ages sometimes a ciborium-altar, a structure resting on pillars and covered with a baldachino that was set over an altar, sometimes an ostensory or mon- strance, a tower-shaped vessel for preserving and ex- hibiting relics and the Blessed Sacrament, sometimes, lastly, like to-day, it was the name of the vessel hold- ing the pyx. That is, at the present time in eccle- siastical usage it is only the name for the receptacle or case placed upon the table of the high altar or of another altar in which the vessels containing the Blessed Sacrament, as the ciborium, monstrance, custodia, are kept. As a rule, in cathedrals and monastic churches it is not set upon the high altar but upon a side altar, or the altar of a special sacra- mentary chapel; this is to be done both on account of the reverence due the Holy Sacrament and to avoid impeding the course of the ceremonies in solemn func- tions at the high altar. On the other hand it is generally to be placed upon the high altar in parish churches as the most befitting position (" Cserem. ep.", I, xii. No. 8; "Rit. rom.", tit. IV, i, no. 6; S. C. Episc, 10 February, 1579). A number of decisions have been given by the Sacred Congregation of Rites regarding the tabernacle. According to these, to mention the more important decisions, relics and pictures are not to be displayed for veneration either on or before the tabernacle ("Decreta auth.", nos. 2613, 2906). Neither is it permissible to place a vase of flowers in such manner before the door of the taber- nacle as to conceal it (no. 2067). The interior of the tabernacle must either be gilded or covered with white silk (no. 4035, ad 4); but the exterior is to be equipped with a mantle-like hanging, that must be either al- ways white or is to be changed according to the colour of the day; this hanging is called the canopcum (no. 3520; cf. "Rit. rom., loc. cit.). A benediction of the tabernacle is customary but is not prescribed.

History. — In the Middle Ages there was no uni- form custom in regard to the place where the Blessed Sacrament was kept. The Fourth Lateran Council and many provincial and diocesan synods held in the Middle Ages require only that the Host be kept in a secure, well-fastened receptacle. At the most they demand that it be put in a clean, conspicuous place. Only a few s>-nods designate the spot more closely, as the Synods of Cologne (1281) and of Mtinster (1279), which commanded that it was to be kept above the altar and protected by locking with a key. In general, four main methods of preserving the Blessed Sacramcjnt may be distingjiiished in medieval times: (1) in a cabinet in the sacristy, a custom that is connected with early Christian usage; (2) in a cup- board in the wall of the choir or in a projection from one of the walls which wiis constructed jike a tower, was called Sacrament-House, and sometimes reached up to the vaulting; (3) in a dove or pyx, surrounded by a cover or receptacle and generally surmounted by a small baldachino, which hung over the altar by a chain or cord; (4) lastly, upon the altar table, either in the pyx alone or in a receptacle similar to a taber- nacle, or in a small cupboard arranged in the rcredos or prcdellaof the altar. This hi.st method is mentioned in tlio "Adnionitio svnodalis" of the ninth century by Hcf;in of Priiui (d. 915), latiT by Durandus, and iii till- rcgulalioiLS issued by the SvikmIs of Trier and Munslcr already nienlioneil. Ueredoses containing

cupboards to hold the Blessed Sacrament can be proved to have existed as early as the fourteenth cen- tury, as, for instance, the altar of St. Clara in the Cologne cathedral, although they were not numerous until the end of the medieval period. The high altar dating from 1424 in the Church of St. Martin at Landshut, Bavaria, is an example of the combination of reredos and Sacrament-House. From the sixteenth century it became gradually, although slowly, more customary to preserve the Blessed Sacrament in a receptacle that rose above the altar table. This was the case above all at Rome, where the custom first came into use, and in Italy in general, influenced largely by the good example set by St. Charles Borro- meo. The change came very slowly in France, where even in the eighteenth century it was still customary in many cathedrals to suspend the Blessed Sacrament over the altar, and also in Belgium and Germany, where the custom of using the Sacrament-House was maintained in many places until after the middle of the nineteenth century, when the decision of the Sacred Congregation of Rites of 21 August, 1863, put an end to the employment of such receptacles.

Thiers, Traite de Vexposition du St-Sacrement de Vautel (laris, 167.3); CoBBLET, Hist, du Sacrement de V Euchxiristie, I (Paris, 1885); ROHAULT de Fleury, La Mcsse, II (Paris. 1883); Laid AND ScHWARZ, Studicn liber die Gesckiehte des christt. Altars (Stuttgart. 1857); Schmid, Der christl. Altar (Ratisbon, 1871); Raible, Tabernakel Einsl u. Jetzt (Freiburg, 1908).

Joseph Braun.

Tabernacle (Latin lahernaculum, tent) in Biblical parlance usually designates the movable tent-like sanctuary of the Hebrews before the erection of Solo- mon's Temple. The various expressions in the He- brew text in reference to the Tabernacle (ohel, tent; 'ohel mo'ed, tent of meeting; 'ohel ha-'eduth, tent of the testimony; mishkan, dwelling; mishkan ha- 'eduth, dwelling of the testimony; mishkan 'ohel, dwelling of the tent; beth Yahireh, house of Yahweh; gndesh, holy; miqdash, sanctuary; hckal, temple), while enabling us to form a fair idea of this construction, raise, by the seeming consistency of the passages in which they severally occur, many problems with which all modern commentators of the Scriptures have to grapple. Thus, Exodus describes the ark as sheltered in a tent (xx.xiii, 7; Hebr. 'ohel mo'cd), whose position was "without the camp afar off" (Cf. Num., xi, 16 sqq.; 24-30; xii; Deut., xxxi, 14 sqq.), guarded by "Josue the son of Nun" (11), and at the door of which Yah- weh was wont to manifest himself to Moses (9-11; cf. Num., xii, 5; Deut., xxxi, 15). That this "tent of tryst" (or better, perhaps, "tent of the oracle") was not identical with the tabernacle modern independ- ent critics urge from the fact that this 'ohel mo'ed was in existence before Beseleel and Ooliab commenced the construction of the Tabernacle (Ex., xxxv-xxxvi) and that the customary jjlace of the latter was in the very midst of the encampment (Nimi., ii, 1 sqq.; X, 15 sqq.). Much stress is laid upon this and other seeming discrepancies to conclude that the description of the tabernacle found in Ex., xxv-.\xxi, xxxix-xl, is the work of the post-e.xilian authors of the Priestly Code.

Assuming, however, the historical accuracy of the Biblical narratives, we shall limit ourselves here to a brief description of that "portable s.anctuary" of the Hebrews. In this sanctuary we should distinguish the tent or tabernacle proper from the sacred enclo- sure in which the tent stood. The "court of the tabernacle" (Ex., xxvii, 9) was a rectangular space, measuring 100 by 50 cubits (probably the Egyptian cubit, 20?:4 ins.), .screened off by cmlains of "fine twisted linen" (xxvii, 9), 5 cubits high, 100 cubits long on the nortli and south sides, .'50 on the east .and 15 on the west, and 20 cubits on either side of the entrance. The entrance was closed by a hanging of fine twisted