5 "You shall take fine flour, and bake twelve cakes of it: two tenth parts of an ephah shall be in one cake.
*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
Each cake or loaf of unleavened bread Leviticus 2:11 was to contain about six pounds and a quarter (see Exodus 29:40 note) of fine flour. The material was the same, both in quality and in quantity, with that of each one of the wave-loaves of Pentecost Leviticus 23:17. In the service of the temple the preparation and arrangement of the cakes was committed to the Levites 1-Chronicles 9:32; 1-Chronicles 23:29; 2-Chronicles 13:11.
Bake twelve cakes - See the whole account of the shew-bread in the notes on Exodus 25:30 (note); and relative to the table on which they stood, the golden candlestick and silver trumpets carried in triumph to Rome, see the note on Exodus 25:31.
And thou shalt take fine flour, and bake twelve cakes thereof: two (c) tenth deals shall be in one cake.
(c) That is, two omers, read (Exodus 16:16).
And thou shalt take fine flour,.... Of wheat, and the finest of it:
and bake twelve cakes thereof; answerable to the twelve tribes, as the Targum of Jonathan, which were typical of the spiritual Israel of God:
two tenth deals shall be in one cake; that is, two tenth parts of an ephah, which were two omers, one of which was as much as a man could eat in one day of the manna: so that one of these cakes was as much as two men could eat of bread in one day; each cake was ten hands' breadth long, five broad, and seven fingers its horns, or was so high (g).
(g) Menachot, c. 11. sect. 4.
take fine flour, and bake twelve cakes--for the showbread, as previously appointed (Exodus 25:30). Those cakes were baked by the Levites, the flour being furnished by the people (1-Chronicles 9:32; 1-Chronicles 23:29), oil, wine, and salt being the other ingredients (Leviticus 2:13).
two tenth deals--that is, of an ephah--thirteen and a half pounds weight each; and on each row or pile of cakes some frankincense was strewed, which, being burnt, led to the showbread being called "an offering made by fire." Every Sabbath a fresh supply was furnished; hot loaves were placed on the altar instead of the stale ones, which, having lain a week, were removed, and eaten only by the priests, except in cases of necessity (1-Samuel 21:3-6; also Luke 6:3-4).
The preparation of the shew-bread and the use to be made of it are described here for the first time; though it had already been offered by the congregation at the consecration of the tabernacle, and placed by Moses upon the table (Exodus 39:36; Exodus 40:23). Twelve cakes (challoth, Leviticus 2:4) were to be made of fine flour, of two-tenths of an ephah each, and placed in two rows, six in each row, upon the golden table before Jehovah (Exodus 25:23.). Pure incense was then to be added to each row, which was to be (to serve) as a memorial (Azcarah, see Leviticus 2:2), as a firing for Jehovah. על נתן to give upon, to add to, does not force us to the conclusion that the incense was to be spread upon the cakes; but is easily reconcilable with the Jewish tradition (Josephus, Ant. iii. 10, 7; Mishnah, Menach. xi. 7, 8), that the incense was placed in golden saucers with each row of bread. The number twelve corresponded to the number of the twelve tribes of Israel. The arrangement of the loaves in rows of six each was in accordance with the shape of the table, just like the division of the names of the twelve tribes upon the two precious stones on Aaron's shoulder-dress (Exodus 28:10). By the presentation or preparation of them from the fine flour presented by the congregation, and still more by the addition of incense, which was burned upon the altar every Sabbath on the removal of the loaves as azcarah, i.e., as a practical memento of the congregation before God, the laying out of these loaves assumed the form of a bloodless sacrifice, in which the congregation brought the fruit of its life and labour before the face of the Lord, and presented itself to its God as a nation diligent in sanctification to good works. If the shew-bread was a minchah, or meat-offering, and even a most holy one, which only the priests were allowed to eat in the holy place (Leviticus 24:9, cf. Leviticus 2:3 and Leviticus 6:9-10), it must naturally have been unleavened, as the unanimous testimony of the Jewish tradition affirms it to have been. And if as a rule no meat-offering could be leavened, and of the loaves of first-fruits prepared for the feast of Pentecost, which were actually leavened, none was allowed to be placed upon the altar (Leviticus 2:11-12; Leviticus 6:10); still less could leavened bread be brought into the sanctuary before Jehovah. The only ground, therefore, on which Knobel can maintain that those loaves were leavened, is on the supposition that they were intended to represent the daily bread, which could no more fail in the house of Jehovah than in any other well-appointed house (see Bhr, Symbolik i. p. 410). The process of laying these loaves before Jehovah continually was to be "an everlasting covenant" (Leviticus 24:8), i.e., a pledge or sign of the everlasting covenant, just as circumcision, as the covenant in the flesh, was to be an everlasting covenant (Genesis 17:13).
Thou - By the priests or Levites, whose work it was to prepare them, 1-Chronicles 9:32. Twelve cakes - Representing the twelve tribes.
*More commentary available at chapter level.