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24. The Covenant Confirmed

¹ Then the LORD said to Moses, “Come up to the LORD, you and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel. You are to worship at a distance, ² but Moses alone is to approach the LORD; the others must not come near. And the people may not come up with him.”

³ When Moses went and told the people all the LORD’s words and laws, they responded with one voice, “Everything the LORD has said we will do.” ⁴ Moses then wrote down everything the LORD had said.

He got up early the next morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain and set up twelve stone pillars representing the twelve tribes of Israel. ⁵ Then he sent young Israelite men, and they offered burnt offerings and sacrificed young bulls as fellowship offerings to the LORD. ⁶ Moses took half of the blood and put it in bowls, and the other half he splashed against the altar. ⁷ Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read it to the people. They responded, “We will do everything the LORD has said; we will obey.”

⁸ Moses then took the blood, sprinkled it on the people and said, “This is the blood of the covenant that the LORD has made with you in accordance with all these words.”

⁹ Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and the seventy elders of Israel went up ¹⁰ and saw the God of Israel. Under his feet was something like a pavement made of lapis lazuli, as bright blue as the sky. ¹¹ But God did not raise his hand against these leaders of the Israelites; they saw God, and they ate and drank.

¹² The LORD said to Moses, “Come up to me on the mountain and stay here, and I will give you the tablets of stone with the law and commandments I have written for their instruction.”

¹³ Then Moses set out with Joshua his aide, and Moses went up on the mountain of God. ¹⁴ He said to the elders, “Wait here for us until we come back to you. Aaron and Hur are with you, and anyone involved in a dispute can go to them.”

¹⁵ When Moses went up on the mountain, the cloud covered it, ¹⁶ and the glory of the LORD settled on Mount Sinai. For six days the cloud covered the mountain, and on the seventh day the LORD called to Moses from within the cloud. ¹⁷ To the Israelites the glory of the LORD looked like a consuming fire on top of the mountain. ¹⁸ Then Moses entered the cloud as he went on up the mountain. And he stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights.

2. And Moses alone shall come near the Lord. Three gradations are here marked. A station is prescribed for the people, from whence they may “worship afar off;” the elders and the priests are appointed to be the companions of Moses, to come closer, and thus to be witnesses to the people of all the things which we shall afterwards see to be shewn them; whilst, as they were separated from the multitude, so finally Moses alone was received up into the higher glory; for he was caught up on high in the covering of the cloud. This ³⁰⁷³⁰⁷ “Ces trois estats;” these three estates. — Fr. distinction is marked in the words, “Moses alone shall come near...; but they shall not come nigh; neither shall the people go up.” Some translators render the verbs in the past tense; but improperly, in my opinion; for Moses is not yet relating what was done, but only what God had commanded, as is plain from the next verse, wherein also the modesty and humility of the people is commended, because they received with reverence a command which was not in itself very agreeable or likely to be approved. For, such is the ambition of men, that it might have appeared insulting that they should be set afar off and prohibited from approaching the mountain, like strangers and heathens. It is, therefore, an evidence of their pious reverence, that they should submit to be placed at a distance, and should be contented with a position apparently less honorable. And Moses more clearly expresses their promptitude to obey, when he reports their words, that they would do all that he had declared to them from the mouth of God.