Commentaria in Exodum
Chapter the Thirty-fourth. Synopsis of the Chapter
Moses, the tables restored, returns to the mount; God passes before him; Moses sees the back parts of God. Next, secondly, verse 10, God renews the covenant with the Hebrews and repeats his laws. Thirdly, verse 28, the tables being brought by Moses, God writes the Decalogue on them. Fourthly, verse 29, Moses with horned face returns with the tables to the people, who fear and flee: hence Moses veils his face, and so he speaks with the people veiled, and the people with him.
1. And after this he said: Cut two tables of stone like unto the former, and I will write upon them the words which were in the tables, which thou brakest. 2. Be ready in the morning, that thou mayst forthwith go up into mount Sinai, and thou shalt stand with me upon the top of the mount. 3. Let no man go up with thee, and let not any man be seen throughout all the mount: neither let the oxen nor the sheep feed over against it. 4. And Moses cut two tables of stone, such as had been before: and rising in the night he went up to mount Sinai, as the Lord had commanded him, carrying with him the tables. 5. And when the Lord was come down in a cloud, Moses stood with him, calling upon the name of the Lord. 6. And when he passed before him, he said: O the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, patient and of much compassion, and true, 7. Who keepest mercy unto thousands: who takest away iniquity, and wickedness, and sin, and no man of himself is innocent before thee. Who renderest the iniquity of the fathers to the children, and to the grandchildren, unto the third and fourth generation. 8. And Moses making haste, bowed down prostrate unto the earth, and adoring, 9. Said: If I have found grace in thy sight, O Lord, I beseech thee that thou wouldst go with us (for it is a stiffnecked people) and take away our iniquities and sin, and possess us. 10. The Lord answered: I will make a covenant in the sight of all: I will do signs such as were never seen upon earth, nor in any nation: that this people, in the midst of whom thou art, may see the terrible work of the Lord which I will do. 11. Observe all things which I command thee this day: I myself will drive out before thy face the Amorrhite, and the Chanaanite, and the Hethite, the Pherezite also, and the Hevite, and the Jebusite. 12. Beware thou never join in friendship with the inhabitants of that land, which may be thy ruin: 13. But destroy their altars, break their statues, and cut down their groves: 14. Beware lest thou adore a strange god. The Lord his name is Jealous, he is a jealous God. 15. Make no covenant with the men of those countries: lest when they have committed fornication with their gods, and have adored their idols, some one should call thee to eat of the things sacrificed.
16. Neither shalt thou take of their daughters a wife for thy sons, lest after they themselves have committed fornication, they make thy sons also to commit fornication with their gods. 17. Thou shalt not make to thyself any molten gods. 18. Thou shalt keep the feast of the unleavened bread. Seven days shalt thou eat unleavened bread, as I commanded thee in the time of the month of the new corn: for in the month of the springtime thou camest out of Egypt. 19. All of the male kind that openeth the womb, shall be mine: of all beasts, whether of ox or sheep, it shall be mine. 20. The firstborn of an ass thou shalt redeem with a sheep: and if thou give not a price for him, he shall be slain. The firstborn of thy sons thou shalt redeem: neither shalt thou appear before me empty.
21. Six days shalt thou work: the seventh day thou shalt cease to plough and to reap. 22. Thou shalt keep the feast of weeks, of the firstfruits of the corn of thy wheat harvest, and the solemnity when, the time of the year returning, all things are laid up. 23. Three times in the year shall all thy males appear in the sight of the almighty Lord the God of Israel. 24. For when I shall have taken away the nations from before thy face, and shall have enlarged thy borders, no man shall lie in wait against thy land, when thou goest up, and appearest in the sight of the Lord thy God thrice a year. 25. Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice upon leaven: neither shall there remain in the morning any thing of the victim of the solemnity of the phase. 26. The firstfruits of the corn of thy ground thou shalt offer in the house of the Lord thy God. Thou shalt not boil a kid in the milk of its dam. 27. And the Lord said to Moses: Write thee these words, by which I have made a covenant both with thee and with Israel. 28. He was therefore there with the Lord forty days and forty nights: he did neither eat bread, nor drink water, and he wrote upon the tables the ten words of the covenant. 29. And when Moses came down from mount Sinai, he held the two tables of the testimony, and he knew not that his face was horned from the conversation of the Lord. 30. And Aaron and the children of Israel seeing the face of Moses horned, were afraid to come near. 31. And being called by him, both Aaron, and the rulers of the synagogue, returned to him. And after that he had spoken to them, 32. All the children of Israel came to him: and he gave them in commandment all that he had heard of the Lord in mount Sinai. 33. And having done speaking, he put a veil upon his face. 34. And when he went in to the Lord, and spoke with him, he took it away, until he came forth: and then he spoke to the children of Israel all things that had been commanded him. 35. And they saw that the face of Moses when he came out was horned, but he covered his face again, if at any time he spoke to them.
1. AND AFTER THIS,—supply God spoke to Moses, and prosecuting his discourse, he at last completed it with the inscription of the second tables.
CUT (in Hebrew pesol) THEE TWO TABLES OF STONE.—God had given the former tables, and had inscribed them with the Decalogue; but because the Hebrews had violated and broken them by making the golden calf, therefore, in punishment of the sin, God here commands that they themselves provide these second ones, and offer them to God to be inscribed, and as suppliants ask that the law be written on them for them anew by God.
2. BE READY IN THE MORNING, THAT THOU MAYST FORTHWITH GO UP INTO MOUNT SINAI.—Hence it seems that God said this to Moses on the day before his ascent, about morning time, and that Moses then straightway came down from the mount to the camp, and there had two tables of stone cut and hewn by workmen, and proclaimed to the people that none should approach the mount; then the following night went up again into the mount, to present himself to God next morning with the tables, that God might inscribe the Decalogue on them with his own hand; which God also presently did on that same day, which was the fortieth from Moses’ ascent into the mount; whence it follows that on the preceding day, which was the thirty-ninth, Moses had come down from Sinai to cut the tables of the law, and bring them to God, as God here commands him. So Abulensis.
3. NEITHER LET THE OXEN NOR THE SHEEP FEED OVER AGAINST IT,—opposite the mount. God willed all this in order to strike into a hard and rude people fear and reverence of himself.
5. AND WHEN THE LORD WAS COME DOWN IN A CLOUD, MOSES STOOD WITH HIM.—“Stood,” namely Moses, shut in the cave, and covered by the cloud in which God came down to cover him while he passed, that Moses might not see the face, but the back of the Lord, as God had promised Moses at the end of the preceding chapter.
5 and 6. CALLING UPON THE NAME OF THE LORD. AND WHEN HE PASSED BEFORE HIM, HE SAID: O THE LORD, THE LORD GOD, MERCIFUL, etc.—“He said,” who? it is uncertain, whether Moses or the Lord. The Hebrew can be fitted to either: for it reads word for word: and the Lord came down in a cloud, and stood with him, and called upon the name of the Lord (which our Interpreter took of Moses: for he renders, Moses stood with him calling upon the name of the Lord), and the Lord passed before his face, and cried: Lord, Lord, etc.