Commentaria in Exodum
18. AND ALL MOUNT SINAI WAS ON A SMOKE: BECAUSE THE LORD WAS COME DOWN UPON IT IN FIRE, AND THE SMOKE AROSE FROM IT AS OUT OF A FURNACE.—In Deut. 4:11 mount Sinai is said to have burned even unto heaven. As therefore in a furnace partly flame and fire, partly smoke not yet kindled, but smoke wrapped in fire is seen: so likewise the angel in God’s stead produced fire mixed with smoke on Sinai, and that either from air, or from some smoky matter which easily catches fire, namely from incense, resin, sulphur, etc.
Note: Fire is the sign of divine and royal majesty: hence God appeared in fire in the bush of Moses, in the pillar, on mount Sinai, in the temple, and elsewhere, when his royal or judicial power is expressed. For fire goes before him, as the true king and supreme judge. Psalm 49:3: “God shall come manifestly, etc.; a fire shall burn before him,” that is, shall shine before the true king. Psalm 96:3, speaking of the judgment of Christ: “A fire,” he says, “shall go before him.” So fire was anciently borne before Emperors, as Herodian witnesses, because fire is the symbol both of sovereignty, as that which first and chief among the elements excels in virtue and splendour; and of life, doctrine, felicity, power and glory, in which things God and the divine ones are mighty, and after them princes, kings and judges. Hence Varro: Fire, he says, is called from begetting and being born, because all things are born from fire, and fire gives wonderful force to living things.
Symbolically Cyprian, book 3 Testimonies to Quirinus, thinks that by this fire, as by the fire of the bush, Exodus chap. 3, and the fiery tongues at Pentecost, Acts chap. 2, the Holy Spirit is signified. Moreover this smoking fire, and the smoke itself, was a threat of burning, if they should violate the law of God, as in fact for the violation of the law the city and temple were burned, first by the Chaldees, then by Titus and the Romans, and reduced to smoke and ashes.
AND ALL THE MOUNT WAS TERRIBLE.—Our version translates well, if with other points you read in Hiphil vaiachared, that is, and this mountain terrified, or frightened, the Hebrews. Now with other points they read in Qal vatecherad, that is, as the Chaldee has it, and the whole mountain trembled, and therefore likewise was terrible.
That mount Sinai was shaken by an earthquake is plain also from Psalm 67:9: “The earth was moved, and the heavens dropped at the presence of the God of Sinai, at the presence of the God of Israel.” Whence it is plain that, together with the earthquake, amid the fires and lightnings of which verse 16, there was rain here, which Josephus also testifies. Seven terrible things therefore there were on Sinai, when the law was given there. First, the whole mountain trembled. Secondly, the whole mountain burned with fire and smoke. Thirdly, horrible were the thunders and lightnings. Fourthly, a very thick darkness. Fifthly, there was rain and tempest, as the Apostle says, Hebr. chap. 12, verse 18. Sixthly, the sound of the trumpet loudly resounded. Seventhly, the angel from Sinai with trumpet-like and awful voice proclaimed the Decalogue. All these tended to this, to strike the Hebrews with a certain sacred horror, fear and reverence both of the divinity and of the law which they were to receive and keep. Aptly too the rain signified the law as a doctrine descending from heaven.
Whence that of Moses, Deut. chap. 32, verse 2: “Let my doctrine gather as the rain, let my speech distil as the dew, as a shower upon the herb.”
Allegorically, the thunder signified the terror of the preaching of the Gospel: whence Paul is called by St. Jerome the thunder of the Gentiles; the lightnings signified the brightness of miracles; the voice of the trumpet, the strong preaching of the Apostles. The Lord came down in fire and smoke, because he illuminates the faithful by the showing of the light of the Gospel, and darkens the eyes of unbelievers with the smoke and gloom of error, says Isidore.
19. AND GOD ANSWERED HIM.—The Hebrew adds, by a voice, as if to say: Not by phantasms or visions, but outwardly with a clear voice God answered Moses, that the Hebrews might hear God speaking with Moses their lawgiver.
Note: He who here speaks with Moses throughout, and who in the following chapter proclaimed the Decalogue from Sinai, was an angel, as appears Acts chap. 7, verse 38, and Gal. chap. 3, verse 19, where it is expressly said that the law was given by angels; yet this angel is here called God, because he bore the person of God, and delivered his law, as God’s herald and ambassador.
20. AND THE LORD CAME DOWN UPON MOUNT SINAI, IN THE VERY TOP OF THE MOUNT, AND HE CALLED MOSES.—God had already come down through an angel, verse 18, upon the mountain in fire, but as if still raised above the mountain, and standing in the air: for this the word “upon” implies; but here he comes down further to the very top, and calls Moses thither: for Moses stood below the top, and there conversed with God, the neighbouring people listening, standing at the foot of the mountain: whence here he is bidden by God to go up to the summit of the mountain, to which likewise God comes down in a denser cloud and with greater glory. Wrongly therefore does Calvin here carp at our Interpreter, wanting it to be rendered not “he came down” but “he had come down,” namely already before, verse 21.
21. LEST THEY SHOULD HAVE A MIND TO PASS THE LIMITS.—The Hebrew is, lest they break through, lest they destroy, understand, the limit fixed by me. Whence it seems to be gathered that this limit and term was often covered with some fence or stakes, which for one approaching the mountain would have to be broken down.
22. THE PRIESTS ALSO THAT COME TO THE LORD, LET THEM BE SANCTIFIED, LEST HE STRIKE THEM.—Aaron and his sons were not yet made priests: by priests therefore he here means those who before Aaron among the people were priests by the law of nature, whom many think to have been the firstborn of the families. So Cajetan, Lipomanus and others. Such certainly seem to have been those young men whom Moses, chap. 24, verse 5, sent to offer holocausts.
Note: “That come to the Lord,” as if to say: Whose office it is to come to the Lord, that by praying and sacrificing they may be mediators between God and the people. God therefore commands the priests with the rest, nay before the rest, to be sanctified, that is, to cleanse themselves from all filth and stain, to wash their garments, to abstain from their wives, and to await reverently God the promulgator of the Decalogue.
23. AND MOSES SAID: THE PEOPLE CANNOT COME UP TO MOUNT SINAI,—as if to say: The people will not presume that which they know to be forbidden by thee on pain of death: Moses, more eager for the divine fellowship and converse, [wished to take the people up].
AND SANCTIFY IT,—as if to say: Separate mount Sinai by a limit, or some fence, from the approach of the people, that this mountain may seem dedicated to me alone.
24. GO, GET THEE DOWN,—that to the priests also thou mayest declare that they pass not the limits of the mountain, set by me for the people: for of priests the earlier precept, verse 21, touched nothing. Then, “get thee down,” that thou mayest confirm and enact the same by a severer interdict and penalty, namely that not by the people, but by me your God, he who acts otherwise and passes the limits of the mountain is to be put to death. Thirdly, “get thee down,” that thou mayest bring Aaron, now destined priest, with thee into the mountain to me, and that to this end, that by this means his priesthood may be commended by me to the people, and be made venerable and reverend to them, when they see this honour paid to Aaron by me, that I deign him by my calling and presence. Fourthly and chiefly, “get thee down,” that thou, O Moses, set under the top of the mountain almost with the people, as one of them, mayest hear my law, namely the Decalogue (which I will proclaim from Sinai in the next chapter), to which thou also art subject; but this reason God here keeps silent.
Allegorically, the promulgation of the old law signified the promulgation of the new: for both were made on the fiftieth day from the pasch, namely at pentecost; there the mountain trembled with earthquake, here the house of the disciples; there amid flames of fire and flashing lightnings the crash of thunders resounded, here with the vision of fiery tongues a sound likewise came from heaven as of a mighty wind; there the blast of the trumpet loudly pronounced the words of the law, here the Gospel trumpet sounded by the mouth of the Apostles. So Bede in the homily of the vigil of Pentecost, and St. Jerome to Fabiola; nay the Apostle, Hebr. chap. 12, verse 18: “For you are not come,” he says, “to a mountain that might be touched, and a burning fire, and a whirlwind, and darkness, and storm, and the sound of a trumpet; but you are come to mount Sion, and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to the company of many thousands of angels, etc.: see that you refuse not him that speaketh.” Moses accordingly descended to promulgate to the people the precept about not transgressing the limit of the mountain; which done, immediately again with his brother Aaron, as God had commanded him, verse 24, he went up some way, so that he was distant from the people standing at the foot of the mountain, as appears chap. 20, verse 19; and there Moses standing heard the Decalogue proclaimed by the angel, and therefore afterwards called to the summit he ascended, chap. 20, verse 21, to receive there from God other ceremonial and judicial laws, and then sent Aaron and the people back to the camp, as appears Deut. chap. 5, verse 30.