3 Go up to that land flowing with milk and honey; but I will not go up among you, for you are a stiff-necked people, for fear that I send destruction on you while you are on the way.
And the Lord said to Moses, I have been watching this people, and I see that they are a stiff-necked people. Now do not get in my way, for my wrath is burning against them; I will send destruction on them, but of you I will make a great nation.
And I have come down to take them out of the hands of the Egyptians, guiding them out of that land into a good land and wide, into a land flowing with milk and honey; into the place of the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Amorite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite.
Come out from among this people, so that I may send sudden destruction on them.
And Moses said, If you yourself are not going with us, do not send us on from here. For is not the fact of your going with us the sign that I and this people have grace in your eyes, so that we, that is, I and your people, are separate from all other people on the face of the earth? And the Lord said to Moses, I will do as you say: for you have grace in my eyes, and I have knowledge of you by your name.
You whose hearts are hard and whose ears are shut to me; you are ever working against the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you.
And God saw what they did, how they were turned from their evil way; and God's purpose was changed as to the evil which he said he would do to them, and he did it not.
Give ear now, and give witness against the family of Jacob, says the Lord God, the God of armies; For in the day when I give Israel punishment for his sins, I will send punishment on the altars of Beth-el, and the horns of the altar will be cut off and come down to the earth.
When I say to the upright that life will certainly be his; if he puts his faith in his righteousness and does evil, not one of his upright acts will be kept in memory; but in the evil he has done, death will overtake him. And when I say to the evil-doer, Death will certainly be your fate; if he is turned from his sin and does what is ordered and right; If the evil-doer lets one who is in his debt have back what is his, and gives back what he had taken by force, and is guided by the rules of life, doing no evil; life will certainly be his, death will not overtake him. Not one of the sins which he has done will be kept in mind against him: he has done what is ordered and right, life will certainly be his.
When I say to the evil-doer, Death will certainly be your fate; and you give him no word of it and say nothing to make clear to the evil-doer the danger of his evil way, so that he may be safe; that same evil man will come to death in his evil-doing; but I will make you responsible for his blood. But if you give the evil-doer word of his danger, and he is not turned from his sin or from his evil way, death will overtake him in his evil-doing; but your life will be safe.
Whenever I say anything about uprooting a nation or a kingdom, and smashing it and sending destruction on it; If, in that very minute, that nation of which I was talking is turned away from its evil, my purpose of doing evil to them will be changed. And whenever I say anything about building up a nation or a kingdom, and planting it; If, in that very minute, it does evil in my eyes, going against my orders, then my good purpose, which I said I would do for them, will be changed.
So that I may give effect to the oath which I made to your fathers, to give them a land flowing with milk and honey as at this day. And I said in answer, So be it, O Lord.
And it will be that, when the Lord takes you into the land of the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Amorite and the Hivite and the Jebusite, the land which he made an oath to your fathers that he would give you, a land flowing with milk and honey, you will do this act of worship in this month.
For this reason the Lord God of Israel has said, Truly I did say that your family and your father's people would have their place before me for ever: but now the Lord says, Let it not be so; I will give honour to those by whom I am honoured, and those who have no respect for me will be of small value in my eyes.
For the children of Israel were wandering in the waste land for forty years, till all the nation, that is, all the fighting-men, who had come out of Egypt, were dead, because they did not give ear to the voice of the Lord: to whom the Lord said, with an oath, that he would not let them see the land which the Lord had given his word to their fathers to give us, a land flowing with milk and honey.
Be certain then that the Lord your God is not giving you this good land as a reward for your righteousness; for you are a stiff-necked people. Keep well in mind how you made the Lord your God angry in the waste land; from the day when you went out of Egypt till you came to this place, you have gone against the orders of the Lord. Again in Horeb you made the Lord angry, and in his wrath he would have put an end to you. When I had gone up into the mountain to be given the stones on which was recorded the agreement which the Lord made with you, I was on the mountain for forty days and forty nights without taking food or drinking water. And the Lord gave me the two stones with writing on them done by the finger of God: on them were recorded all the words which the Lord said to you on the mountain out of the heart of the fire, on the day of the great meeting. Then at the end of forty days and forty nights the Lord gave me those stones, the stones of the agreement. And the Lord said to me, Get up now, and go down quickly from this place; for the people you have taken out of Egypt have given themselves over to evil; they have quickly been turned from the way in which I gave them orders to go; they have made themselves a metal image. And then the Lord said to me, I have seen that this people is stiff-necked:
Is it not enough that you have taken us from a land flowing with milk and honey, to put us to death in the waste land, but now you are desiring to make yourself a chief over us?
And if the Lord has delight in us, he will take us into this land and give it to us, a land flowing with milk and honey.
And they said, We came to the land where you sent us, and truly it is flowing with milk and honey: and here is some of the produce of it.
And he said, If now I have grace in your eyes, let the Lord go among us, for this is a stiff-necked people, and give us forgiveness for our wrongdoing and our sin, and take us for your heritage.
So the Lord let himself be turned from his purpose of sending punishment on his people.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible » Commentary on Exodus 33
Commentary on Exodus 33 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 33
Ex 33:1-23. The Lord Refuses to Go with the People.
1. the Lord said—rather "had" said unto Moses. The conference detailed in this chapter must be considered as having occurred prior to the pathetic intercession of Moses, recorded at the close of the preceding chapter; and the historian, having mentioned the fact of his earnest and painful anxiety, under the overwhelming pressure of which he poured forth that intercessory prayer for his apostate countrymen, now enters on a detailed account of the circumstances.
3. I will not go up … lest I consume thee—Here the Lord is represented as determined to do what He afterwards did not. (See on Ex 32:7).
4. when the people heard these evil tidings—from Moses on his descent from the mount.
5. put off thy ornaments—In seasons of mourning, it is customary with Eastern people to lay aside all gewgaws and divest themselves of their jewels, their gold, and every thing rich and splendid in their dress. This token of their sorrow the Lord required of His offending people.
that I may know what to do unto thee—The language is accommodated to the feeble apprehensions of men. God judges the state of the heart by the tenor of the conduct. In the case of the Israelites, He cherished a design of mercy; and the moment He discerned the first symptoms of contrition, by their stripping off their ornaments, as penitents conscious of their error and sincerely sorrowful, this fact added its weight to the fervency of Moses' prayers, and gave them prevalence with God in behalf of the people.
7. Moses took the tabernacle, and pitched it without the camp—Not the tabernacle, of which a pattern had been given him, for it was not yet erected, but his own tent—conspicuous as that of the leader—in a part of which he heard cases and communed with God about the people's interests; hence called "the tabernacle of the congregation," and the withdrawal of which, in abhorrence from a polluted camp, was regarded as the first step in the total abandonment with which God had threatened them.
8. all the people rose up, and stood every man at his tent door—Its removal produced deep and universal consternation; and it is easy to conceive how anxiously all eyes would be directed towards it; how rapidly the happy intelligence would spread, when a phenomenon was witnessed from which an encouraging hope could be founded.
9-11. the cloudy pillar descended, and stood at the door of the tabernacle—How would the downcast hearts of the people revive—how would the tide of joy swell in every bosom, when the symbolic cloud was seen slowly and majestically to descend and stand at the entrance of the tabernacle!
as Moses entered—It was when he appeared as their mediator, when he repaired from day to day to intercede for them, that welcome token of assurance was given that his advocacy prevailed, that Israel's sin was forgiven, and that God would again be gracious.
18-23. I beseech thee, show me thy glory—This is one of the most mysterious scenes described in the Bible: he had, for his comfort and encouragement, a splendid and full display of the divine majesty, not in its unveiled effulgence, but as far as the weakness of humanity would admit. The face, hand, back parts, are to be understood figuratively.