There is nothing in the ark, only the two tables of stone which Moses put there in Horeb, when Jehovah covenanted with the sons of Israel in their going out of the land of Egypt.
`And now, if ye really hearken to My voice, then ye have kept My covenant, and been to Me a peculiar treasure more than all the peoples, for all the earth `is' Mine;
And Jehovah saith unto Moses, `Come up unto Me to the mount, and be there, and I give to thee the tables of stone, and the law, and the command, which I have written to direct them.'
And He giveth unto Moses, when He finisheth speaking with him in mount Sinai, two tables of the testimony, tables of stone, written by the finger of God.
And Jehovah saith unto Moses, `Hew for thyself two tables of stone like the first, and I have written on the tables the words which were on the first tables which thou hast broken;
And he is there with Jehovah forty days and forty nights; bread he hath not eaten, and water he hath not drunk; and he writeth on the tables the matters of the covenant -- the ten matters.
and if the ministration of the death, in letters, engraved in stones, came in glory, so that the sons of Israel were not able to look stedfastly to the face of Moses, because of the glory of his face -- which was being made useless,
`And me hath Jehovah commanded at that time to teach you statutes and judgments, for your doing them in the land whither ye are passing over to possess it;
`These words hath Jehovah spoken unto all your assembly, in the mount out of the midst of the fire, of the cloud, and of the thick darkness -- a great voice; and He hath not added, and He writeth them on two tables of stone, and giveth them unto me.
having a golden censer, and the ark of the covenant overlaid all round about with gold, in which `is' the golden pot having the manna, and the rod of Aaron that budded, and the tables of the covenant,