Moses Did Not Know That the Skin of His Face Shone While He Talked to Him: Exodus 34:27-35

Exodus 34:27-35: "27 Then the LORD said to Moses, 'Write these words, for according to the tenor of these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel.' 28 So he was there with the LORD forty days and forty nights; he neither ate bread nor drank water. And He wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments. 29 Now it was so, when Moses came down from Mount Sinai (and the two tablets of the Testimony were in Moses' hand when he came down from the mountain), that Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone while he talked with Him. 30 So when Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come near him. 31 Then Moses called to them, and Aaron and all the rulers of the congregation returned to him; and Moses talked with them. 32 Afterward all the children of Israel came near, and he gave them as commandments all that the LORD had spoken with him on Mount Sinai. 33 And when Moses had finished speaking with them, he put a veil on his face. 34 But whenever Moses went in before the LORD to speak with Him, he would take the veil off until he came out; and he would come out and speak to the children of Israel whatever he had been commanded. 35 And whenever the children of Israel saw the face of Moses, that the skin of Moses' face shone, then Moses would put the veil on his face again, until he went in to speak with Him."

Because Moses was in communion with God, and spoke with Him for forty days and nights, his face shone, reflecting back onto his face the glory of the Lord. When the people of Israel, saw this glory reflected upon Moses face, they were afraid.

Now consider this: This was only the reflection of God's glory. But in their sinful state, the people of Israel, seeing only a glimmer and a glimpse of the glory of God, drew back in fear. Even Aaron, Moses own brother, cowered at the veil presence of God that was reflected onto Moses face.

St. Paul talks about this glory of God on Moses' face in his Epistle to the Church at Corinth. But there he remarks about how it faded, when he was no longer in the presence of God. Nowhere in the Old Testament is this revealed, but the Blessed Apostle, speaking through the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, fills in the blanks for us, showing us that the glory of Moses' face, was only a precursor, a glimmer of the true glory that comes from the Gospel.

Hear what Keil and Delitzsch have to say on this subject:

"This reflection of the splendour thrown back by the glory of God was henceforth to serve as the most striking proof of the confidential relation in which Moses stood to Jehovah, and to set forth the glory of the office which Moses filled. The Apostle Paul embraces this view in 2 Co 3:7., and lays stress upon the fact that the glory was to be done away, which he was quite justified in doing, although nothing is said in the Old Testament about the glory being transient, from the simple fact that Moses died. The apostle refers to it for the purpose of contrasting the perishable glory of the law with the far higher and imperishable glory of the Gospel. At the same time he regards the veil which covered Moses' face as a symbol of the obscuring of the truth revealed in the Old Testament. But this does not exhaust the significance of this splendour. The office could only confer such glory upon the possessor by virtue of the glory of the blessings which it contained, and conveyed to those for whom it was established. Consequently, the brilliant light on Moses' face also set forth the glory of the Old Covenant, and was intended both for Moses and the people as a foresight and pledge of the glory to which Jehovah had called, and would eventually exalt, the people of His possession."

Thus far Keil and Delitzsch.

This narrative again brings us to the Mount of Transfiguration, where our Lord Jesus was transfigured before the Apostles, St. Peter, St. James the Elder, and St. John, and standing there in His transfigured glory with Him were Elijah and Moses.

This glory of God which Moses reflects, is a picture and image of the glory of our Lord Jesus. For when He reveals on the Mount of Transfiguration His full glory, we can see the picture of the Israelites in the Apostles who fell to their faces in fear.

Of course, all those who sin, when they come into the perfection of our Lord's revealed glory, shudder in fear, for they realize that they are unworthy to behold such an image. This is shown throughout the Holy Scriptures, from Adam, to Isaiah, to Moses at the burning bush, to Aaron and the people of Israel. And the list could go on.

But this is the very reason that our Lord Jesus is born into our flesh, so that he might remove that barrier of sin, which prevents us from beholding the true glory of God. And He accomplished this on the tree of the cross.

May God be with you!

Deacon Dulas

Behold, I Make A Covenant: Exodus 34:1-10

Exodus 34:1-10: "1 And the LORD said to Moses, 'Cut two tablets of stone like the first ones, and I will write on these tablets the words that were on the first tablets which you broke. 2 So be ready in the morning, and come up in the morning to Mount Sinai, and present yourself to Me there on the top of the mountain. 3 And no man shall come up with you, and let no man be seen throughout all the mountain; let neither flocks nor herds feed before that mountain.' 4 So he cut two tablets of stone like the first ones. Then Moses rose early in the morning and went up Mount Sinai, as the LORD had commanded him; and he took in his hand the two tablets of stone. 5 Now the LORD descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the LORD. 6 And the LORD passed before him and proclaimed, 'The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, 7 keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children's children to the third and the fourth generation.' 8 So Moses made haste and bowed his head toward the earth, and worshiped. 9 Then he said, 'If now I have found grace in Your sight, O Lord, let my Lord, I pray, go among us, even though we are a stiff-necked people; and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us as Your inheritance.' 10 And He said: 'Behold, I make a covenant. Before all your people I will do marvels such as have not been done in all the earth, nor in any nation; and all the people among whom you are shall see the work of the LORD. For it is an awesome thing that I will do with you.'"

Our Lord God tells Moses to hewn out of stone two tablets, and bring them to Him, so that He might once again write the Law on them with His own finger. There is a difference in this second set of stone tablets, in that Moses is the one providing the materials. In the first set, the ones that Moses broke in his anger, the Lord provided both the materials and the writing on them. Why the difference? We are not told. Perhaps it was because Moses was the one who broke them, therefore he must replace them. Perhaps our Lord God now required some action on behalf of the Israelites, who would perform it through Moses, whereas in the first case, He was willing to give the Law freely to the Israelites without any action on their part, other than to stay away from the mountain. What the reason is we do not know, but we do notice this difference.

Another intriguing thing about this pericope, is the manifestation of God's glory to Moses that is shown to us in verse 5. This is the fulfillment of God, which He made to Moses in chapter 33, when He told Moses that He would put him in the cleft of the rock, and pass by showing him His back, but not His face. We are only revealed two things about this, first, that Moses fell to his face and worshipped God. The second, is that we are not told what Moses saw, only that as He passed by, the Lord spoke, as Martin Luther called it, the great "sermon on the Name of the Lord."

"The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children's children to the third and the fourth generation." This is very similar to the introduction to the Commandments, which in Martin Luther's Small Catechism, is placed as the Close of the Commandments, wherein our Lord God, declared that He would both punish sin, and would forgive sin. Hear what Keil and Delitzsch have to say regarding this passage regarding the Lord's Name:

"It proclaimed that God is love, but that kind of love in which mercy, grace, long-suffering, goodness, and truth are united with holiness and justice. As the merciful One, who is great in goodness and truth, Jehovah shows mercy to the thousandth, forgiving sin and iniquity in long-suffering and grace; but He does not leave sin altogether unpunished, and in His justice visits the sin of the fathers upon the children and the children's children even unto the fourth generation. The Lord had already revealed Himself to the whole nation from Mount Sinai as visiting sin and showing mercy (Exo 20:5.). But whereas on that occasion the burning zeal of Jehovah which visits sin stood in the foreground, and mercy only followed afterwards, here grace, mercy, and goodness are placed in the front. And accordingly all the words which the language contained to express the idea of grace in its varied manifestations to the sinner, are crowded together here, to reveal the fact that in His inmost being God is love. But in order that grace may not be perverted by sinners into a ground of wantonness, justice is not wanting even here with its solemn threatenings, although it only follows mercy, to show that mercy is mightier than wrath, and that holy love does not punish till sinners despise the riches of the goodness, patience, and long-suffering of God. As Jehovah here proclaimed His name, so did He continue to bear witness of it to the Israelites, from their departure from Sinai till their entrance into Canaan, and from that time forward till their dispersion among the heathen, and even now in their exile showing mercy to the thousandth, when they turn to the Redeemer who has come out of Zion."

Thus far Keil and Delitzsch.

The whole purpose of this scene we have to remember, is because Moses what some proof from God that He indeed desired the Israelites to be His people. Now having seen the glory of God, Moses once again intercedes on behalf of the Israelites. Or to say it another way, now that the proof has been given, and that Moses has been shown that God desires to have the people of Israel as His people, he immediately reminds the Lord of His promise to lead them into the promised land of Canaan Himself, and not through and His Angel.

Therefore, Moses confesses his sin, and the sin of the Israelites, proclaiming himself and the Israelites to be "stiff-necked people." What Moses is doing here is pleading on behalf of our Lord God's grace and mercy, which He just proclaimed Himself to be, in proclaiming His Name to Moses. On account of Moses' intercession, the Lord proclaims that He will make a covenant with the people of Israel, that only they will see the signs and wonders that He will do for them, and the rest of the nations will not get to see these.

Hence, from the people of Israel, our Lord God would reveal Himself in the flesh. This would be His greatest sign and wonder that He would do, that He would take on our flesh, and suffer and die for not just the Jews, but for all nations.

May God be with you!

Deacon Dulas