The golden cherubim that crowned the Ark of the Covenant were not two separate statues, Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on Exodus 37:8 insists. They were part of the same piece of gold. They were not separated from the mercy seat; but by the wisdom of the Spirit of prophecy, he made the kerubin on its two sides.
The Targum is resolving a technical puzzle. The Torah says Bezalel hammered the cherubim out of the mercy seat itself — meaning from the same slab of beaten gold. No welding, no attaching. One piece of metal, two faces, beaten into shape by a craftsman working under the ruach ha-kodesh.
The Targum attributes this feat specifically to the wisdom of the Spirit of prophecy. Regular craftsmanship could not accomplish it. You cannot hammer a flat slab of gold into two three-dimensional angelic figures that stand up on opposite ends of the slab without some part either snapping off or thinning to tearing. The Talmud says Bezalel only knew how because the Spirit of prophecy told his hands what to do.
And why face to face? The rabbis of the Talmud (Bava Batra 99a) read the cherubim's orientation as a weathervane of Israel's standing before God. When Israel did God's will, the cherubim faced each other. When Israel sinned, the cherubim turned away. The golden angels were a barometer of the covenant.
The Targum's detail — they were not separated from the mercy seat — has a theological resonance too. The cherubim are not floating above God's presence. They are part of the same piece. Guardians and mercy are one continuous substance in Jewish theology.
The takeaway: the holiest object in Judaism was not assembled. It was hammered out of a single block, with angels and mercy-seat inseparable. Some sacred things cannot be put together. They must be forged whole.