Exodus 34 - Introduction

Moses is commanded to hew two tables of stone, like those which he had broken, and to take them up the mount to Jehovah, vv.1 5. Proclamation of Jehovah's moral character in the promised theophany, vv.6 8. Moses again entreats Jehovah to forgive His people's sin, and to go with them to Canaan, v.9 [and receives the promise that He will do so, Exodus 33:14-16]. Establishment of a covenant with Israel, vv.10 28. How Moses" face shone, when he came down from conversing with Jehovah on the mountain, vv.29 35.

Vv.29 35 have all the marks of belonging to P; but the analysis of vv.1 28 presents great difficulties. If these verses be read carefully, it will be seen that one thing is commanded, and another done. In vv.1 4 Moses is commanded to prepare and take up the mountain two tables of stone like those which he had broken: Jehovah will then write upon them the words which were upon the first tables (i.e. the Decalogue of Exodus 20). In v.10, however, Jehovah declares that He is about to make a covenant: a number of regulations which Israel is to observe are given (vv.11 26): Moses is then told to write these words, for they are the basis of the covenant (v.27); and (v.28b) he does write upon the tables -the words of the covenant, the ten words." It is true, as Di. observes, Moses is not in v.27 told to write the words on the tables, so that, in itself, the intention of the command might be that he was to write them on a scroll for his own use: if this were the case, it would of course leave the way open for understanding the -words of the covenant" in v.28 of the Decalogue of Exodus 20. In view, however, of the connexion in which vv.27, 28 now stand, it seems most unnatural to distinguish the covenant of v.28 from the covenant of v.27; or to understand the -he" in -and he wrote" in v.28b, of any one but the -he" (twice) in v.28a, i.e. of Moses. The contradiction therefore remains: in v.1 it is said that Jehovahwill write upon the tables the Decalogue of Exodus 20; in v.28 it is said that Moseswrote the -words of the covenant" given in vv.11 26.

There are also other difficulties. As was pointed out on p. 347, there is nothing in the terms of Exodus 34:10; Exodus 34:27 to suggest that a renewalof the covenant is contemplated; and in addition to this, as Dr McNeile well argues, a fresh body of laws (vv.11 26) is not required: -a covenant having been formed (Exodus 24:7 f.), and based upon laws which are given earlier in the book (Exodus 20:22 to Exodus 23:33), and then having been broken by sin, all that can conceivably be required is repentance and forgiveness. The original covenant laws must unalterably hold good." Vv.1 4 should in fact be followed consistently not by the wholly different laws contained in vv.11 26, but as they are followed after the quotation in Deuteronomy 10:1-3 by such words as, -And he wrote on the tables, according to the first writing, the ten words (i.e. the Decalogue of Exodus 20), … and Jehovah gave them unto" Moses (Deuteronomy 10:4).

It is plain, from what has been said, that the representation in Exodus 34:1-28 is not throughout consistent with itself. The following considerations will shew how critics generally Di., for instance, not less than Wellh.; cf. EB.ii. 1444 suppose that the inconsistencies arose. The laws on worship contained in Exodus 34:12-26 are evidently nothing but a different recension of laws on the same subject embedded in the Book of the Covenant, esp. in Exodus 23:12; Exodus 23:15-19: here, in J, they appear as the laws on the basis of which the covenant is not renewed, but established for the first time (vv.10, 27), just as in E (in its present form) the laws contained in the Book of the Covenant form the basis on which the covenant is established (Exodus 24:7 f.). J's original narrative in Exodus 34:1-5; Exodus 34:10-28, in other words, describes really the firstestablishment of the covenant, and formed originally the sequel in J to Exodus 19:20-25 (see on Exodus 24:1): it is a parallel to E's account of the establishment of the covenant preserved in Exodus 20:22 to Exodus 23:33; Exodus 24:3-8: there was no room for it immediately beside E's account of the same event: but it was retained by the compiler, and placed by him where it now stands, immediately after the account of the people's forgiveness and re-instatement in Jehovah's favour, where it has in consequence the appearance of the renewalof the covenant which had been broken. The inconsistencies have arisen from the imperfect adjustment of the two narratives, the narrative of the re-writing of the tables which had been broken, and that of the (re-) establishment of the covenant. If we omit from vv.1, 4 the clauses marked in the analysis, we shall find that we have in vv.1 5, 10 28, a consistent account of Moses ascending the mountain with two tables of stone, of his receiving from Jehovah the laws which were to form the basis of the covenant (vv.10, 27), and of his writing these laws upon the tables (v.28). By the insertion from E who, as he described (Exodus 32:19) the breaking of the tables, will also naturally have described how they were replaced of the two clauses in vv.1, 4 a narrative describing how Moses ascended the mountain to receive the laws of vv.10 26 was transformed into one describing how he ascended the mountain to receive the Decalogue of Exodus 20, which Jehovah promises that He will re-write. But the wording of v.28b was not altered so as to adjust it properly to the new sense of vv.1 4; and hence the inconsistency between v.28 and vv.1 4.

One more point remains to be noticed. v. 28b understood in the sense which the context naturally imposes speaks of the -words of the covenant" (i.e. the words on which the covenant of vv.10, 27 is based) as -ten words"; and hence Göthe (in 1773), Wellhausen (independently: see Compos. des Hex.2 p. 328), and others have supposed that there stood originally in vv.11 26 tenregulations, which have since been added to by later hands, forming in contrast to the -moral Decalogue" of Exodus 20 a -ritual Decalogue," which according to the writer of v.28 was inscribed upon the two tables, and formed the basis of the covenant. As there are more regulations than ten in vv.11 26, of course the -ten" in question can be differently constituted: Wellh. (l.c.p. 331: so Bä. p. xlvi) supposes them to have consisted of vv.14a, 17, 18a, 19a, 22a, 22b, 25a, 25b, 26a, 26b. In view of the close connexion subsisting between v.27 and v.28 those who argue in this manner can hardly be blamed. It is however open to question whether -the ten words" are an original part of the text of v.28: they may be a harmonizing addition, intended (in spite of the inconsistency which it involves) to identify the -words" written upon the tables with the Decalogue of Exodus 20. But, whether they were ten or more, it certainly seems that, according to the writer of vv.27, 28, the ritual regulations of vv.10 26 were like the -moral Decalogue" of E written upon stone tables. The argument for this view of the chapter is clearly and forcibly presented in the Interpreter, Oct. 1908, p. 6 ff.