The tabernacle and Christ

The Bronze Laver

In the tabernacle of Moses · Exodus 25 to 40 · Washing

The bronze laver was a basin of water standing between the altar and the tent, where the priests washed their hands and feet before serving. Sacrifice dealt with guilt at the altar; the laver dealt with the daily defilement of walking in a fallen world. It is a fitting picture of the cleansing Christ gives, both the once-for-all washing of forgiveness and the ongoing washing by his word.

Thou shalt also make a laver of brass, and his foot also of brass, to wash withal: and thou shalt put it between the tabernacle of the congregation and the altar, and thou shalt put water therein.Exodus 30:18 (KJV)

What the laver was

Thou shalt also make a laver of brass, and his foot also of brass, to wash withal: and thou shalt put it between the tabernacle of the congregation and the altar, and thou shalt put water therein. It was a bronze basin on a bronze base, filled with water, set in the open court between the place of sacrifice and the door of the tent. Later we are told a striking detail: it was made of the lookingglasses of the women assembling at the door, the polished bronze mirrors the women gave, so that the basin itself could show a priest his own face and his own need.

Its purpose was plain and urgent. For Aaron and his sons shall wash their hands and their feet thereat. A priest who came to the altar or entered the holy place with unwashed hands and feet was warned that he would die. Every act of service began with washing at the laver.

What it meant for Israel

The altar and the laver stood in a deliberate order. First the altar, where blood atoned for sin once and for all in each offering; then the laver, where water cleansed the priest again and again through the day's work. Between the great dealing with guilt and the entrance into God's presence came the constant washing away of the dust and defilement picked up simply by walking and working in the world.

The priests' hands did the holy work and their feet walked the holy ground, and both were washed. It taught Israel that God cares not only for the great crisis of forgiveness but for the daily cleanness of those who serve him, and that no one enters his presence trailing the dirt of the world unwashed.

How it points to Christ

The New Testament does not name the tabernacle laver as a type of Christ, so we should say plainly that reading it of him is a devotional reflection rather than a direct teaching of Scripture. Yet it is a reflection the New Testament's own language invites, for it speaks often of cleansing by water and by the word. Christ loved the church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word. And God saved us by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost.

Most beautifully, on the night before he died, Jesus washed his disciples' feet, and when Peter objected, he said, If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me. Then he added the very distinction the altar and laver had pictured: He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit. The believer is bathed once and for all in forgiveness, as at the altar, and then needs the daily washing of the feet, as at the laver, the ongoing cleansing of confession and of the word as we walk through a soiling world.

So the bronze basin, made of mirrors that showed a servant his own face, is a gentle picture of the word of God, which shows us ourselves and washes us clean, and of the Savior who stoops to wash the feet of his own. It is a picture the New Testament nowhere forbids and everywhere illuminates, held as reflection and not as proof.

Why the laver still matters

The laver answers a question every honest Christian knows: what do I do with the sins of daily life after I have been forgiven once for all? The altar deals with the great debt, cancelled entirely and never to be reckoned again. But the feet still gather dust, and the hands still touch what defiles. The believer who has been justified still needs to be daily cleansed, not to be saved again, but to walk in fellowship and to serve with clean hands. The two vessels stand for two different works of one grace.

The New Testament calls this the ordinary rhythm of confession and the word. If we confess our sins, John writes, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. And it is with the washing of water by the word that Christ keeps his people clean, so that the Scriptures function as the laver did, showing us our own faces and washing them at once. To read the Word honestly is to be washed by it, and to pray it back to God is to be made clean.

There is a great mercy in the altar and the laver standing together, the once and the daily. It saves us from two errors. It saves us from despair, for the altar means the great matter is settled forever and cannot be undone by tomorrow's failure. And it saves us from carelessness, for the laver means our daily walk still matters to God and still needs his cleansing. Forgiven at the altar and washed at the laver, the believer may come near with clean hands and a pure heart.

And the laver was made of the bronze mirrors the women gave, which holds a quiet grace of its own. What might have been kept for vanity was given up to God and became the basin where servants were made clean. Whatever we bring and lay down before him, even the things we once used only for ourselves, he is able to turn into a vessel of cleansing in his house. The small basin between the altar and the tent is no minor thing, for it stands exactly where the forgiven must pass on their way to serve.

The laver is not named in the New Testament as a type of Christ, so this page treats it as a devotional reflection, grounded in the New Testament's own imagery of cleansing by water and word (John 13:10; Ephesians 5:26; Titus 3:5), not as an explicit fulfillment stated in Scripture.

Related: The bronze altar · The holy place · Who is Jesus? · The whole tabernacle