Deuteronomy 5: 1 – 33
Not like the other
5 And Moses called all Israel, and said to them: “Hear, O Israel, the statutes and judgments which I speak in your hearing today, that you may learn them and be careful to observe them. 2 The LORD our God made a covenant with us in Horeb. 3 The LORD did not make this covenant with our fathers, but with us, those who are here today, all of us who are alive. 4 The LORD talked with you face to face on the mountain from the midst of the fire. 5 I stood between the LORD and you at that time, to declare to you the word of the LORD; for you were afraid because of the fire, and you did not go up the mountain. He said: 6 ‘I am the LORD your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. 7 ‘You shall have no other gods before Me. 8 ‘You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; 9 you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, 10 but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments. 11 ‘You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain. 12 ‘Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, as the LORD your God commanded you. 13 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 14 but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your ox, nor your donkey, nor any of your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates, that your male servant and your female servant may rest as well as you. 15 And remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God brought you out from there by a mighty hand and by an outstretched arm; therefore the LORD your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day. 16 ‘Honor your father and your mother, as the LORD your God has commanded you, that your days may be long, and that it may be well with you in the land which the LORD your God is giving you. 17 ‘You shall not murder. 18 ‘You shall not commit adultery. 19 ‘You shall not steal. 20 ‘You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. 21 ‘You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife; and you shall not desire your neighbor’s house, his field, his male servant, his female servant, his ox, his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor’s.’ 22 “These words the LORD spoke to all your assembly, in the mountain from the midst of the fire, the cloud, and the thick darkness, with a loud voice; and He added no more. And He wrote them on two tablets of stone and gave them to me. 23 “So it was, when you heard the voice from the midst of the darkness, while the mountain was burning with fire, that you came near to me, all the heads of your tribes and your elders. 24 And you said: ‘Surely the LORD our God has shown us His glory and His greatness, and we have heard His voice from the midst of the fire. We have seen this day that God speaks with man; yet he still lives. 25 Now therefore, why should we die? For this great fire will consume us; if we hear the voice of the LORD our God anymore, then we shall die. 26 For who is there of all flesh who has heard the voice of the living God speaking from the midst of the fire, as we have, and lived? 27 You go near and hear all that the LORD our God may say, and tell us all that the LORD our God says to you, and we will hear and do it.’ 28 “Then the LORD heard the voice of your words when you spoke to me, and the LORD said to me: ‘I have heard the voice of the words of this people which they have spoken to you. They are right in all that they have spoken. 29 Oh, that they had such a heart in them that they would fear Me and always keep all My commandments, that it might be well with them and with their children forever! 30 Go and say to them, “Return to your tents.” 31 But as for you, stand here by Me, and I will speak to you all the commandments, the statutes, and the judgments which you shall teach them, that they may observe them in the land which I am giving them to possess.’ 32 “Therefore you shall be careful to do as the LORD your God has commanded you; you shall not turn aside to the right hand or to the left. 33 You shall walk in all the ways which the LORD your God has commanded you, that you may live and that it may be well with you, and that you may prolong your days in the land which you shall possess.
Today’s title is ‘Not like the other’. What am I talking about? Many teachers think that Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5 both are talking about the Ten Commandments.
In truth Exodus 20 is a listing of the Ten Commandments. What we read about today in chapter 5 of the book of Deuteronomy is the Law of Moses. We are going to discuss the differences between Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5?
In the book of Exodus 20 GOD speaks directly to His people Israel. While in Deuteronomy 5 Moses spoke for God to the people as stated:
Moses summoned all Israel and said:
Hear, Israel, the decrees and laws I declare in your hearing today. Learn them and be sure to follow them. Deuteronomy 5:1
Please, allow me to show you how the scripture itself proves that the "Ten Commandments" and the "law of Moses" are two completely separate laws. I will discuss several points.
Simply stated, The "Law of Moses" has been known mainly as the "commandments of Moses" throughout the scripture, but can also be known as the commandments of God. On the other hand, the Ten Commandments are known only as the direct commandments of God, and never ever as the "commandments of Moses."
First of all the major point of difference between these two laws is the way they were recorded:
Exodus 31:18, "And he gave unto Moses, when he had made an end of communing with him upon mount Sinai, two tables of testimony, tables of stone, written with the finger of God."
No one can confuse the Ten Commandments writing with the way the Mosaic law was produced: Deuteronomy 31:9, "And Moses wrote this law."
Another major point of difference between these two laws is the way they were given to God's People.
Deuteronomy 4:36; 5:22, "Out of heaven He made thee to hear His voice, that He might instruct thee: ...These words the LORD spake unto all your assembly in the mount out of the midst of the fire, of the cloud, and of the thick darkness, with a great voice: and he added no more. And he wrote them in two tables of stone, and delivered them unto me."
It's important to notice that after God wrote the Ten Commandments, He "added no more" to this Law, yet God gave Moses statutes, precepts, judgments, and ordinances afterwards. If the Mosaic Law was part of the Ten Commandments, there would be a contradiction here, because God did add more to this law! But there was no contradiction, because God considered the Ten Commandments to be a separate Law. The Ten Commandments were spoken by God Himself to the people, so that God would instruct them. There was no mediator involved! Moses was not the mediator of the Ten Commandments. But he was the mediator of the sacrificial laws:
Exodus 33:9, "And it came to pass, as Moses entered into the tabernacle, the cloudy pillar descended, and stood at the door of the tabernacle, and the LORD talked with Moses."
2 Chronicles 34:14, "...Hilkiah the priest found a book of the law of the LORD given by Moses."
Unlike the Ten Commandments, in which God talked directly to the people, the sacrificial and ceremonial laws were spoken to Moses only. Moses was the mediator of these temporary laws, but not the Ten Commandments.
God made known this distinction to Moses, and Moses explained it to the people at Mt. Horeb:
Deuteronomy 4:13-14, "And He declared unto you His covenant, which He commanded you to perform, even Ten Commandments; and He wrote them upon two tables of stone. And the Lord commanded me at that time to teach you statutes and judgments, that ye might do them in the land whither ye go over to possess it."
Please notice how Moses clearly separated the Ten Commandments which "He commanded you", from the statutes which "He commanded me" to give the people.
The big question now is whether those statutes and judgments were designated as separate and distinct "law".
2 Kings 21:8, "Neither will I make the feet of Israel move any more out of the land which I gave their fathers; only if they will observe to do according to all that I have commanded them, and according to all the law that my servant Moses commanded them."
Here we are assured that the statutes which Moses gave the people were called a "law". Two different laws are being described now. God speaks of the law "I commanded" (The Ten Commandments) and also of the law "Moses commanded" (the Law of Moses).
Daniel was inspired to make the same careful distinction:
Daniel 9:11, "Yea, all Israel have transgressed thy law, even by departing, that they might not obey thy voice; therefore the curse is poured upon us, and the oath that is written in the Law of Moses the servant of God, because we have sinned against him."
Once more we see "thy law" (God's law, the Ten Commandments) and "the Law of Moses" (the commandments of Moses), and are different in content. There are no curses recorded in the Ten Commandments that God wrote. Only the book of Moses has curses (Deuteronomy.29:20,21, 27, 2 Chron.34:24).
The following verses show that the "Ten Commandments" and the "law of Moses" are 2 separate laws, because they were separated physically:
Deuteronomy 31:24-26, "And it came to pass, when Moses had made an end of writing the words of this law in a book, until they were finished, That Moses commanded the Levites, which bare the ark of the covenant of the Lord, saying, Take this book of the law, and put it in the side of the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, that it may be there for a witness against thee."
The book of statutes and judgments which Moses wrote in a book was placed in a pocket on the side of the ark. In contrast, the Law written by God on tables of stone was placed inside the Ark of the Covenant.
Exodus 25:16, "And thou shalt put into the ark the testimony which I shall give thee."
The spiritual lesson of this physical separation is that we are to spiritually separate the Ten Commandments from the laws of Moses.
To summarize, we can note several distinctions in the two laws. They had different authors, were originally written on different materials, were spoken by different law-givers, were placed in different locations in the ark, and they had totally different content. This shows, by example, how they are to be considered and treated as separate laws. In addition, the Ten Commandments were spoken from God's mouth (Exodus 19:19; 20:1,), and God said he would not "alter the thing that is gone out of my lips." (Psalm 89:34). The Ten Commandments went out of God's lips, so the Ten Commandments could not have been altered!
To give you a hypothetical situation, if the Ten Commandments were a part of the book of Moses, then whatever happens to the book of Moses must also, by definition, happen to the Ten Commandments. Don't you agree?
Well, if the Ark caught on fire, and the book of the covenant (Exodus 24:7), the law of Moses, suddenly burned to a crisp, would the Ten Commandments be burned up as well? - No! But will the law of ordinances be burned up? -Yes!- The priesthood laws? -Yes! The sacrificing laws? -Yes! -The Ten Commandments on Stone? - No! Why? - Because they were recorded on different materials. The tables of stone symbolize the imperishable nature of the Ten Commandments!
Does God still expect us to sacrifice lambs, heifers, and other animals today, to atone for our sins? No, these sacrificial laws were changed. Does God still expect us to not steal, murder, lie, and commit adultery? - Yes! Therefore, this simple fact that God does not expect us to obey the sacrificial laws of the Old Covenant, but does expect us to keep the laws of the Ten Commandments, prove that they are not part of the same law!
Moses' law was the temporary, ceremonial law of the Old Testament. It regulated the priesthood, sacrifices, rituals, meat and drink offerings, etc., all of which foreshadowed Christ Jesus. This law was added "till the seed should come," and that seed was Christ Jesus The Messiah (Galatians 3:16,19). The ritual and ceremony of Moses' law pointed forward to Christ, and this law came to an end, but the Ten Commandments (God's law) "stand fast forever and ever." (Psalm 111:8).
We have learned so far the first speech of Moses which proclaimed the recent history of Israel under the hand of Yahweh God, demonstrating why they had reason to be grateful to Him, and finishing with a reminder of how gloriously and fearsomely the covenant had been given and an exhortation to keep the covenant requirements and remember Who had given them.
Starting now with chapter 5 this section consists mainly of a proclamation of general basic principles related to the fulfillment of the covenant. This is then followed by a detailed review of the statutes and ordinances which have been spoken of previously, but with special reference to their applicability to the people and mainly ignoring priestly activity.
5 And Moses called all Israel, and said to them: “Hear, O Israel, the statutes and judgments which I speak in your hearing today, that you may learn them and be careful to observe them.
Moses calls ‘all Israel’ as a nation to hear his proclamation of Yahweh’s statutes and ordinances, so that they may learn them and observe them. This proclamation of the covenant was no doubt required on a regular basis at the different feasts, so that it would come as no surprise.
2 The LORD our God made a covenant with us in Horeb. 3 The LORD did not make this covenant with our fathers, but with us, those who are here today, all of us who are alive.
He begins by reminding them of the covenant that The Holy Lord God Yahweh had made with them. He stresses that the covenant was made with all of them, not just with their fathers. It is personal to them. Indeed they are not to think of it as a covenant made with their fathers at all but as one that has been made with them, that is, ‘with us, even us, who are all of us here alive this day’.
What he is indicating here in a forceful way is that the covenant was not only for their fathers. At this present time it was a covenant made with them. Of course, it had been made with their fathers, but they had failed to obtain its full benefit by refusing to enter the land at Yahweh’s command. Thus in the end there was a sense in which it had not been for them. They had not obtained its full benefit, and in the end had forfeited it. But now that covenant was being renewed with those who were currently listening to Moses and he was calling on them to make it effective. Their fathers had failed to respond to it, but now it was made to them too and ready for their response. They must choose whether they will make it their own, and act on it. That is why he will now repeat it almost word for word.
This reflects the important principle that no man is in covenant because his father was. Each must in the end respond for himself. Each succeeding generation must opt to enter into the covenant.
It reminds us that God’s word comes to all of us, both as a church and as individuals, but that if we fail to respond to Him truly and fail to walk in His ways, then He will declare that it is not for us but for others. If we refuse His light shining on our lives in order to reveal what we are and bring us to His Lordship, we will be left in outer darkness (John 3.19-21).
4 The LORD talked with you face to face on the mountain from the midst of the fire.
Moses now encircles the words of the basic covenant itself with a reminder of the awe-inspiring background against which it was given, and what had been their response to it. He wants them to recognize the seriousness of what he is bringing to their thoughts.
He opens by reminding them of the circumstances of the giving of the covenant, of how Yahweh had spoken with them face to face out of the midst of the raging, savagely burning, resplendent and glorious Fire that had descended on the Mount, the Fire which had made its peak seem alight. Some of them who had been children then would remember it vividly. They could never have forgotten its glory. Others would have been retold the story again and again. The Fire had both laid bare His glory and warned them that He was a consuming fire so that they would take heed to what they heard (4.24).
They had not seen His face. But it had been a person to person encounter, for they had seen the Fire that signified His presence and personally heard His voice.
Moses clearly understood that the voice at Mount Sinai as connected with the God of the burning bush where God ‘in a flame of fire’ (Exodus 3.2) spoke to him ‘out of the (burning) bush’ (Exodus 3.4). He wanted the people to be aware of the source of the commandments, statutes and ordinances, and continually stresses the Fire through which Yahweh revealed Himself (
5 I stood between the LORD and you at that time, to declare to you the word of the LORD; for you were afraid because of the fire, and you did not go up the mountain. He said:
Moses goes on to remind them of the fearsome nature of their own experience, and that in the end he alone had been able to go up into the Mount, standing as mediator between Yahweh and the people, and giving them the word of Yahweh. Indeed they had been so full of fear because of the Fire and the Voice, that they had not wanted to go up into the Mount. Once Yahweh took possession of it they had actually not been able to, for it was forbidden to them. It had become ‘holy’ ground.
6 ‘I am the LORD your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
First Moses declares the maker of the covenant, and the basis on which He can expect their response. This is not an agreement between two equal parties, but the declaration of an Lord God Most High to His subjects because of what He has done for them in delivering them.
Moses declares that He Is ‘Yahweh their God’, the One Who had ‘brought them out of the land of Egypt and out of the house of bondage’ (out of the position of being bondsmen in Egypt, which was the ‘house’ of Pharaoh). That He Is their Great Deliverer. He reminds them that they had been an oppressed people, enslaved and restrained by Pharaoh, and that the requirements laid on them then had come from Pharaoh and from Egypt, binding them in a slave contract. And these restrictions had resulted in terrible bondage in ‘the slave house of Pharaoh’. But by His mighty acts He had delivered them and brought them out as free men to this very place. It is because of this therefore that He has the right to state to them His own requirements, His covenant requirements. They had been freed from subjection to Pharaoh and from Egypt, with its bondage, so that they might come within His covenant love, and enjoy the land He would give them, with its freedom.
Furthermore this experience of deliverance had been brought up to date so far as we have learned in Chapters 1-4. It had been confirmed by subsequent victories. Thus they could now not only rejoice in their deliverance from Egypt, but could rejoice in those further victories given, and in the part of the land that had already been given to them as an extra and as a kind of first fruit. And now there they were on the verge of entering into the land under the rule of God in freedom and liberty.
7 ‘You shall have no other gods before Me.
The first requirement was that their Holy God Yahweh was to be pre-eminent in their lives and worship. They were to have nothing to do with any other gods.
8 ‘You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; 9 you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, 10 but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.
Further, they were not to fashion for themselves, for the purpose of worship or veneration, any engraved image. Such an image must not be fashioned, whether in the likeness of anything in the heavens above, or in the earth beneath, or in the waters under the earth. Such were forbidden and if fashioned could result in their expulsion from the land.
In Romans 1.18 onwards Paul amplifies on this, pointing out how the worship of beastly forms resulted in beastly behavior. For what man truly worships he becomes like. Many today would see themselves as released from this proviso. They consider that they worship no images. Instead they have replaced God by ‘society’, by political expression, by credos, by sex, by wealth, by music and by sport. It is not that God is more central to their lives than He was among the Canaanites. They are still idolaters, and equally blameworthy, even though the images be photographs or digital images or notes, instead of gold. And the world still languishes. Their minds are taken up with other than God, and the images that take up their minds are the equivalent of graven images for they have molded them for themselves.
They must make their choice. They must either worship The only living and real God Yahweh or phony gods, but they could not worship both, for that would be to lower Him to their level. And He Is The God Who will not permit the worship of any other than Himself because He Is the Supreme Creator and Lord of all. This ‘jealousy’ has both a positive and a negative aspect. Positively He knows that it is only when He Is central in our hearts that we are what we should be. He knows that our greatest hope of fulfillment lies in knowing Him fully, and that idolatry can only turn us into beasts. Thus modern idolatry is as harmful to us as the ancient idolatry was to people then.
It is telling us that Yahweh has the deepest concern for what is right at the heart of things, and is thus concerned lest His people worship and serve that which was not worthy of such worship and service.
He tells them (and us) that all should take note of how they behave in this regard, because what they do will affect succeeding generations. What is the old saying, ‘much more is caught than taught?’ He does not do this by personal attack but because He has made the world in such a way that the inevitable consequence of a man’s choosing to sin is that his family become involved and are affected by it. So by copying him they bring themselves under the same judgment and this tends to affect generation after generation. Indeed the ‘father’ might well still be alive when the third or fourth generation is born, with his pernicious influence as father of the family still affecting the whole. Thus his iniquity is visited on them and they suffer too.
Yet even though this is so, in the end it must be recognized that what they are is by their own choice. No men are forced to follow their fathers (Abraham had not), and there are no examples given in Scripture of righteous men directly suffering under God for the sins of their fathers. The lesson is that what we are not only affects us but also those who look up to us and associate with us, and that it can go very deep.
On the other hand to those who love Him and respond to Him, delighting in and keeping His commandment, He declares that He shows loving-kindness and mercy on a constant and overwhelming scale. His delight is to bless His people. And this is offered to ‘thousands’, that is, to large and inexpressible numbers, a multitude which no man can number. For God Is a God of loving-kindness.
11 ‘You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain.
The idolatry previously mentioned was a desertion, but to take Yahweh’s name in vain is a positive attack. So we need to understand that to take the name of Yahweh in vain means to use it lightly, or to use it for wrong purposes, either in a curse, or a false oath, or casually, or in contempt. It is man’s attempt to bring God into trivial matters. Any of these things are blasphemy, and those who behave in such a way will not be found guiltless. For to insult or depreciate or misuse or be casual with His name is to positively insult and depreciate Him, and reveals how they view Him.
Even today we may do the same. We may use the name of our Lord Jesus in order to manipulate God to give us what we want. That is blasphemy. For prayer ‘in the name of Jesus’ should only be offered for what He wants and what will make us more useful in His service. To ask in His name should mean to want it for His sake, not for our own (Matthew 6.8-13). To use His name in order to obtain private and selfish benefits is to break this commandment in an insidious way.
12 ‘Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, as the LORD your God commanded you. 13 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 14 but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your ox, nor your donkey, nor any of your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates, that your male servant and your female servant may rest as well as you.
This is the first commandment in which we find Moses making clear and deliberate alterations. There are a number of them. ‘Observe’ is used instead of ‘remember’; ‘as Yahweh your God commanded you’ is added; special mention is made of the ox and the ass, instead of just the general ‘cattle’; and ‘that your man-servant and your maid-servant may rest as well as you’ is tacked on. The first in some ways makes little difference, for to ‘remember’ means to ‘observe’. Perhaps there had been a laxity in keeping the Sabbath so that Moses wished to stress that it must not only be remembered but fully observed.
The question of the Christian attitude to this cannot be fully dealt with here. Suffice to say that the point was that every seventh day was to be kept as holy to Yahweh (there was at that time no such thing as a ‘week’ and thus it was not the last day of the week). The fact that there are different time zones, which are decided by men and subject to change, brings out that it, is the principle that matters not the particular day. Change the time zone and the ‘day of the week’ may change. Paul himself makes clear that what matters is not the keeping of a particular day, but the keeping of a day to the Lord, whether it is one day in seven or every day. We are not to judge one another on the matter. Each stands responsible to the Lord for what he does (Romans 14.5-6). What does matter is that we bring God regularly, or always, into our use of time. Indeed the strict keeping of the Sabbath was not feasible for many early Christians. They could not cease work. It was an injunction only possible for a free people with the freedom to choose.
15 And remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God brought you out from there by a mighty hand and by an outstretched arm; therefore the LORD your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day.
The reference to the men-servants and maid-servants leads him on to stress why this is so. It is because they should remember that they too had been ‘servants’ in the land of Egypt until Yahweh delivered them with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. They had known what it was to slave without respite. They had known what it was to have no rest. But they had been delivered from this servitude by the hand of Yahweh. And He had exerted Himself that they might have rest. They should therefore have greater respect for their servants and ensure that both they and their servants fully ‘observed’ the Sabbath day, and that the servants had full rest on that day.
16 ‘Honor your father and your mother, as the LORD your God has commanded you, that your days may be long, and that it may be well with you in the land which the LORD your God is giving you.
5Here he adds ‘as Yahweh your God commanded you’ and ‘that it may go well with you’. With the possession of the land now almost on them these promises gained greater meaning. And they were a warning hint that if they were to enjoy the land permanently it could only be by a permanent keeping of the covenant, and that this would partly result from honoring father and mother as they learned from them the instruction of Yahweh. Long life and spiritual and material prosperity in the land would depend on it.
In Israel all authority from the top downwards was placed in the father figure; the father of the family. And in each case the wife was the mother of the family. They ensured the smooth running of each unit, and the teaching of the covenant of Yahweh. Thus to honor them was to honor God. To go against them was to go against God. To curse them was to undermine the whole of society and to despise the authority given by Yahweh (Exodus 21.17; Leviticus 20.9)
17 ‘You shall not murder.
The taking of another human life was ever forbidden by God, for men’s lives were sacred to Him and the life that was in them was His. He alone had the right to decide when a man’s life should cease. He alone had given man breath (Genesis 2.7), He alone had the right to take it away again. The only exceptions were genuine self-defense and when carrying out an execution in accordance with Yahweh’s laws, the former because there was no alternative and it was forced upon them, the latter because it was God’s determination.
18 ‘You shall not commit adultery.
The relationship between a man and his wife was sealed by God (Genesis 2.24). It was as such a unique and binding covenant relationship which was essentially intended to be unbreakable. To break it was to seriously interfere in God’s covenant working. To God all covenants are binding (Psalm 15.4), and this one more than all. It was thus uniquely an especially serious breach of God’s covenant. Next to killing a man, to take his wife in adultery was the worst thing that someone could do. Both these crimes carried the death penalty.
19 ‘You shall not steal.
Stealing covered all aspects of dishonesty, including kidnapping for which the penalty was death, stealing a man’s reputation, and stealing his property. Next to a man’s life, and his wife, his property and his name were the most important things in a man’s estimation, and in God’s, for they had been given to him by God. It was thus an offence against God. To steal them broke the covenant relationship. There were various penalties laid out for dishonesty and stealing. It depended on the nature of the offence. And they all required compensation.
20 ‘You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
The main concern here was the maintenance of justice. To bear false witness in a court was to subvert justice, and thus to render the court unable to fulfill its function under Yahweh. To bear false witness was thus to attempt to prevent Yahweh from carrying out justice. It was to subvert God’s purpose. All must therefore contribute towards maintaining true justice in every way. A man who was shown to have borne false witness had to bear the consequences that fell, or would have fallen, on the person he bore false witness about.
21 ‘You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife; and you shall not desire your neighbor’s house, his field, his male servant, his female servant, his ox, his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor’s.’
The final command is that they were not even to consider such things in their minds. The previous four commandments were widely held in many law codes and systems. In one way or another they were basic to life everywhere, although not always with such intensity. And punishment for them was made clear. But coveting is a thought process. And man could not judge and punish thought processes. Only God could do that.
Yet coveting is at the root of much sin for coveting leads to doing, and the point here is that God can even judge the thought processes before the outward sin itself is committed. Man may not be aware of them, but God Is. Wrong thought processes are thus a breach of the covenant. They break essential unity with one’s neighbor. And Yahweh will know. That is why Jesus could stress that to think was to do (Matthew 5.22, 28). As a man thinks in his heart, so is he (Proverbs 23.7). Indeed coveting is the most important of all things to avoid for from it come all the other sins and it takes the heart away from God. It is a form of idolatry, for it means putting what we covet higher than God (Colossians 3.5). If we can avoid coveting we will mainly avoid sin.
This commandment thus lifts the covenant above the level of social law. It brings out that in the end it is something directly between man and God. It is personal.
22 “These words the LORD spoke to all your assembly, in the mountain from the midst of the fire, the cloud, and the thick darkness, with a loud voice; and He added no more. And He wrote them on two tablets of stone and gave them to me.
Moses draws attention to the fact;
That the words of Yahweh had been spoken to the whole assembly (Exodus 20.22), and no one had been omitted.
That they had come from the Fire and Cloud and thick darkness that was on the Mount. They were from the very presence of God, the God of glory, in consuming power and mystery.
That they had heard a great voice - a voice that had directly spoken to them and terrified them.
That nothing was added to the commandments. He added no more to the people, the remainder coming through Moses).
That God’s Commandments were recorded on stone by the hand of God so as to seal their permanence and importance, and handed over by the covenant Lord to His people through Moses His mediator.
23 “So it was, when you heard the voice from the midst of the darkness, while the mountain was burning with fire, that you came near to me, all the heads of your tribes and your elders.
He stresses the Fire again and that they had heard the voice from within the thick darkness even while they saw the surrounding fire, and had been deeply moved. He reminds them of the effect that this had had on their fathers, and on some of them as children. And how at what they had seen and heard they had been filled with fear and awe, so that they had approached Moses, through all their heads of tribes and their elders, pleading that they wanted no more of it.
24 And you said: ‘surely the LORD our God has shown us His glory and His greatness, and we have heard His voice from the midst of the fire. We have seen this day that God speaks with man; yet he still lives.
They had been so moved that they had then spoken to him with awe of how Yahweh their covenant God had revealed to them His glory and His greatness in the Fire. Of course, they had in fact only seen the outskirts of His ways, but to them that had been moving enough, for what they had seen and heard had terrified them. They felt that they had done the impossible, heard the voice of God and lived. In a strange way they appreciated the fact. But it was not something that they wished to experience again. God had never come that close to them before and they thought of it in terms that no man could see God and live, for that was how they felt. To them it was not an experience that they wanted repeating.
25 Now therefore, why should we die? For this great fire will consume us; if we hear the voice of the LORD our God anymore, then we shall die.
Yet limited though their experience had been they had not wanted it repeated. They had felt as though they had almost died. If it happened again they feared that they would die. That terrible Fire that they had seen would surely devour them. The awful voice of God would surely cause them to wither and be annihilated. They could not even bear the thought of it.
26 For who is there of all flesh who has heard the voice of the living God speaking from the midst of the fire, as we have, and lived?
It had shaken them to the core. And yet they recognized that it had made them special. Of course, Moses had experienced exactly that at the burning bush. But then he was Moses. They were speaking of ordinary men.
‘27 You go near and hear all that the LORD our God may say, and tell us all that the LORD our God says to you, and we will hear and do it.’
The result was that they had begged Moses to stand in for them, to be their mediator, to go in their place. Would he not approach Yahweh their God, and hear all that He had to say, and then pass on His covenant words to them? They were ready to obey, but let him be to them the spokesperson of God.
28 “Then the LORD heard the voice of your words when you spoke to me, and the LORD said to me: ‘I have heard the voice of the words of this people which they have spoken to you. They are right in all that they have spoken.
Moses reminded them that our Great and Mighty God Yahweh had heard their plea. It was necessarily so, for Yahweh God Is the all-seeing and the all-hearing Holy One. Nothing is hidden from Him.
Yahweh God had heard their words. He wanted them to know that the words and thoughts of all men were known to Him. ‘For all things are open to Him with Whom we have to do’ and He had approved of what they had requested. He had known full well how little they could bear His presence. Thus He had indicated to Moses that the request met with His approval. He knew that otherwise it might all be too much for them. This was the pattern for the future. God would speak with men through His word passed on through the prophets and Apostles.
Our Master and King Jesus warned us that God hears our words too. ‘For every idle word that a man shall speak, he will give account thereof in the day of judgment’ (Matthew 12.36-37).
In His response Yahweh declares His longing that what His people had said might be true, and allows them to return to their tents, but commands that Moses will remain before Him in order to receive His commandment, that is, His statutes and ordinances in order to teach them to them so that they would do them once they had entered the land which Yahweh was giving them as a possession.
29 Oh, that they had such a heart in them that they would fear Me and always keep all My commandments, that it might be well with them and with their children forever!
But at the same time He had desired that their hearts might have been such that they had not requested it in vain, or at least such that they had continued to hear Him and obey Him. If only their hearts had been such that they would fear Him like Moses did, and keep His commandments permanently, and might thus find that all was well with them and with their children for ever. That was His longing for them. He only wished them well.
This heart cry reveals that Yahweh was not deceived about this people. Even as He gave His word through Moses He knew what would finally result. Even their behavior here had revealed the seeds of movement away from God and His covenant. The whole of the Old Testament history is contained within these words. They had found that knowing God was uncomfortable. But God never desires the death of the wicked. He longs that they might turn from their wickedness and live (Ezekiel 33.11). And He therefore longs that people may hear Him and fear Him. We do no good to ourselves when we seek to hide from God.
God cries out in the same way today. He looks at us and says the same, and speaks to us through His word. But He knows what we are, and that therefore we will constantly be totally dependent on His mercy. Yet He longs for those who will be fully taken up with Him, and seek Him more earnestly so as to enter into the deeper things of God.
30 Go and say to them, “Return to your tents.”
He tells Moses that the people are free to return to their tents. How sad this was. It was not because they had obtained victory that they returned to them, but because they did not want to have to face up to our Holy and Loving God as He really Is. From now on they would be making do with second hand experience. And the saddest thing was that they were satisfied with it. It was really the beginning of the end for Israel’s hopes of fulfilling God’s purposes through Abraham. It was only through the coming of a greater than Moses that such hope would be restored, when One came Who spoke continually with God face to face, and in Himself revealed the face of God (2 Corinthians 4.4-6). And if we would know God we must not be afraid to face Him.
Yet the returning to their tents also indicated that they must take Yahweh’s instruction into their home lives. The way was open to lives of obedience. We must not overlook the fact that God was giving them the opportunity that they had sought.
31 But as for you, stand here by Me, and I will speak to you all the commandments, the statutes, and the judgments which you shall teach them, that they may observe them in the land which I am giving them to possess.’
The stark contrast between Moses and the people comes out here. This returning to his tent was not for Moses. He could not return to his tent. He must face what his people were unwilling to face. He must constantly ‘face God and live’, as he had at the bush (Exodus 3). He must ‘stand by’ Yahweh and hear Him as He spoke to him regarding all the commandment, and the statutes and the ordinances’. Then he must teach them to the people so that they may fulfill them in the land to which they were going so that they might continue to possess it.
Here we learn quite plainly how God intended to teach Moses all that was required of his people. Here was the promise of one large ‘commandment’, of statutes (recorded requirements) and ordinances (judgments), of legislation and instruction, which he would have to pass on as God’s revelation to them.
Having fully described what had happened at Sinai/Horeb Moses now adds his own final comments. They are to observe and do what Yahweh has commanded without any diversions from it, and they are to walk in the way in which Yahweh has commanded them to live so that it might be well with them and they might have long life in the land which they will shortly possess (and some already possess).
32 “Therefore you shall be careful to do as the LORD your God has commanded you; you shall not turn aside to the right hand or to the left.
Moses now speaks again to all the people as a group. They are to observe all that Yahweh their God has commanded them. They must turn neither to the right nor to the left in the way of disobedience, but must walk straight forward in the way of obedience without deviation.
33 You shall walk in all the ways which the LORD your God has commanded you, that you may live and that it may be well with you, and that you may prolong your days in the land which you shall possess.
For this was the only way in which they could ensure that they would live and not die. And by it they would ensure not only that they lived, but that they lived so that it would be well with them and so that they would have long lives in the land which they would possess. Everything depended on hearing and responding to the covenant. That would ensure long life in the land which was only for the righteous.
