There was nothing. — The emphasis of this (repeated in 2 Chronicles 5:10) is remarkable, and seems intended to make it clear that the various things laid up “before the testimony” — the pot of manna (Exodus 16:33-34), the rod of Aaron (Numbers 17:10), the copy of the Law (Deuteronomy 31:24-26) — were not in the ark, but (as in the last case is actually stated), at “the side of the ark.” Unless any change afterwards took place — which is highly improbable — this clear statement must determine the interpretation of the well-known passage in the Epistle to the Hebrews (1 Kings 9:4), in which no stress need be laid on the literal accuracy of the word “wherein;” for its purpose is simply a general description of the Temple, its chief parts, and its most sacred furniture. The command to deposit the tables in the ark is recorded in Exodus 25:16, and the actual deposit of them there in Exodus 40:20, immediately after the erection of the Tabernacle.
There is something singularly impressive in the especial hallowing of the granite tables of the Law of Righteousness, as the most sacred of all the revelations of the Nature of God; thus indissolubly binding together religion and morality, and showing that God is best known to man, not in His omnipotence, or even in His infinite wisdom, which man can only in slight degree imitate, but in His moral nature, as the very Truth and Righteousness, of which all that in man is called true and righteous is but the reflection. The one main object of all prophetic teaching was to bring out the truth here implied, thus writing the law on the heart and on the mind (Jeremiah 31:33), and rebuking moral evil at least as strongly as religious error and apostasy. The very name of the Messiah for whom they prepared is “Jehovah our righteousness” (Jeremiah 23:6).