Exodus 24

Ex. 24 1 And he said unto Moses, Come up unto the LORD, thou, and Aaron, Nadab, and 2 Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel ; and worship ye afar off : and Moses alone shall come near unto the LORD ; but they shall not come near ; neither shall the people go up with 9 him. Then went up Moses, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel ; 10 and they saw the God of Israel ; and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of sap 11 phire stone, and as it were the very heaven for clearness. And upon the nobles of the children of Israel he laid not his hand : and they beheld God, and did eat and drink. 12 And the LORD said unto Moses, Come up to me into the mount, and be there : and I will give thee the tables of stone, and the law and the commandment, which I have written, that thou 13 mayest teach them. And Moses rose up, and Joshua his minister : and Moses went up into 14 the mount of God. And he said unto the elders, Tarry ye here for us, until we come again unto you : and, behold, Aaron and Hur are with you : whosoever hath a cause, let him come 15 near unto them. And Moses went up into the mount, and the cloud covered the mount. And 16 the glory of the LORD abode upon mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days : and the 17 seventh day he called unto Moses out of the midst of the cloud. And the appearance of the glory of the LORD was like devouring fire on the top of the mount in the eyes of the children 18 of Israel. And Moses entered into the midst of the cloud, and went up into the mount : and Moses was in the mount forty days and forty nights.

De. 9 9 When I was gone up into the mount to receive the tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant which the LORD made with you, then I abode in the mount forty days and forty nights ; I did neither eat bread nor drink water.

Ex. 32 1 And when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mount, the people gathered themselves together unto Aaron, and said unto him, Up, make us gods [or, a god], which shall go before us; for as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we know not what is become of him. And Aaron said unto them, Break off the golden rings, which are in the ears of your wives, of your sons, and of your daughters, and bring them unto me. And all the people brake off the golden rings which were in their ears, and brought them unto Aaron. And he received it at their hand, and fashioned it with a graving tool, and made it a molten calf: and they said, These be thy gods [or, This is thy god], O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. And when Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it; and Aaron made proclamation, and said, To-morrow shall be a feast to the LORD. And they rose up early on the morrow, and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play.

24:1, 2, 9-11. As a nation Israel was now reconciled and set apart unto God—both having been accomplished by the “blood of sprinkling.” Thereby they became prepared for that fellowship with him which was symbolized in the sacrificial meal that followed. There God, in pledge of his favor, fed his people upon the sacrifices which he had accepted. The sacrificial meal meant the fellowship of acceptance; its joy was that of the consciousness of this blessed fact. And now Moses and Aaron, and his two sons (the future priests), along with seventy of the elders of Israel, went up into the mount, “and did eat and drink” at that sacrificial meal, in the seen presence of the God of Israel—not indeed under any outward form, but with heaven’s own brightness underneath the Shekinah. Thus “to see God, and to eat and drink,” was a foretaste and a pledge of the perfect blessedness in beholding him hereafter. It was also a symbol and a type of what shall be realized when, as the Alleluia of the “great multitude” proclaims the reign of the “Lord God omnipotent,” the gladsome, joyous bride of the Lamb now made ready for the marriage, and adorned with bridal garments, hears the welcome sound summoning her to “the marriage supper of the Lamb.” A. E.

9. Moses and Aaron ascend as the prophet and priest of God; Nadab and Abihu, as the elder sons of Aaron, henceforth to be associated with him in the priesthood; the seventy elders as the representative heads of the people. M.—In all this narrative is manifest the wide distinction betwixt the Old and New Covenant. In the New Testament, all believers are called on to enter with their Forerunner into the holiest through the veil (Heb. 10:19); while in the Old, merely the chosen representatives of the people, and they only to a very limited extent, may come into the presence of God. Still, the general priestly dignity of the whole people is declared in the fact that not consecrated priests, but elders out of every tribe, enjoy this high privilege. Gerl.—To what point they ascended would be a very unprofitable inquiry. It is incomparably more important to mark the fact that now, when the covenant has received its solemn and final sanction, the people by their representatives have access to God. M.

10. And they saw the God of Israel; under his feet a paved work of sapphire stone, as the very heaven for clearness. All these remained at a respectful distance; yet it is said they saw the God of Israel; it should seem, the symbolic fire which indicated his presence, beneath which was what appeared like a pavement of lapislazuli or sapphire, or the deep blue of the clearest and most cloudless heaven. Milman.—The sapphire is a precious stone of a sky-colored hue, next in value and beauty to the diamond, and there seems to be an allusion to this vision in the prophet’s words (Is. 54:11), “I will lay thy stones with fair colors, and lay thy foundations with sapphires.” In order to make the impression of its appearance still more distinct, it is compared to “the very heaven for clearness.” It had the aspect of the azure vault of heaven as seen in its pure native splendor, when the atmosphere is serene and unclouded. Bush.—A paved work of sapphire is descriptive of a scene of matchless splendor, having the qualities of adamantine solidity, transparence, and brilliancy. The substance of heaven for purity. The substance of heaven is a phrase for the very heaven itself. Nothing less than the spotless purity and lustre of the skies above is fit to be compared with the inexpressible beauty and grandeur of that which was beneath the feet of the God of Israel. M.—This vision has all the indistinctness of whatever is superhuman, when the mortal becomes a spectator of an object of which he is unacquainted with a prototype. The Deity appeared, as if his feet were resting on a paved way, inlaid with stars, amid the azure of the sapphire, the aerial substance of the heavens, lucid and serene. Aboab.

There is something sublime and significant in the restrained and reverent way in which the glory of the Lord is referred to. No attempt to describe the vision itself, nothing which could supply even to the imagination the materials for the construction of any likeness of the Almighty. Simply a suggestion, chaste and yet glowing, of the glory “under his feet.” Ah! that is all the eye of sinful man can see, even under the most favored conditions, here on earth. But then may we not well argue that if what is under his feet suggests pavement of sapphire and heaven’s clearest ethereal blue—if all that is most rapturously beautiful in nature be only the tinting of his footstool—what shall be the glory of his face when we “shall see him as he is,” and “be like him” too; for the time is coming when, by the side of the “pure river of the water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb,” they who now only serve and wait upon the footstool, “shall see his face; and his name shall be in their foreheads; and there shall be no night there!” J. M. G.—It is to this future and consummated glory of the Redeemer, made again visible and taking up its abode among men, that the symbol of the Shekinah always points. Its manifestation to Israel of old was preintimative of its renewed appearance and establishment in more sublime and glorious state to the subjects of the Gospel economy in its ulterior periods, as set forth in the splendid predictions of Isaiah and the Apocalypse. It is only in the realization of all that was shadowed by the Shekinah that we are to look for the fulfilment of the assurance ratified by “a great voice out of heaven, saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people.” We suppose that it was with a view to impart a prophetic intimation of this great futurity, that the present vision was vouchsafed and recorded; and that a similar end was contemplated in the similar disclosures made to Isaiah, to Ezekiel, to Daniel, and to John. They all point forward to the blissful period referred to in the annunciation, “the tabernacle of God shall be with men”—that is, his Shekinah, his manifested presence, shall be with men. Bush.

11. They beheld God, and did eat and drink.** No emblems of judgment were seen by them now. He who had before covered himself with clouds, and indicated his presence in tempests, is now arrayed in light. The calm serenity of the sky now hides him in its peaceful majesty, and nothing comes to create in them either terror or dismay, for “upon the nobles of Israel he laid not his hands.” Therefore, with calm composure and with grateful hearts, they sit down before him to keep sacramental feast: “They saw God, and did eat and drink.” Now that they approach him as his covenanted ones, the heads of the people “find his presence no more a source of disturbance and dread, but radiant in all the bright loveliness of supernal glory;” and their feast upon the mount may be regarded as a foretoken not merely of the happiness of those who are one with God in Christ, but also of the blessedness of that celestial abode, where, in the highest sense of which the words are capable, it will still be true of its inhabitants that they “see God, and do eat and drink.” W. M. T.—They feasted upon the sacrifice, before God, in token of their cheerful consent to the covenant now made, their grateful acceptance of the benefits of it, and their communion with God in pursuance of that covenant. Thus believers eat and drink with Christ at his table (Luke 22:30). Blessed are they that shall eat bread in the kingdom of our Father, and drink of the new wine there. H.

Ex. 24 3 And Moses came and told the people all the words of the LORD, and all the judgements : and all the people answered with one voice, and said, All the words which the LORD hath spoken will we do. And Moses wrote all the words of the LORD, and rose up early in the morning, and builded an altar under the mount, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel. And he sent young men of the children of Israel, which offered burnt offerings, and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen unto the LORD. And Moses took half of the blood, and put it in basons ; and half of the blood he sprinkled on the altar. And he took the book of the covenant, and read in the audience of the people : and they said, All that the LORD hath spoken will we do, and be obedient. And Moses took the blood, and sprinkled it on the people, and said, Behold the blood of the covenant, which the LORD hath made with you concerning all these words.

3. And Moses came [down from the mount] and told the people all the words of the Lord, and all the judgments.

The first thing Moses did was to make the people acquainted with the contents of the book so that they might know certainly what obligations they were about to assume. Whatever they did, they must do intelligently. J. M. G. —This seems to have been a preliminary recital, immediately upon his descent from the interview with Jehovah, of “the words and the judgments” referred to in the previous section. And all the people answered with one voice and said, All the words which the Lord hath spoken will we do. This is the first responsive expression of acceptance and assent to the terms of the covenant, as proffered by Jehovah. But this was only preliminary to the formal ceremony of ratification, which took place on the following day.

4. And Moses wrote all the words of the Lord. This was done, it would seem, on the same day of the first recital, and immediately subsequent to the people’s response of acceptance and assent. He wrote in what is called (verse 7) “the book of the covenant.” B. —The art of writing was certainly known in the time of Moses. Monuments of Egypt which antedate the exodus exhibit abundant specimens of writing on stone, and some papyrus rolls still extant probably date from a higher antiquity than this Book of Genesis. Lepsius found in Thebes the tombs of two librarians—“chiefs over the books”—of the fourteenth century before Christ ; and he traced the ruins of a library in a temple of the same era, upon whose walls Champollion had previously found “the representations of Thoth, the God of Wisdom, and of Saf, the Goddess of History ; then, behind the former, the God of Hearing, and behind the latter, the God of Seeing.” J. P. T. —The monuments prove conclusively that in no country of the ancient world was facility in writing so great, in none were the materials for writing so perfect, and in none was the passion for writing so incorporated into the habits and business of the people, as in Egypt ; and that, too, at a period anterior to the time of Moses, and even of Joseph. In this opinion scholars best qualified to judge upon the subject concur —as Wilkinson, Rosellini, Salvolini, Gesenius, Ewald, and others. “We must shut our eyes against the clearest light,” says Rosellini, “if we would deny that the art of reading and writing was generally studied and practised in ancient Egypt, to as great a degree at least as it now is among us.” So that it turns out that the many passages in the Pentateuch, implying a great extension of the art of writing among the Hebrews in the time of Moses, are founded in truth. Instead of invalidating, they confirm the narrative ; witnessing not against, but for its Mosaic origin and its entire trustworthiness. E. C. W.

Early in the morning builded an altar under the mount, and twelve pillars. The altar represented the presence of God. The pillars represented the tribes of Israel. It is probable that the altar would be in the centre and the pillars ranged round it ; and accordingly we have here the first outward representation of the Church. Here we have the idea of the tabernacle, afterward more fully developed in the temple, and realized spiritually in the Church of Christ, the tabernacle or temple of the New Testament. The altar of sacrifice was in the centre then. It is in the centre still; for what else is the cross around which we all as Christians gather, than the altar of the New Testament, on which “Christ our Passover was sacrificed for us.” J. M. G.

After the people had promised obedience, and so entered into the bonds of the covenant, it was necessary to preserve the memory of these transactions and to confirm the covenant by authentic and solemn ceremonies. And this Moses does: (1) As legislator, he reduces to writing all the articles and conditions of the agreement, with the people’s act of consent. (2) As their mediator and the deputy of the Lord, he accepts on his part the resolution of the people; and Jehovah on his part engages himself to Israel to be their God, their King, and Protector, and to fulfil to them all the promises he had made to their fathers. (3) To make this the more solemn and affecting, and to ratify the covenant, which could not be done without shedding and sprinkling of blood, Moses builds an altar, probably of turf, as was commanded, ch. 20:24, and erects twelve pillars, no doubt of unhewn stone, and probably set round about the altar. The altar itself represented the throne of God; the twelve stones, the twelve tribes of Israel. These were the two parties who were to contract or enter into covenant. No covenant was considered to be ratified and binding till a sacrifice had been offered; hence the necessity of the sacrifices mentioned here. A. C.

5. There was as yet no formally appointed priest in Israel. Moses himself, the [divinely appointed] mediator of the covenant, until special appointments were made, united in his own person all the different offices. So he employed young men to offer the sacrifices. J. M. G. —The order of the Levitical priesthood was not yet instituted, and hence the first-born of each family, being regarded as the most excellent in that family, was selected to be the officiating priest, and to offer sacrifices to God; and, therefore, he sent young men—the first-born—of the children of Israel, to offer up these burnt-offerings. J. C.—They are merely the ministers of Moses, and not the representatives of the people, who are the seventy elders, and occupy a different position in this great transaction. M.

6. And Moses took half of the blood. The blood is that which makes atonement, and thereby lays the foundation for a covenant of peace. Hence it ratifies the covenant. For this purpose it is divided into two equal parts. The one is reserved in basins—the other is sprinkled on the altar. There it makes propitiation, and in the present instance signifies concurrence in the covenant.

7. And he read the book of the covenant in the audience of the people: and they said, All that the Lord hath spoken will we do, and be obedient. The book of the covenant, which he had written, contained the “words” and “judgments” of the previous four chapters. These again he solemnly recites. The former assent of the people authorized the step of solemnizing the covenant. This unanimous consent, after a second deliberate hearing, is the formal acceptance of the covenant. M.—This is the tenor of the covenant, “That, if they would observe the foregoing precepts, God would perform the foregoing promises. ‘Obey, and be happy.’” Here is the bargain made. H.

8. And Moses took the blood and sprinkled it on the people. With the other half of the blood, after having again read the terms of the covenant, and obtained anew from the people a promise of obedience—he sprinkled the people themselves, and said, “Behold the blood of the covenant, which the Lord hath made with you concerning all these words.” P. F.—Its application to the people makes them parties to the covenant. It is the one blood that accomplishes the pacification. Hence Moses sprinkles the reserved portion of the atoning blood on the people. M.—Half of the blood being sprinkled on the altar, and half of it sprinkled on the people, showed that both God and they were mutually bound by this covenant. God was bound to the people to support, defend, and save them: the people were bound to God to fear, love, and serve him. A. C.

This sacrifice was peculiar; for God desired the Jews to be reminded of the one great confirmation of the covenant which he made with them; as if he had openly shown that it would then only be ratified and effectual, when it should be sealed with blood. The sum is, that the blood was the medium whereby the covenant was confirmed and established, since the altar as the sacred seat of God was bathed with half of it, and then the residue was sprinkled over the people. Hence we gather that the covenant of gratuitous adoption was made with the ancient people unto eternal salvation, since it was sealed with the blood of Christ in type and shadow. Now, if this doctrine hold good under the Law, much more must it occupy a place with us now; and hence, in order that God’s promises may always maintain their power and certainty, let this sealing be constantly kept before us; and let us remember that the blood of Christ has therefore once been shed, that it might engrave upon our hearts the covenant whereby we are called to the hope of the kingdom of heaven. For this reason Christ in the Holy Supper commends his blood as the seal of the New Covenant. Calv.

The blood was sprinkled upon the altar as a sign that God accepted the sacrifice as a vicarious atonement. As soon as the blood was sprinkled upon the altar, the people were regarded as reconciled, and therefore fit to enter into covenant alliance with God. When the people had thus received a negative consecration through the removal of their sin, the whole Law of the covenant was laid before them; and when they had pledged themselves to obedience, they received a positive consecration as the covenant people, by being sprinkled with the other half of the blood. The expiatory virtue of the blood was derived from the fact, that the life of the animal sacrificed was in the blood. And it was from this also that it derived its virtue as a positive consecration. The life was taken from the animal that the people might have the advantage of it. In the place of the sinful life of the sinful nation, the innocent life of the animal was given up to death; and Jehovah accepted it as a valid atonement. But when the life that had been sacrificed was proved by God’s acceptance of it to have power to expiate guilt which merited death, it was also proved as a gift of God to have power to effect the restoration of life. The former was exhibited in the use that was made of the first half of the blood, the latter, in the purpose to which the second was applied. For the people stood in need not only of the extermination of sin, that they might be negatively prepared for entering into covenant-fellowship with Jehovah, but also of the restoration of life, that they might be positively fitted for that fellowship. By being sprinkled with the blood, they received the necessary consecration. The covenant, thus concluded, had a fundamental character; it was concluded once for all, and every member of the covenant nation had eo ipso a part in the covenant itself. No doubt the covenant relation might be disturbed by fresh sins, which rendered a fresh expiation necessary; but the covenant consecration retained its validity as long as the covenant lasted. It was this which constituted the difference between the sacrifices which were offered within an existing covenant, and the sacrifice which accompanied the first establishment of the covenant. This will also explain the fact that, while the subsequent law of sacrifice made provision for the continued offering of an expiatory sacrifice by the sprinkling of the sacrificial altar, nothing more is said about consecration by sprinkling the blood upon the people, or the individual, who offered the sacrifice. K.

This transaction was the most important in the whole history of Israel. By this one sacrifice, never renewed, Israel was formally set apart as the people of God; and it lay at the foundation of all the sacrificial worship which followed. Only after it did God institute the tabernacle, the priesthood, and all its services. Thus this one sacrifice prefigured the one sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ for his Church, which is the ground of our access to God and the foundation of all our worship and service. A. E.—The account given of this solemn transaction is referred to in the Epistle to the Hebrews, with an especial respect to the use then made of the sacrificial blood, and for the purpose of proving, that as the inferior and temporary covenant then ratified required the shedding of animal blood, blood of a far higher and more precious kind must have been required to seal the everlasting covenant brought in by Christ. P. F.

As soon as their solemn assent to the covenant is given, as soon as the people’s will is surrendered to the Lord, the blood of the sacrifice is sprinkled, reconciliation is made, and the covenant embraces them in its blessed bond. And now we can see very clearly what was in the Apostle Peter’s mind when he speaks of believers as “elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father (this carries us back to the early promises before the work of redemption from bondage began) through sanctification of the Spirit (this leads us to think of the Pentecostal day at Sinai, with its revelation of the holy Lord, and his holy Law), unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ” (here we think of the ratification of the covenant, when the sprinkling of the blood followed the declaration of obedience). It will be observed, of course, that the obedience is not the obedience of fact, which follows the blood sprinkling, but the obedience of heart and will, which must precede it. That obedience of the heart and will is the necessary antecedent even of the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ. When the great sacrifice was offered up on Calvary, the altar was sprinkled once for all; but it is necessary that we should be sprinkled with the same blood that we may become the people of God ; and all that is required in order to this is just the assent of the heart, the surrender of the will to him, the word “O Lamb of God, I come,” which carries with it the old declaration of which that altar and these pillars were the witness : “All that the Lord hath said will we do.” J. M. G.

Referring to this great covenant transaction between Jehovah and his newly redeemed Church, the martyr Stephen says : “This is he that was in the Church in the wilderness.” It was a covenant with this Church as a representative body, standing for the Church of all succeeding ages. Moses, forty years after, when this generation that stood before Sinai had all perished, expressly says to the next generation, “The Lord made this covenant not with our fathers but with us, even as who are all here alive this day.” And under the New Testament dispensation Stephen expressly says, “Our fathers received the lively oracles to give unto us.” That is, they stood there as representing us. It was a covenant wholly spiritual in its significance. Moses, just as Jesus afterward, sums up its provisions in the generalization, “Love the Lord thy God with all thy mind, soul, and strength.” S. R.

It was a great event, the transaction of that day, which on the separate and self-contained nationality of Israel placed a crown of glory, by superadding Jehovah’s sovereignty. Every devout and believing soul through that populous camp, looking at the fiery-cloudy column, as it moved ahead, at once a royal standard and an aerial fortress, could say to himself with thrilling assurance, “The Lord is our defence ; the Holy One of Israel is our King.” And although in later centuries between the people and their King, immortal and invisible, a monarch was interposed, both visible and mortal, faith and affection always ascended to Jehovah as the true King in Jeshurun, and under pious princes like Hezekiah and Josiah, when the covenant was renewed, overlooking or at least overlapping the earthly ruler, the people swore again the oath of allegiance to the Sovereign Supreme, the Divine and undying Head of the Hebrew commonwealth. Hamilton.

In the Mosaic legislation God reigns and governs by himself. It is he who has given his laws to the Hebrews. Moses has been, it is true, the medium between the Eternal and the people, but the people have taken part in the grand spectacle of the revelation of the Law ; of this the people, in the exercise of its freedom, have evinced their acceptance. Nicolas.—

The Mosaic Theocracy is a fact unique in the history of the world. There is here no paramount priesthood ; no secular power playing the part of the oppressor. God is constantly present, and sole master. All passes between God and the people ; all so passes through the agency of a single man whom God inspires and in whom the people have faith, asking no other authority than that of the revelation which he receives. No sign here of a fact of human origin : just as the God of the Bible is the true God, the religion that descended, by Moses, from Sinai upon the elect people of God is the true religion destined to become, when Jesus Christ ascends Calvary, the religion of the human race. Guizot.

The central point of the Pentateuch is the covenant, made by the mediation of Moses, between Jehovah and his people. Everything in the Pentateuch, before the time of Moses, was preparatory to that covenant ; and everything during this time was a development of it. By this it is not meant that its development came to a close at the death of Moses ; but that the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy give a history of it up to that time. The national covenant, made at Sinai, was preceded by and founded on the Abrahamic covenant recorded in Genesis. This covenant finds its explanation in the previous history, which is accordingly given by the sacred historians. In order to understand this covenant, and the Mosaic economy also, the history, contained in the Book of Genesis, is necessary ; for the history of Israel begins with that of the world. “The work of Creation, in its fundamental plan,” Havernick remarks, “at once proclaims itself as intimately connected with the Theocracy. Viewed from its internal side, the fundamental idea of the Theocracy, to be holy like to the holy God, and the consecration of the people, the priestly family, etc., arising thence, can be apprehended only in their relation to the beginning of the human race, and its relation to God ; so that the Theocracy is connected with Gen. 1 : 27, as the restoration of that which formerly subsisted.” The history of Abraham is written in a theocratic spirit ; and from his time until the death of Moses, the Pentateuch is confined to the history of the theocratic people. At Sinai they received the Law, by which they were constituted a theocratic nation. God proceeded with them on a plan strictly pedagogic. The Decalogue, as the fundamental Law, stands first ; and the other laws, both civil and ceremonial, are framed to carry out its principles. The whole national life was to be imbued with the spirit of the Law; and all the institutions growing out of it were intended to remind the people that they should be holy, because Jehovah, their God, is holy. C. Elliott.

Between the two Testaments there is a difference, not of kind, but merely of degree. They are both the records of the unfolding, in time and history, of the plans of God for the restoration of man to the lost estate. Both give a picture and description of the kingdom of God on earth in its gradual development externally and internally. The two Testaments differ in this, that the Old describes this kingdom externally, in its national Jewish form, in the shape of a closely circumscribed politico-religious Theocracy, and internally as being in a preparatory stage, before the appearance of the Saviour and King, and the full establishment, as objective realities, of the great principles of grace, faith, and free pardon of sins, that distinguish his kingdom in all of its stages; while the New, externally, represents this kingdom as no longer being bound or bounded by national and geographical limits, but as a communion of saints from all the nations of the world, and internally as in the stage of completion when the King has appeared in Jesus Christ, whose life and death formed the objective basis for the blessings of this kingdom, which, though real in the Old Covenant, were nevertheless hidden in the form of promises, types, and symbols of the work to be done by the Messiah. Both Testaments are Christo-centric: the one viewing and trusting in him with the eye of hope and promise, the other glorying in him as one who has actually accomplished the great work of salvation.

The Old Testament covenant, then, represents the preparatory stage of the kingdom of God on earth. Sin had made a chasm between the Creator and the creature, and God’s original purpose of man’s happiness to the end of Divine glory would have thus been thwarted, unless a reconciliation and restoration had taken place. At the head of the whole biblical development stands the dire fact of sin; and without a strong conception of this fact there can be no thorough understanding of the biblical records, or of the great truths and history of which they bear testimony. But in the same moment in which God’s justice condemns the transgressor on account of his sin, his mercy plans and promises deliverance from the consequences of his sin. The first gospel message is the promise of the proto-evangelism of Genesis 3. While sin was the woful fact that must be taken into account, salvation through the seed of the woman should and would be equally a fact in God’s own appointed manner and hour.

God did not choose in his wisdom to show forth fully in revelation or fact these plans at the very beginning, because it was necessary that salvation should be prepared for man, and man should be prepared for salvation. God would not force man, who had of his own free will deserted God and entered the service of sin, to re-enter upon the condition originally designed for him, and into which he was created. It was necessary that through special training man should be educated up to a recognition of his true condition and needs, as also to the willingness to accept from God’s grace the blessings lost through sin. God is a God of system and order, not only in the kingdom and in the laws of nature, but also in the kingdom of grace. Christ did not appear in the flesh immediately at the beginning of the rule of sin, although there was a need of a Saviour then as much as there was in the days of Herod, and is now; but he appeared thus when, according to the providential wisdom of God, “the fulness of time” had arrived, when Israel’s remarkable history had taught the positive lesson of man’s guilt and God’s grace, and the Gentiles, who had, in this same providence of God, been permitted to go their own way, had taught eloquently the negative lesson of man’s inability to help himself, of the vanity of human philosophy and civilization when not based upon the solid foundation of revelation and Divine guidance. When the course of the history of the world had reached such a stage that the world was ready for his advent, Christ entered the flesh, and the Gospel he lived and taught could go forth on its mission conquering and to conquer.

This example of method and order in this central scene of the grand drama of the development of God’s kingdom on earth is typical and representative. It characterizes the whole revelation of God, and is especially apparent in the educational process of Israel, which took place chiefly through the Law and prophecy as the chief means and instruments in God’s hands for the establishment of the covenant with his people, and of the great principles which distinguish this covenant. This covenant was and is one of grace, one of righteousness through faith (Gen. 15:6; Gal. 3:6; Rom. 4:3). Faith and the acceptance of grace implies in man a recognition of sin, and implies in God a willingness to pardon this sin. To demonstrate the truth of these two cardinal principles of the covenant must of necessity be the object of the whole Old Testament development. In order to demonstrate the one, God chose, in the covenant relation, the Law; to demonstrate the other, he selected prophecy. The two are mutually complementary and supplementary in God’s guidance of the Church of the Old Covenant, and both conspired to bring about that “fulness of time” which marks the advent of the Saviour into history.

The covenant with Israel at Mount Sinai is the same as that between God and the Patriarchs; only that it has now assumed a national form, because the family had developed into a nation. While it was yet a special arrangement between God and the chosen few, it was possible for him, through special revelation, to teach and inculcate the great truths of this covenant to those who had entered upon this relationship. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, through such intercourse with the Lord of the covenant, were kept within the limits of this covenant; and their lives, as we know from biblical accounts, are examples of the trust and confidence in God’s mercy and grace which are the leading features of this covenant. When the family expanded into a nation, it was, in the nature of the case, no longer possible, by direct revelation and special guidance of each individual member of this kingdom, to awaken into life the great truths implied in the entrance upon this relationship by Israel. In order to effect in Israel and in history what had been effected in the Patriarchs through a viva voce revelation, God chose the Law on the one hand, and added to it prophecy, to step in when the Law had performed its mission. The Mosaic legal code represented over against Israel, as the people of the covenant, the duties which they owed to Jehovah as the Lord of the covenant, both the duties based on the moral nature of man, and which represent man’s duty toward God in all stages and at all times, and which hold good in our case also, as also those duties which are based upon the special relationship as the Theocratic nation, the ceremonial and political duties, which, with the political and Theocratic Israel, have passed into history. The recognition of these duties in the covenant life brought with it also the recognition of the inability to comply with these duties; in other words, the recognition of sin. Such was the aim and purpose of the Law in the Old Testament dispensation. It was by no means intended to supplant righteousness through faith as the central principle of revelation, both of the Old as also of the New Testament, but merely to be a propedeutic means to make this principle a truth and a fact in the history of Israel, and the leading lesson of that history. The Law was to drive man away from himself, and to show that for salvation he must flee to another; in other words, it was to be a “schoolmaster unto Christ” (Gal. 3:24). The Law itself recognizes the important fact of man’s inability to comply with its commands (that is, his sinful condition), by the very fact that it, through the Levitical priesthood, through sacrifices, atonements, types, and symbols, directs the citizen under this covenant to another and better way of final reconciliation and restoration to the blessings promised by God to the covenant adherents.

To announce what is this other and better (or, rather, only) ground of hope before God is the special mission of prophecy: and herein law and prophecy find their inner connecting link in the great scheme of Old Testament revelation. Prophecy is the Gospel of the Old Testament; it is the Christianity before Christ. Life under the Law could lead, on the one hand, to a formal and outward obedience, hence to superficiality and self-righteousness, as really proved to be the fact in the case of New Testament Pharisaism; or, on the other hand, it would burden conscientious souls with the weight of sin, and lead to despair. Constantly to direct the life under the Law, and especially to add to the word of command also the word of promise, the proclamation of pardon and free grace, and hence also to supply Israel with more light on the plans and ways of God as this kingdom grew, was the work of prophecy and of the prophets. The legal code given through Moses was a rounded whole; prophecy was given by God just as the needs of the hour required it. It was the life-producing power in Israel’s religion. While it constantly preached the duty of obedience to God’s will, as laid down in the Law, the prophets were by no means Old Testament rabbis. They preached this obedience simply as a means to an end, simply to lead the sinning people to repentance and to a trust and faith in the promises of grace which it was their special mission to proclaim. Naturally, one of the leading features of their revelation would be, and was, the Messianic promises, and the person and work of the Messiah, because in and on him were based the realization of the dearest hopes of all the children of God. But it is certainly a grave mistake, and a strange misconception of Old Testament prophecy, to imagine the prophets to be mere foretellers of the future. They were pre-eminently, and in the first instance, preachers of their own day and date, and their messages of repentance and grace were intended first of all for their own contemporaries. The future and the promises of the future enter into their proclamations so largely simply because the golden age of Israel’s hope was yet in the future, and Christ, the objective summum bonum of Israel’s faith, had not yet appeared in the flesh. Their importance for us lies, not in the fact that they foretold the future, but rather in this, that in the proclamation of their messages they pronounced the same great truths of salvation which the Gospel also announced, only in the manner and ways of their day, and in conformity with the stage which the development of God’s kingdom on earth had then reached. Their importance for us is considerably higher than the merely historical.

It is equally a mistake to make the period of prophecy post-legal. And as internally the Law and the prophets do not represent two successive stages of God’s plan, but rather two sides of one stage, thus historically they are not, and cannot be, separated. While it is true that the period of literary prophets is much later than the period of the giving of the Law, we have abundant evidence to show that prophecy externally also went hand in hand with the Law to work out the destinies of Israel, and, with Israel, of all mankind. Moses himself was a prophet, and through him God made ample provision for the establishment of prophecy, and plainly described the sphere of its work (compare De. 18 : 9-22). And throughout the early history of Israel we everywhere find the signs of their activity.

Prophecy had, then, an all-important mission to perform in the development of Israel’s religious life. Far from being a spasmodic or sporadic phenomenon, called into activity merely to predict this or that special feature of the future, it was rather, in the hands of God, a medium through which he directed and guided the people of his choice in their life under the special covenant with him. Looked at in this light, and in its bearing on the Old Covenant in general, and also on the Law as a means of making the principles of this covenant effectual, it is seen in its full importance and in its grand mission. Schodde.

CHOSEN NOBLES OF ISRAEL CALLED TO A VISION OF GOD AND FELLOWSHIP WITH HIM. MOSES ON THE MOUNT WITH GOD FORTY DAYS. APOSTASY OF THE GOLDEN CALF.

A greater privilege than that of seeing God upon the mountain is yet in store. To go up and see God on the mountain is good; but to have him come down and dwell with us in the plain is better. To feast in the Divine presence, on a great and special occasion, was a privilege indeed; but it is better still to have the Divine presence on all occasions, from day to day, from hour to hour continually. And it is to prepare the way for this inestimable blessing that Moses is now called up alone into the immediate presence of the Lord, there to abide for many days, during which he will receive the tabernacle revelation, the substance of which was this: “Let them make me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them” (25:8). The great importance and inestimable value of the new revelation is betokened by the glory prelude of six days which preceded it (24:16), and the length of time that was occupied in conveying it, the whole amounting to forty days and forty nights. J. M. G.

14. Before leaving them, Moses commanded the elders to await his return where they were, and pointed out Aaron and Hur as his representatives to the people. M.—15-18. Moses and Joshua were now together, and both enshrouded within the borders of the cloudy crown which covered the brow of the mountain. On the seventh day the Divine summons called Moses up to the utmost heights of the mountain, and then we suppose the dark thick cloud was rent and opened in the sight of all Israel, and the inner glory broke forth like devouring fire. The six days mentioned (verse 16) were probably not a part of the forty; for during those six days Moses and Joshua were together, and both probably ate of manna as usual, and drank of the brook mentioned (De. 9 : 21) : but when Moses was called into the midst of the cloud, his forty days’ fasting commenced, while Joshua, in the mean time, no doubt continued to eat and drink daily while waiting for Moses’ return. Bush.

Moses, who was the mediator of the Old Covenant, is alone permitted to draw nigh to God; none of the people are suffered to come up to the Divine glory, not even Aaron, nor his sons, nor the nobles of Israel. Moses was a type of Christ, who is the mediator of the New Covenant; and he alone has access to God in behalf of the human race, as Moses had in behalf of Israel. A. C.

De. 9 : 9. During this period of forty days, and the second period when the tables were renewed, Moses neither ate bread nor drank water. Elijah in like manner fasted for forty days, when he visited the same spot (1 Kings 19 : 8). The two who met our Saviour on the Mount of Transfiguration, the one as representing the Law, the other as representing the Prophets, thus shadowed forth in their own experience the fast of forty days in the wilderness of Judæa. Clark.—The story of those forty days is written in heaven’s register; and if Moses were himself still here to give his witness as to what occurred, perhaps he would repeat the words of Paul regarding the most blessed hour of his experience, “Whether it took place in the body, or out of the body, I cannot tell—God knoweth.” It is enough for us that there is now made known to him, not merely the grand principles of law to regulate the Jewish commonwealth, but God’s express appointments as to everything relating to the life, both civil and religious, of the chosen nation, even to minute details; that he is now allowed the greatest privilege of all, to pray in such a way that he most truly lives in close communion with the Infinite. Van O.

Ez. 32 : 1-6.

Forty days Moses remained on the mountain, neither appearing nor holding any communication with the people. Day after day they exexpected his return : the gloom and silence of the mountain remained unbroken. Had he perished? Had he abandoned the people? Aaron himself is in the same total ignorance as to the designs and the fate of his brother. Whither shall they wander in the trackless desert? Who shall guide them? Their leader and their God seem equally to have deserted them. Still utterly at a loss to comprehend the sublime notions of the Deity, which their leader would inculcate, they sink back to the superstitions of the country which they had left. Milman.

It is yet less than six weeks since the amazing scenes of the giving of the Law of the commandments, when the voice of Jehovah and his words seemed to overwhelm the whole assembly of Israel with religious awe. So thoroughly, to all appearance, are they pervaded with the spirit of piety and reverence, that, no sooner has Moses rehearsed to them the words of Jehovah than, as with one heart, they shout, “All that Jehovah hath said will we do and be obedient.” But after Moses is gone up into the mount, and the mighty pillar of cloud and fire that before was near to them has risen to the summit of Sinai and now become stationary there—after the excitement has lulled somewhat and everything in the plain Rahab and about Mount Sinai has resumed its wonted appearance, the leaven of idolatry and lust that had been subdued by the terrors of the Law begins again to work. First, secretly; then more openly as the return of Moses is delayed day after day, and as the bolder spirits begin to give utterance to their speculations concerning what has become of him; till at length the whole camp becomes pervaded with the idea that Moses has perished—probably from rashly venturing too near to the mysterious brightness within the cloud. And the return of Moses, once given up, the next inquiry is what is to be done now? And Satan, ever busy in the souls of his agents, suggests the idea of a great religious festival. As is ever the case when men begin to devise ordinances of religious observance which God has not commanded, then a suitable form of worship for the festival must be devised; and what more suitable form than the forms they have been accustomed to see so universally in Egypt? They will, therefore, have an image to aid their devotions. Of course they do not mean to adore the image, or worship any other God than Jehovah. They will merely present Jehovah in visible form to the eye, so that, as they have now something tangible to start from, the imagination can soar upward and lend to the soul wings of devotion. While this is the view of the less sensual class of religionists among them, the ignorant multitude are pleased with the suggestion, because such form of worship carries with it the idea of revel and plays, and indecent wantonness. Soon, therefore, everybody is in favor of the new movement, and Aaron, who has been left in charge of affairs in Moses’ absence, is surprised at the petition backed by an overwhelming popular opinion: “Up, make us gods which shall go before us, for, as for this Moses, that brought us here, we know not what is become of him.” S. R.

1. Make us a god. So the Hebrew word is often translated. The meaning is, Make us a sacred symbol or sign, which may represent God to us in a visible manner. They hankered after the idolatrous worship which they had learned in Egypt. Stephen calls this a turning back of their hearts unto Egypt (Acts 7:39). Bp. Patrick.—Daily fed by manna from heaven; daily refreshed by water from the smitten rock; surrounded by miracles of might and benignity against which it would seem impossible that their eyes should be closed, who could have anticipated that, in utter defiance of the commandment to which they had so lately and so solemnly avowed obedience, they should have ordered the fabrication of other gods, and “changed their glory into the likeness of an ox, that eateth grass”? Bush.

O royal Law, and mighty Lawgiver! How could they think of making any resemblance of him whom they saw could not be seen, and whom they saw in not being seen, infinite? How could they think of daring to profane his name, whom they heard to name himself, with that voice, Jehovah? Have they so soon forgotten that fire and thunder, which they heard and saw? Is that smoke vanished out of their mind, as soon as out of their sight? Could their hearts cease to tremble with the earth? Can they, in the very sight of Sinai, call for other gods? Did they so lately hear and see him to be an infinite God? Did they quake to hear him say out of the midst of the flames, “I am Jehovah thy God: thou shalt have no Gods but me”? With his pillar uplifted before their eyes and his manna descending day by day, yet they say, “Make us a god.” Bp. H.—Had they not but the other day, in this very place, heard the voice of the Lord God speaking to them out of the midst of the fire, Thou shalt not make to thyself any graven image? Had they not heard the thunder, seen the lightnings, and felt the earthquake, with the dreadful pomp of which this Law was given? Had they not been particularly cautioned not to make gods of gold

(ch. 20:23)? Nay, had they not themselves solemnly entered into covenant with God, and promised that all that which he had said unto them they would do, and would be obedient (ch. 24:7)? And yet, before they stirred from the place where this covenant had been solemnly ratified, and before the cloud was removed from the top of Mount Sinai, thus to break an express command, in defiance of an express threatening that this inquiry should be visited upon them and their children—what shall we think of it? It is a plain indication that the Law was no more able to sanctify than it was to justify; by it is the knowledge of sin, but not the cure of it. This is intimated in the emphasis laid upon the place where this sin was committed (Ps. 106:19)—They made a calf in Horeb, the very place where the Law was given. H.

Even on that very plain, beneath that very mount, they could not bear to think that they were to serve a God who was invisible; they returned to Egypt in their hearts. And not then only, but again and again, both in the history of the Jewish and of the Christian Church, has the same temptation returned. The priest has set up what the prophet has destroyed. Graven images have been set up in deed or in word, to make the Unseen visible, and the Eternal temporal. But the Revelation of Sinai has prevailed. Slowly and with many reverses did the great truth then first imparted gain possession of the hearts of Israel, and, through them, of the whole world—that we are neither to imagine that we see God when we do not, nor that because we do not see him, are we to doubt that he has been, and is, and yet shall be. This was the marvel which the Jewish worship presented, even to the best and wisest heathens who were perplexed by what seemed to them a religion without a God. It is to us the declaration that there must be a void created by the destruction of errors, by the removal of false images of God, before we can receive the true image of the Truth itself. A. P. S.

Aaron’s Part in the Apostasy.