Various authors
18th and 19th centuries
The claim that the Ark of the Covenant was an electrical device, either a weapon, a battery, or a communication technology, is widespread in fringe literature. Erich von Däniken popularized it in Chariots of the Gods (1968) when he wrote, "Undoubtedly the Ark was electrically charged! If we reconstruct it today according to the instructions handed down by Moses, a voltage of several hundred volts is produced." His version of the story inspired Steven Spielberg and George Lucas as they developed the powers of the Ark for Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) and inspired Graham Hancock to see evidence of a lost civilization's high technology in The Sign and the Seal (1992). It remains a popular claim, with Scott Wolter speculating that the Ark was a battery to power the Great Pyramid. The claim originated in a discussion among German scientists at the end of the 18th century. Johann David Michaelis and Georg Christoph Lichtenberg began the discussion, and it was developed in an exceptionally windy article in the Berlinisches Archiv der Zeit und ihres Geschmacks by Lazarus Bendavid in 1797, which I excerpt in my translation below:
I believe I can show that the tabernacle in Moses’ time contained a fairly complete set of electrical instruments and, moreover, also expressed effects that we can now explain in a fairly understandable way through the doctrine of electricity. Would it be too daring, given these circumstances, if I believed that the spikes on the temple of Solomon were deliberately not used to divert away, but rather to serve as conductors of, lightning, namely in order to conduct the electricity into the Ark of the Covenant?
I know quite well that there are two difficulties in the way of this conjecture. For, in the first place, the effects of the tabernacle, if such operations were regarded as a natural phenomenon, would cease to be miraculous. Secondly, however, one would not like to argue that the people of that time had already come so far in the mastery of science to produce effects with the help of machines that we ourselves are not always able to produce successfully.
If I had room to play with words, I could say that the second difficulty obviates the first, precisely because the people of that time, according to our assumptions, did not acquire knowledge in a scientific way. The fact, if one does not want to deny all credible history, must nevertheless be admitted; the apparition (at least for that time) was a miracle: it was something supernatural, even if it was not contrary to nature.
No, I don't think I have to resort to this sloppy sensitivity, which also presupposes that Moses made his tabernacle, like M. Jourdain in Moliere’s play, without really knowing what he was doing. According to the notion of miracles given by Rabbi Moses ben Maimon in his Guide for the Perplexed, according to the concepts from the Pentateuch, Christ and the Apostles must have had performed miracles, since a miracle means nothing other than the unusual use and application of a physical force to physical objects […] Therefore a miracle is always a natural phenomenon, and it is now even possible for us to imitate it […].
After this introduction, which took longer than I thought, I come to my actual subject, which is to show that the Ark of the Covenant in the tabernacle was a very good Leyden jar […]
Bendavid spends several pages discussing the specifications of the Ark and the Holy of Holies of the Temple from biblical descriptions and then relating each part to various electrical and magnetic concepts as known in the 1790s and exploring various Bible verses to explain the powers of the Ark in terms of electrical discharge. "This collects all the data that I know of that can be used to support my conjecture. How probable it has become that electricity was already known in Moses' time, I do not want to decide...".
In English, the same claims, almost certainly paraphrased from a German source, can be found in a newspaper article by a certain C. B. Warrand, which was repeated, expanded upon, and discussed throughout the 1890s and early 1900s before inspiring Fortean writers and ancient mysteries speculators like von Däniken at midcentury (von Däniken himself knew the claim from Bendavid). This copy of Warrand's article is from the reprint made in the Electrical Review of July 25, 1894. The Review ascribed the origins of the piece to the July 15, 1894 Savannah Morning News, though given the standards of the day, it is unclear whether this was the first publication of the story. The text of the article is below:
In English, the same claims, almost certainly paraphrased from a German source, can be found in a newspaper article by a certain C. B. Warrand, which was repeated, expanded upon, and discussed throughout the 1890s and early 1900s before inspiring Fortean writers and ancient mysteries speculators like von Däniken at midcentury (von Däniken himself knew the claim from Bendavid). This copy of Warrand's article is from the reprint made in the Electrical Review of July 25, 1894. The Review ascribed the origins of the piece to the July 15, 1894 Savannah Morning News, though given the standards of the day, it is unclear whether this was the first publication of the story. The text of the article is below:
ELECTRICITY WELL KNOWN TO THE ISRAELITES.
There is nothing new on the face of the earth, and there is no doubt that electricity was well known to the Israelites and probably to the Phoenicians. The first record of electrical phenomena is as old as the Ten Commandments. Moses, when he received the stone tablets on which the Ten Commandments were written the second time, built a box out of fir – not the common cedar or any other native woods, but fir wood, which had to be imported by Phoenician merchants from the southern part of Europe. Was this choice accidental on account of the great value of the resinous wood, or was it the choice of the best known nonconductor among the great number of various timbers?
Moses had the fir box lined inside and outside with beaten gold, which converted the ark of the covenant into a very expensive but very perfect leyden jar or storage battery for electricity. As gold is by 50 percent a better conductor of electricity than copper, was the choice of gold again on account of its value, or was it an inspiration or revelation? So much is certain – that if Edison or Tesla had lived in those days they could not have improved on the choice of material, and the result was a powerful leyden jar.
How was this leyden jar charged, was the next problem. A fire of material rich in carbon was kept burning on top of the ark of the covenant, and during daytime a tall column of smoke guided the 12 tribes of Israel through their wanderings, and at night a tall flame was equally well seen by them. Now carbon is a good conductor of electricity, and the particles of carbon floating in the smoke would conduct sufficient electricity to highly charge the leyden jar. At least the current of electricity would be amply strong, so that if a hand were held toward the ark of the covenant, sparks would result. That this was done by Moses at different times is a matter of record, and that he could always depend that his faithful Levites would obey his instructions to the letter and have the jar always charged.
After Moses’ death his brother Aaron took the matter in hand and greatly improved the electrical power of the strange battery. He had the ark of the covenant placed in the temple and had it surrounded by poles 50 ells high, or 150 feet. These poles were covered with beaten gold, and gold chains were hung from poles to the ark of the covenant, which made a very expensive but very complete and powerful electrical connection. In a country where electrical storms are as frequent and as powerful as in Palestine at an elevation of 600 feet and a reach of 150 feet of the best conductor an abundant supply of Franklin’s electricity would necessarily always be on hand.
It is very likely that Aaron knew nothing of amperes, ohms, or volts; otherwise his two sons never would have monkeyed with this powerful apparatus, and they would not have been killed by fire breaking out of the ark of the covenant and killing them without any wounds or burns appearing on their bodies.
Any coroner’s jury of today, if it were to sit on an inquest over the body of Aaron’s sons, would at once bring a verdict or death by a discharge of electricity.
Aaron knew this power, and to make it effective all he had to do to deal death from his apparatus was to remove the costly camel’s hair carpets, which are almost perfect nonconductors of electricity, and make the culprit stand on terra firma. Death would result instantly by fire breaking out and leave no wounds or burns to account for his death. That several members of revolting tribes of Israelites were thus electrocuted is also a matter of record in the Bible.
Solomon in building his temple advanced one step further. He found that copper would do as well as gold. He had the temple covered with copper, and copper water pipes led into the cisterns inside the temple.
On the temple, or rather on its roof, a number of gilt spears placed in vertical positions, ostensibly to scare off the birds and to keep them from defiling the temple, but these spears were several cords high, or from 16 to 24 feet. Such a height would hardly be necessary for scarecrows, but it was ample to load the roof, water pipes, etc., with a powerful current of electricity.
Franklin, the electric chair in the state of New York, and the discovery of the leyden jar itself in Leyden, Germany, are all back numbers. History only repeats itself, whether recorded or not.
Moses had the fir box lined inside and outside with beaten gold, which converted the ark of the covenant into a very expensive but very perfect leyden jar or storage battery for electricity. As gold is by 50 percent a better conductor of electricity than copper, was the choice of gold again on account of its value, or was it an inspiration or revelation? So much is certain – that if Edison or Tesla had lived in those days they could not have improved on the choice of material, and the result was a powerful leyden jar.
How was this leyden jar charged, was the next problem. A fire of material rich in carbon was kept burning on top of the ark of the covenant, and during daytime a tall column of smoke guided the 12 tribes of Israel through their wanderings, and at night a tall flame was equally well seen by them. Now carbon is a good conductor of electricity, and the particles of carbon floating in the smoke would conduct sufficient electricity to highly charge the leyden jar. At least the current of electricity would be amply strong, so that if a hand were held toward the ark of the covenant, sparks would result. That this was done by Moses at different times is a matter of record, and that he could always depend that his faithful Levites would obey his instructions to the letter and have the jar always charged.
After Moses’ death his brother Aaron took the matter in hand and greatly improved the electrical power of the strange battery. He had the ark of the covenant placed in the temple and had it surrounded by poles 50 ells high, or 150 feet. These poles were covered with beaten gold, and gold chains were hung from poles to the ark of the covenant, which made a very expensive but very complete and powerful electrical connection. In a country where electrical storms are as frequent and as powerful as in Palestine at an elevation of 600 feet and a reach of 150 feet of the best conductor an abundant supply of Franklin’s electricity would necessarily always be on hand.
It is very likely that Aaron knew nothing of amperes, ohms, or volts; otherwise his two sons never would have monkeyed with this powerful apparatus, and they would not have been killed by fire breaking out of the ark of the covenant and killing them without any wounds or burns appearing on their bodies.
Any coroner’s jury of today, if it were to sit on an inquest over the body of Aaron’s sons, would at once bring a verdict or death by a discharge of electricity.
Aaron knew this power, and to make it effective all he had to do to deal death from his apparatus was to remove the costly camel’s hair carpets, which are almost perfect nonconductors of electricity, and make the culprit stand on terra firma. Death would result instantly by fire breaking out and leave no wounds or burns to account for his death. That several members of revolting tribes of Israelites were thus electrocuted is also a matter of record in the Bible.
Solomon in building his temple advanced one step further. He found that copper would do as well as gold. He had the temple covered with copper, and copper water pipes led into the cisterns inside the temple.
On the temple, or rather on its roof, a number of gilt spears placed in vertical positions, ostensibly to scare off the birds and to keep them from defiling the temple, but these spears were several cords high, or from 16 to 24 feet. Such a height would hardly be necessary for scarecrows, but it was ample to load the roof, water pipes, etc., with a powerful current of electricity.
Franklin, the electric chair in the state of New York, and the discovery of the leyden jar itself in Leyden, Germany, are all back numbers. History only repeats itself, whether recorded or not.
C. B. WARRAND.
