Book excerpt: Read this exciting story of the early Israelite people . . . You can almost hear the men of Israel as they cut and plane the hardest and heaviest wood in the world to make the Ark of the Covenant, the most fabulous piece of cabinetmaker’s art ever conceived. No nails in this ark; only wood, and to top off this wooden masterpiece, the ark was covered with 100-percent twenty-four-karat gold. The total weight of the ark came to over two tons.