Ye shall kindle no fire throughout your habitations upon the sabbath day.
Ye shall kindle no fire throughout your habitations upon the sabbath day. The Sabbath was not a fast day. The Israelites cooked their victuals on that day, for which, of course, a fire would be necessary; and this view of the institution is supported by the conduct of our Lord (Luke 14:1). But in early times the Israelites, while sojourning in the wilderness and subsisting on manna, received a double supply on the sixth day, which they cooked also on that day (see the note at Exodus 16:23), so that a fire for culinary purposes was entirely unnecessary on the Sabbath day. As the kindling of a fire, therefore, could only be for secular purposes, the insertion of the prohibition in connection with the work of the tabernacle makes it highly probable that it was intended chiefly for the mechanics who were to be employed in that erection; and as some of them might have supposed it was allowable to ply their trade in the furtherance of a structure to be dedicated to religious worship, it was calculated to prevent all such ideas, by absolutely forbidding any fire for the sharpening of tools, for the melting of metals, or any other material purpose bearing on the sanctuary.