The metaphor of God's "tent", incidentally, harkens back to Canaanite mythology, which refers to the creator god El's paradisical dwelling as inside a tent at Mount Hermon. In the Baal Epic, the craftsman god Kothar went to visit El: "Then he heads toward El at the springs of the Double-Rivers, amidst the channels of the Double-Deeps. He comes to the mountain of El and enters the tent of the King, the Father of Years" (KTU 1.2 III 4-5). Similarly, in another myth El's mountain palace is said to lie "at the springs of the Two Rivers, at the meeting place of the Double-Deeps (mbk nhrm b'dt thmtm, KTU 1.100 R 1-4). The same concept is found in Psalm 42:
"I am on my way to the wonderful Tent, to the House of God , among cries of joy and praise and an exultant throng. Why so downcast, my soul, why do you sigh within me? Put your hope in God, I shall praise him yet, my savior, my God. When my soul is downcast within me, I think of you; from the land of Jordan and in Hermon, in Mount Misar deep is calling to deep as your cataracts roar." (Psalm 42:4-7)
Mount Misar refers to a hill in the Hermon range near the source of the Jordan, and "deep calling to deep" is based in the Canaanite notion that the cosmic mountain where El makes his abode joins the heavenly "Deep" (cf. Genesis 1:6) with the subterranean "deep" contained within the mountain (cf. Job 28:9-11, 38:16-17). In the OT, we also read how Yahweh "builds his palace on the waters above" and "sits enthroned on the Flood" (Psalm 29:10; 104:2-3), and Ezekiel 28:2 has the Phoenician king declare: "I am El ('l), in the dwelling of the gods ('lhym); I dwell in the midst of the seas (ymym)," a locale linked in v. 13-14 with "Eden", "the garden of God", and "the holy mountain of the gods". El's mountain dwelling is also alluded to in Isaiah 14:13 which refers to the "stars of El" in connection with the "mount of assembly (hr mw'd), and in both Canaanite mythology and in the OT, El (or Yahweh in the OT) presides over the divine assembly at the mountainous dwelling (cf. KTU 1.15 II 2-7, 1.16 V 19-28; cf. Psalm 82:1, 89:6-9). (The Greek concept of the divine assembly at Mount Olympus is related to these West Semitic concepts). The deities of the divine council were also depicted as tent-dwellers (cf. KTU 1.15 III 17-19), and the tabernacle interestingly is called the "tent of assembly" ('whl mw'd) in Exodus 33:7-11, Numbers 11:16-29, 12:4-10, and the divine assembly in KTU 1.2 I 13-44 is similarly called the phr m'd "appointed council". The seventy elders that Moses would assemble at the tent, moreover, reflects the number of gods in the divine assembly (KTU 1.4 VI 46; Numbers 11:24, cf. Deuteronomy 32:8, Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on the "seventy angels"). There are many other similarities between the tabernacle and El's tent dwelling. Both were desgined by an appointed craftsman "skilled in every craft" (cf. KTU 1.3 VI 22-23, 1.4 I 24-25; Exodus 31:2, 35:30), both were divided into chambers, and both have wodden frames called qrs (Hebrew qeresh, Ugaritic qarshu) on which the tent fabric was placed.
The tent shrine at Shiloh was not simply a representation of El's abode; it was conceived as Yahweh's actual place of dwelling on earth. Thus, in 1 Samuel 7:6 Yahweh says that "I have not dwelt in a temple ... rather I have gone about in a tent ('whl) and in a tabernacle (mskn)". Numbers 11:25 states that "Yahweh came down in a pillar of cloud" to the tabernacle, and "stood at the entrance of the Tent" (12:5). And Psalm 78:60 says that "he abandoned his tent in Shiloh, the tent where he dwelt (skn) among men". The language and metaphors used in Revelation appear to draw on OT concepts of God's dwelling among men in a tent and God dwelling in a paradisical abode on his holy mountain. Both concepts were combined in the OT traditions about Mount Zion, which placed the mythological cosmic mountain in Jerusalem. Note especially the eschatological material in Ezekiel 36-37, which refer to a future restoration of God's presence in Jerusalem, and Ezekiel 37:27 is alluded to in Revelation 21:3.