Exodus 32:29

For Moses had said,.... To the Levites, when he first gave them their orders: consecrate yourselves today to the Lord; devote yourselves to his service, by obeying his orders, slaying those, or the

For Moses had said, Consecrate yourselves to day to the LORD, even every man upon his son, and upon his brother; that he may bestow upon you a blessing this day. Consecrate - or ye have consecrated yourselves today.

Offer up yourselves to the honour and service of the Lord in this work, which because it was joined with the hazard of their lives, he calls it a consecration or oblation of themselves, as Abraham for the like reason is said to have offered up Isaac. Consecrate yourselves, Heb. fill your hands, & c., i.e. offer a sacrifice, for so the phrase is oft used, as ,12. That work of justice which they were going to execute might seem an inhuman and barbarous act, but he tells them it was an acceptable sacrifice to God, as the destruction of God’ s enemies is called a sacrifice, . Or he hereby intimates that this tribe was designed by God for his immediate service, and therefore recommends this work to them as an excellent initiation into their office, and as a demonstration that they were in some sort worthy of that great trust.

Exodus 32:29 For Moses had said, Consecrate yourselves to day to the LORD, even every man upon his son, and upon his brother; that he may bestow upon you a blessing this day.Ver. 29. Consecrate yourselves.] Regain that blessing which your father Levi lost.

(29) For Moses had said, Consecrate yourselves.—Moses had explained to them that a brave behaviour under existing circumstances would be accepted as a “consecration,” and would win for the tribe a semi-priestly character. His announcement was made good when the Levites were appointed to the service of the sanctuary in lieu of the firstborn (Numbers 3:6-13).

Verse 29. For Moses had said, Consecrate yourselves] Fill your hands to the Lord. See the reason of this form of speech in Clarke's note on "Exodus 29:19".

29. The Levites are invited to qualify themselves to receive the priesthood as a reward for their zeal. Fill your hand to-day to Jehovah] i.e. (see on Exodus 28:41), Provide yourselves with sacrifices, that you may be installed into the priesthood. for every man (is) against, &c.] That is the spirit which you have shewn to-day, and which is demanded for the priesthood (Di.). Cf. Deuteronomy 33:9 (written under the monarchy), where the priestly tribe is eulogized for its abnegation of natural relationships, though it is uncertain whether the present incident is specifically alluded to. that he may, &c.] The ‘blessing’ is the privilege of officiating as priests. Cf. Kennedy, DB. i. 341b. In view of Deu 10:8 (‘At that time Jehovah separated the tribe of Levi to bear the ark’ &c.), where the fragment of an itinerary in vv. 6 f. must be either parenthetic, or misplaced (so that At that time will refer to the period of the stay at Horeb, the subject of Deu 9:8 to Deuteronomy 10:5), Di. and others can hardly be wrong in holding that JE’s narrative here was followed originally by an account of the consecration of the tribe of Levi—as a reward, presumably, for the display of zeal on Jehovah’s behalf described in vv. 26–29, which the compiler of Ex. did not deem it necessary to retain by the side of the more detailed particulars of P. In P, it will be remembered, the consecration of the priesthood is narrated in Leviticus 8, and that of the ‘Levites’ (in P the inferior members of the tribe, as distinguished from the priests) in Numbers 8:5 ff.; but down to the time when Dt. was written, any member of the tribe had the right to exercise priestly functions (Deuteronomy 18:1; Deuteronomy 18:6-8); and it would be during this stage in the history of the tribe that J or E—like the writer of Deu 10:8 f.—would speak of the whole tribe being set apart or consecrated For priestly functions.

29. For Moses had said — Thus rendered, this verse is supposed to explain the zeal of the Levites in the slaughter just described. Their zeal and activity were to be a consecration of themselves to Jehovah.