8 And I have come down to take them out of the hands of the Egyptians, guiding them out of that land into a good land and wide, into a land flowing with milk and honey; into the place of the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Amorite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite.
Then Joseph said to his brothers, The time of my death has come; but God will keep you in mind and take you out of this land into the land which he gave by his oath to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob.
And I have said, I will take you up out of the sorrows of Egypt into the land of the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Amorite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite, into a land flowing with milk and honey.
In that day the Lord made an agreement with Abram, and said, To your seed have I given this land from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates: The Kenite, the Kenizzite, and the Kadmonite, And the Hittite, and the Perizzite, and the Rephaim, And the Amorite, and the Canaanite, and the Girgashite, and the Jebusite.
And taking in their hands some of the fruit of the land, they came down again to us, and gave us their account, saying, It is a good land which the Lord our God is giving us.
In that day I gave my oath to take them out of the land of Egypt into a land which I had been searching out for them, a land flowing with milk and honey, the glory of all lands:
For the Lord your God is guiding you into a good land, a land of water-springs, of fountains, and deep streams flowing out from the valleys and the hills; A land of grain and vines and fig-trees and fair fruits; a land of oil-giving olive-trees and honey; Where there will be bread for you in full measure and you will be in need of nothing; a land where the very stones are iron and from whose hills you may get copper.
And it will be that, when the Lord takes you into the land of the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Amorite and the Hivite and the Jebusite, the land which he made an oath to your fathers that he would give you, a land flowing with milk and honey, you will do this act of worship in this month.
Say then to the children of Israel, I am Yahweh, and I will take you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians, and make you safe from their power, and will make you free by the strength of my arm after great punishments. And I will take you to be my people and I will be your God; and you will be certain that I am the Lord your God, who takes you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. And I will be your guide into the land which I made an oath to give to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob; and I will give it to you for your heritage: I am Yahweh.
And they said, We came to the land where you sent us, and truly it is flowing with milk and honey: and here is some of the produce of it.
And you gave them kingdoms and peoples, making distribution to them in every part of the land: so they took for their heritage the land of Sihon, even the land of the king of Heshbon, and the land of Og, king of Bashan. And you made their children as great in number as the stars of heaven, and took them into the land, of which you had said to their fathers that they were to go in and take it for themselves. So the children went in and took the land, and you overcame before them the people of the land, the Canaanites, and gave them up into their hands, with their kings and the people of the land, so that they might do with them whatever it was their pleasure to do. And they took walled towns and a fat land, and became the owners of houses full of all good things, water-holes cut in the rock, vine-gardens and olive-gardens and a wealth of fruit-trees: so they had food enough and became fat, and had joy in the good you gave them.
I will go down now, and see if their acts are as bad as they seem from the outcry which has come to me; and if they are not, I will see.
You saw that his heart was true to you, and made an agreement with him to give the land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite and the Perizzite and the Jebusite and the Girgashite, even to give it to his seed, and you have done what you said; for righteousness is yours:
For I have come down from heaven, not to do my pleasure, but the pleasure of him who sent me.
When his cry comes up to me, I will give him an answer: I will be with him in trouble; I will make him free from danger and give him honour.
Our fathers had faith in you: they had faith and you were their saviour. They sent up their cry to you and were made free: they put their faith in you and were not put to shame.
Because of the crushing of the poor and the weeping of those in need, now will I come to his help, says the Lord; I will give him the salvation which he is desiring.
Now on hearing the news of these things, all the kings on the west side of Jordan, in the hill-country and the lowlands and by the Great Sea in front of Lebanon, the Hittites and the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites,
And the Lord came down to see the town and the tower which the children of men were building.
Come, let us go down and take away the sense of their language, so that they will not be able to make themselves clear to one another.
But I will be the judge of that nation whose servants they are, and they will come out from among them with great wealth.
If you are cruel to them in any way, and their cry comes up to me, I will certainly give ear; And in the heat of my wrath I will put you to death with the sword, so that your wives will be widows and your children without fathers. If you let any of the poor among my people have the use of your money, do not be a hard creditor to him, and do not take interest. If ever you take your neighbour's clothing in exchange for the use of your money, let him have it back before the sun goes down: For it is the only thing he has for covering his skin; what is he to go to sleep in? and when his cry comes up to me, I will give ear, for my mercy is great. You may not say evil of the judges, or put a curse on the ruler of your people. Do not keep back your offerings from the wealth of your grain and your vines. The first of your sons you are to give to me. In the same way with your oxen and your sheep: for seven days let the young one be with its mother; on the eighth day give it to me. You are to be holy men to me: the flesh of no animal whose death has been caused by the beasts of the field may be used for your food; it is to be given to the dogs.
And I will send an angel before you, driving out the Canaanite and the Amorite and the Hittite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite: Go up to that land flowing with milk and honey; but I will not go up among you, for you are a stiff-necked people, for fear that I send destruction on you while you are on the way.
Take care to do the orders which I give you today; I will send out from before you the Amorite and the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite.
And what sort of land they are living in, if it is good or bad; and what their living-places are, tent-circles or walled towns;
Make a move now, and go on your way into the hill-country of the Amorites and the places near it, in the Arabah and the hill-country and in the lowlands and in the South and by the seaside, all the land of the Canaanites, and Lebanon, as far as the great river, the river Euphrates.
When the Lord your God takes you into the land where you are going, which is to be your heritage, and has sent out the nations before you, the Hittites and the Girgashites and the Amorites and the Canaanites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and stronger than you;
And that your days may be long in the land which the Lord gave by an oath to your fathers and to their seed after them, a land flowing with milk and honey. For the land where you are going is not like the land of Egypt from which you have come, where you put in your seeds, watering them with your foot, like a planted garden: But the land where you are going is a land of hills and valleys, drinking in the rain of heaven: A land cared for by the Lord your God: the eyes of the Lord your God are on it at all times from one end of the year to the other. And it will be that if you truly give ear to the orders which I put before you this day, loving the Lord your God and worshipping him with all your heart and all your soul, Then I will send rain on your land at the right time, the early rains and the late rains, so that you may get in your grain and your wine and your oil. And I will give grass in your fields for your cattle, so that you may have food in full measure. But take care that your hearts are not turned to false ways so that you become servants and worshippers of other gods; For if you do so, the wrath of the Lord will be burning against you, and the heaven will be shut up so that there is no rain and the land will give no fruit; and in a very little time you will be cut off from the good land which the Lord is giving you. So keep these words deep in your heart and in your soul, and have them fixed on your hand for a sign and marked on your brow; Teaching them to your children, and talking of them when you are at rest in your house or walking by the way, when you go to sleep and when you get up: Writing them on the pillars of your houses and over the doors of your towns: So that your days, and the days of your children, may be long in the land which the Lord by his oath to your fathers said he would give them, like the days of the eternal heavens. For if you take care to keep all the orders which I give you, and to do them; loving the Lord your God and walking in all his ways and being true to him: Then the Lord will send these nations in flight before you, and you will take the lands of nations greater and stronger than yourselves. Every place where you put your foot will be yours: from the waste land and Lebanon, from the river, the river Euphrates as far as the Great Sea, will be the limits of your land.
And he has been our guide to this place, and has given us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. So now, I have come here with the first of the fruits of the earth which you, O Lord, have given me. Then you will put it down before the Lord your God and give him worship: And you will have joy in every good thing which the Lord your God has given to you and to your family; and the Levite, and the man from a strange land who is with you, will take part in your joy. When you have taken out a tenth from the tenth of all your produce in the third year, which is the year when this has to be done, give it to the Levite, and the man from a strange land, and the child without a father, and the widow, so that they may have food in your towns and be full; And say before the Lord your God, I have taken all the holy things out of my house and have given them to the Levite, and the man from a strange land, and him who has no father, and the widow, as you have given me orders: I have kept in mind all your orders, in nothing have I gone against them: No part of these things has been used for food in a time of weeping, or put away when I was unclean, or given for the dead: I have given ear to the voice of the Lord my God, and have done all you have given me orders to do. So, looking down from your holy place in heaven, send your blessing on your people Israel and on the land which you have given us, as you said in your oath to our fathers, a land flowing with milk and honey.
And writing on them all the words of this law, after you have gone over; so that you may take the heritage which the Lord your God is giving you, a land flowing with milk and honey, as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has said.
The heavens were bent, so that he might come down; and it was dark under his feet. And he went in flight through the air, seated on a storm-cloud: going quickly on the wings of the wind. He made the dark his secret place; his tent round him was the dark waters and thick clouds of the skies. Before his shining light his dark clouds went past, raining ice and fire. The Lord made thunder in the heavens, and the voice of the Highest was sounding out: a rain of ice and fire. He sent out his arrows, driving them in all directions; by his flames of fire they were troubled. Then the deep beds of the waters were seen, and the bases of the world were uncovered, because of your words of wrath, O Lord, because of the breath from your mouth. He sent from on high, he took me, pulling me out of great waters. He made me free from my strong hater, and from those who were against me, because they were stronger than I. They came on me in the day of my trouble; but the Lord was my support. He took me out into a wide place; he was my saviour because he had delight in me.
And no one has ever gone up to heaven but he who came down from heaven, the Son of man.
O let the heavens be broken open and come down, so that the mountains may be shaking before you, As when fire puts the brushwood in flames, or as when water is boiling from the heat of the fire: to make your name feared by your haters, so that the nations may be shaking before you;
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible » Commentary on Exodus 3
Commentary on Exodus 3 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 3
Ex 3:1-22. Divine Appearance and Commission to Moses.
1. Now Moses kept the flock—This employment he had entered on in furtherance of his matrimonial views (see on Ex 2:21), but it is probable he was continuing his service now on other terms like Jacob during the latter years of his stay with Laban (Ge 30:28).
he led the flock to the backside of the desert—that is, on the west of the desert [Gesenius], assuming Jethro's headquarters to have been at Dahab. The route by which Moses led his flock must have been west through the wide valley called by the Arabs, Wady-es-Zugherah [Robinson], which led into the interior of the wilderness.
Mountain of God—so named either according to Hebrew idiom from its great height, as "great mountains," Hebrew, "mountains of God" (Ps 36:6); "goodly cedars," Hebrew, "cedars of God" (Ps 80:10); or some think from its being the old abode of "the glory"; or finally from its being the theater of transactions most memorable in the history of the true religion to Horeb—rather, "Horeb-ward."
Horeb—that is, "dry," "desert," was the general name for the mountainous district in which Sinai is situated, and of which it is a part. (See on Ex 19:2). It was used to designate the region comprehending that immense range of lofty, desolate, and barren hills, at the base of which, however, there are not only many patches of verdure to be seen, but almost all the valleys, or wadys, as they are called, show a thin coating of vegetation, which, towards the south, becomes more luxuriant. The Arab shepherds seldom take their flocks to a greater distance than one day's journey from their camp. Moses must have gone at least two days' journey, and although he seems to have been only following his pastoral course, that region, from its numerous springs in the clefts of the rocks being the chief resort of the tribes during the summer heats, the Providence of God led him thither for an important purpose.
2, 3. the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire—It is common in Scripture to represent the elements and operations of nature, as winds, fires, earthquakes, pestilence, everything enlisted in executing the divine will, as the "angels" or messengers of God. But in such cases God Himself is considered as really, though invisibly, present. Here the preternatural fire may be primarily meant by the expression "angel of the Lord"; but it is clear that under this symbol, the Divine Being was present, whose name is given (Ex 3:4, 6), and elsewhere called the angel of the covenant, Jehovah-Jesus.
out of the midst of a bush—the wild acacia or thorn, with which that desert abounds, and which is generally dry and brittle, so much so, that at certain seasons, a spark might kindle a district far and wide into a blaze. A fire, therefore, being in the midst of such a desert bush was a "great sight." It is generally supposed to have been emblematic of the Israelites' condition in Egypt—oppressed by a grinding servitude and a bloody persecution, and yet, in spite of the cruel policy that was bent on annihilating them, they continued as numerous and thriving as ever. The reason was "God was in the midst of them." The symbol may also represent the present state of the Jews, as well as of the Church generally in the world.
4. when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see—The manifestations which God anciently made of Himself were always accompanied by clear, unmistakable signs that the communications were really from heaven. This certain evidence was given to Moses. He saw a fire, but no human agent to kindle it; he heard a voice, but no human lips from which it came; he saw no living Being, but One was in the bush, in the heat of the flames, who knew him and addressed him by name. Who could this be but the Divine Being?
5. put off thy shoes—The direction was in conformity with a usage which was well known to Moses, for the Egyptian priests observed it in their temples, and it is observed in all Eastern countries where the people take off their shoes or sandals, as we do our hats. But the Eastern idea is not precisely the same as the Western. With us, the removal of the hat is an expression of reverence for the place we enter, or rather of Him who is worshipped there. With them the removal of the shoes is a confession of personal defilement and conscious unworthiness to stand in the presence of unspotted holiness.
6-8. I am the God … come down to deliver—The reverential awe of Moses must have been relieved by the divine Speaker (see Mt 22:32), announcing Himself in His covenant character, and by the welcome intelligence communicated. Moreover, the time, as well as all the circumstances of this miraculous appearance, were such as to give him an illustrious display of God's faithfulness to His promises. The period of Israel's journey and affliction in Egypt had been predicted (Ge 15:13), and it was during the last year of the term which had still to run that the Lord appeared in the burning bush.
10-22. Come now therefore, and I will send thee—Considering the patriotic views that had formerly animated the breast of Moses, we might have anticipated that no mission could have been more welcome to his heart than to be employed in the national emancipation of Israel. But he evinced great reluctance to it and stated a variety of objections [Ex 3:11, 13; 4:1, 10] all of which were successfully met and removed—and the happy issue of his labors was minutely described.