At that time Jehovah said unto me, Hew for thyself two tables of stone like the first, and come up unto me into the mountain, and make thee an ark of wood;
Moses is retelling Israel's own story to them. He has just reminded them of the golden calf and of the tablets he smashed at the foot of the mountain. Now God tells him to cut two fresh stones and make a wooden chest. After a failure like that, how can God give His law a second time?
The broken tablets carried a message Israel was meant to read:
Moses lets them hear the Lord's reference to the broken tablets. That was the fitting and forceful way to show how worthless man's covenant was. Why were those tablets broken? Because they had failed shamefully. Those shattered pieces told the humbling story of their hopeless ruin on the ground of the law. All was gone... Like a broken pillar over a grave which tells, at a glance, that the prop and stay of the family lies rotting beneath... So the broken tablets were meant to press one huge fact on Israel's heart. As far as their covenant went, they were ruined and undone. When it came to righteousness, they were bankrupt.
Moses could not carry the stones down into a camp where the calf still stood:
It was broken the first time. How could Moses go and put the tablets of the law beside the golden calf? That would set the ten commandments in the camp alongside the sin that had already violated the law. And the law's very first word was, "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me."
The new instruction is the chest. Why did the law need a box of its own?
God gave a second set of tablets in His mercy. But how could these, with the same holy demands and prohibitions as the first, be anything but a curse to that stubborn and rebellious people? These tablets should have been safe, "unbroken," in the tent of any Israelite. But that was not the case. A special chest had to be prepared for them, and so Moses speaks of the ark of acacia wood... All this would bring home to them how holy the law was, and how completely they had to obey it — and may we not say, their guilt too, and their helplessness? God had to provide a shrine for what should have been treasured in their hearts.
Writers see the wooden chest as a picture of Christ:
The ark was not mentioned at the first giving of the law, and the tablets were broken. But the ark speaks of Christ, the only One in whom the law is safe from the danger of breakage. So this second giving of the law did not put Israel under absolute law. Instead it brought in Christ as mediator between the people and the law. There was grace in this from God, and yet Israel was not put under grace. That can only be so now that Christ has suffered for sins and been raised again (Rom. 6:5-14). But putting the tablets in the ark meant that Israel was under law — law tempered with mercy.
Deuteronomy adds a detail Exodus leaves out. Moses made the chest before he went back up, and this account says nothing about gold:
There was then no ark to receive the tablets — this writing from the finger of God... Deuteronomy 10:5, however, shows us what Exodus does not. The solemn crisis that had arisen made it necessary for Moses to prepare the ark before he returned to God. Then, as soon as he came back to the people, he could place the two tablets of stone there. Perhaps it was not then overlaid with gold; that remained for Bezalel to complete later (Ex. 37:2).
The second set was never broken, and the contrast between the two sets is the point of the whole passage:
Yes, covered up in that ark which spoke of Christ. He is the blessed One who magnified the law and made it honourable, who established its every letter and stroke, to the glory of God and the everlasting blessing of His people. The broken fragments of the first tablets told the sad and humbling tale of Israel's complete failure and ruin. But the second tablets, kept whole inside the ark, set forth the glorious truth that Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile.
- Broken — the first tablets in pieces declared Israel bankrupt. Man's covenant was worth nothing.
- Barred — Moses could not carry the law into a camp that had already broken its opening word.
- Built — God commanded a chest. He gave the law a shrine because Israel's hearts were not one.
- Kept — the ark pictures Christ. In Him the law was safe from breaking, and law came tempered with mercy.
- Fulfilled — the unbroken second set points to Christ. He established every letter of the law and is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.
and I will write on the tables the words that were on the first tables which thou didst break, and thou shalt lay them in the ark.
Moses is retelling Israel's worst hour: the golden calf, and the first stone tablets in pieces at the mountain's foot. God did not soften the law — He wrote the same words again and had Moses keep this copy in a wooden chest.
God softened nothing. He wrote the same commands a second time, but the stone now came from a different hand:
God commands Moses to cut two tablets of stone like the first, which the LORD Himself had cut and which Moses broke… Moses was permitted to furnish the material for the second tablets, while the Lord had furnished it for the first. The second tablets were given as the result of the intercession of Moses. But God wrote the words on the second tablets of stone as He had done on the first.
God keeps naming who did the breaking. One writer reads real loss into that repeated phrase:
I was led partly to these thoughts by the way the Lord always speaks of it as "that you broke". He takes pains to make it the act of Moses. It is a serious thing to break what God Himself had cut out — the tablets were the work of God. He had not consulted the Lord, though he had interceded for the people. God did not make the tablets over again — Moses was now to cut them out; something was lost.
The strange part of the command is the container. A law meant for obedience is put in a box instead:
In mercy God gave a second set of tablets. But they carried the same holy requirements and prohibitions as the first. How could they be anything but a curse to this stubborn, rebellious people? These tablets should have been safe, "unbroken", in the tent of any Israelite. But that was not the case. A special chest had to be prepared for them, and so Moses speaks of the ark of acacia wood… All this would bring home the holiness of the law and the need to obey it — and, may we not say, their guilt too, and helplessness? God had to provide a shrine for what should have been treasured in their hearts.
Timing matters too. One writer notes that Deuteronomy fills in what the Exodus account leaves out.
Deuteronomy 10:5 shows us what Exodus does not. The solemn crisis that had arisen made it necessary for Moses to prepare the ark before he returned to God. Then, the moment he came back to the people, he could place the two tablets of stone there.
The first time, Moses carried the law down to the camp and smashed it in full view. This time God says in advance where it must go:
It had been shown that they were incapable of keeping the law. So it is shut up in Christ — afterwards written on their hearts. This gives a very remarkable contrast in the place of the law after failure… Before, Moses carries the tablets down to Israel and breaks them before their eyes. Now the arrangement, made in the very giving of the law, is that it should be shut up in the ark of the covenant. And so in fact it is in Christ, though afterwards it may be written in the heart when He owns the people.
The chest itself says something. If the people could not be trusted with the law, who could?
Here was a disobedient and rebellious people who could not be entrusted with God's perfect law. He must either judge them, or provide in mercy something that could, as a picture, be entrusted with it… One who perfectly kept the law of God in His heart.
The two sets tell two different stories:
The broken pieces of the first tablets told the sad and humbling story of Israel's utter failure and ruin. But the second tablets, shut up unbroken in the ark, set out the glorious truth that Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile.
They were covered up in that ark which spoke of Christ, that blessed One who magnified the law and made it honourable, who established every jot and tittle of it, to the glory of God and the everlasting blessing of His people.
- Broken. God cut the first tablets and Moses smashed them. They told the story of Israel's utter failure, and God kept naming who broke them: "that you broke".
- Rewritten. Mercy did not lower the standard. Moses interceded and cut the stones, and God wrote the same words again with His own hand.
- Boxed. The law should have been safe in any Israelite's tent. Instead it needed a chest of its own — proof of the people's guilt and helplessness.
- Shut up in Christ. The ark pictures the One who kept God's law perfectly in His heart. The law is shut up in Him, honoured and unbroken.
- Written on hearts. What the ark hid is not hidden forever. The law may yet be written in the heart when God owns His people.
And I made an ark of acacia-wood, and hewed two tables of stone like the first, and went up the mountain with the two tables in my hand.
Moses is retelling the worst moment of Israel's history: the golden calf and the smashed tablets. This verse is his report of what he did next. He built a wooden chest, cut two new stone tablets, and climbed the mountain again. Two questions follow. Why make the chest before God wrote the law, and why did the law need a chest at all?
Moses makes the ark first, then cuts the stones, then goes up. One writer finds in that order something Exodus never tells us.
Deuteronomy 10:5 shows us what Exodus does not. The serious crisis that had arisen made it necessary for Moses to prepare the ark before returning to God. Then, as soon as he came back to the people, he could place the two tablets of stone there. Perhaps it did not have its gold overlay yet; Bezalel completed that work later.
Moses cut the new stones "like the first." That phrase sent his hearers back to the first set, and to how it ended.
He lets them hear the Lord's reference to the broken tablets. They were the fitting and forceful expression of the utter worthlessness of man's covenant. For why were those tablets broken? Because they had shamefully failed. Those shattered fragments told the humiliating story of their hopeless ruin on the ground of the law. All was gone... they were complete bankrupts on the score of righteousness.
A box built to guard God's commandments says something about the people who should have kept them.
In divine mercy God provided a second set of tablets. But they carried the same holy requirements and prohibitions as the first. How could they be anything but a curse to a stubborn and rebellious people? Sadly, these tablets should have been safe, unbroken, in the tent of any Israelite. But that was not the case: Moses had to prepare a special chest for them... God had to provide a shrine for what should have been enshrined in their hearts. This fits the meaning of the acacia wood, mentioned apart from the gold. Here was a disobedient and rebellious people who could not be trusted with God's perfect law. God must either judge them, or in mercy provide one who, in picture, could be trusted with it.
What Moses put inside the ark says something about how God was dealing with Israel all along:
So Moses made an ark of acacia wood and placed the two tablets of stone in it. This showed that the law pure and simple never came into the middle of Israel. God always had Christ before Him, and the way of blessing in sovereign grace through the atoning death of Christ — even for the sinner who had broken the law.
Verse 3 is simple obedience: he made it, he cut them, he went up. One writer finds the point of it in what the ark later held.
Moses therefore obeyed the Lord in making the ark and cutting the tablets of stone, taking them up the mountain (v.3). When the Lord had written on these, Moses brought them down and put them into the ark (vs.4-5). This answers to the words of the Lord Jesus in Psalm 40:8, "Your law is within My heart." The only place the law is safe from abuse is in the heart of the Lord Jesus.
The second giving of the law was not a repeat of the first:
It was not law alone, and not grace alone, but rather the mingling of grace along with law. Without this mingling of grace and mercy with law, God could not have carried on His dealings with Israel, or even brought them into the land. So on this occasion the law was still committed to man. But God shut it up in the ark. He did not display all its terrors before the eyes of men.
Commentators differ on how much that mingling changed Israel's standing. Another writer takes the opposite side:
Any distinction made between the first tablets broken and the second placed in the ark is pointless... And the apostle says that this is condemnation and death: putting man under law after grace, when the law was in the ark.
- Broken — the smashed first tablets said plainly that the law left Israel ruined: "complete bankrupts on the score of righteousness."
- Provided — God had Moses build the chest before he went back up; mercy prepared the place before God wrote the law again.
- Enshrined — a chest guarded what every heart should have held, so the law stayed shut in the ark, not on display with all its terrors.
- Fulfilled — the ark points to Christ. The tablets inside answer to "Your law is within My heart" — the one safe place for the law.
- Disputed — writers differ. Did the law in the ark soften Israel's position, or still leave them under condemnation?
And he wrote on the tables, as the first writing, the ten words which Jehovah spoke unto you on the mountain, from the midst of the fire, on the day of the assembly, and Jehovah gave them unto me.
Moses is retelling Israel's worst hour, when he broke the first tablets of the law in front of the people. Verse 4 records what came next: God wrote the same ten words again and gave them back to Moses.
Deuteronomy is largely repetition, and commentators see purpose in it. Moses keeps setting the two sets of tablets side by side because the contrast carries its own sermon.
To him they were a continual feast. He not only found his own deep personal delight in dwelling on them, he also felt how immensely important it was to unfold them before the whole congregation. For him it was surely not tiresome, and for them it was safe. How delightful for him, and how good and necessary for them, to dwell on the facts connected with the two sets of tablets — the first set smashed to pieces at the foot of the mountain, and the second set enclosed in the ark.
These words carry more than one name in the Bible. And no human hand wrote them.
These have a special place, as having been written on the tablets of stone by "the finger of God" (Ex. 31:18). The margin of Deut. 10:4 reads "the ten words," and they are often called the DECALOGUE. They are also called "the words of the covenant" in Ex. 34:28… The two stones are also called the "tablets of the testimony" (Ex. 34:29), and they were laid up in the ark of the covenant (Ex. 40:20; 1 Kings 8:9; Heb. 9:4).
The verse dates the words to the day Israel gathered at Mount Sinai. Note the boundary God set around that mountain.
And now see how the law is unfolded in what Moses elsewhere calls "the day of the assembly" (see Deut. 9:10; Deut. 10:4; Deut. 18:16)… "on the third day the LORD will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people. And you shall set limits for the people all around, saying, Take care not to go up into the mountain or touch the edge of it. Whoever touches the mountain shall be put to death." Look at that. "Come near to Me," says God, "and you die." That is why the apostle calls it the "ministry of death" (2 Cor. 3:7).
Before God wrote anything again, the broken tablets had already said something.
Why were those tablets broken? Because the people had shamefully failed. Those shattered pieces told the humbling story. On the ground of the law they were ruined beyond hope. All was gone… It was like a broken pillar over a grave. At a glance it tells you that the support and mainstay of the family lies rotting underneath. There is no need of any inscription… So the broken tablets carried a tremendous fact to the heart of Israel. As far as their covenant was concerned, they were completely ruined and beyond hope. They were bankrupt when it came to righteousness.
The second tablets were not broken. They went into the ark, and the ark itself carried a meaning.
Yes, covered up in that ark, which spoke of Christ. That blessed One magnified the law and made it honourable. He established every last detail of it, to the glory of God and the everlasting blessing of His people. So the broken fragments of the first tablets told the sad and humbling story of Israel's complete failure and ruin. But the second tablets, shut up whole in the ark, set out the glorious truth: Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Gentile.
The two occasions differ, and not in the wording. The second time, God hid the law instead of holding it out.
On the second occasion, what a difference! God called the lawgiver into His presence. There He was pleased to mingle mercy with law… It was not law alone, and not grace alone, but grace mingled with law. Without this mingling of grace and mercy with law, God could not have carried on His dealings with Israel. He could not even have brought them into the land. So this time He still committed the law to man. But He shut it up in the ark. He did not display it with all its terrors before people's eyes.
Commentators differ on how far this change goes. Some see the ark as mercy softening law. Others trace a line from stone forward to the human heart.
It had been shown that they could not keep the law. So the law is shut up in Christ — and afterwards written on their hearts… Before, Moses carried the tablets down to Israel and broke them in front of their eyes. Now, in the giving of the law, it is arranged that it should be shut up in the ark of the covenant. That is in fact where it is: in Christ. Afterwards it may be written in the heart, when He owns the people.
- Broken. The first tablets were smashed at the foot of the mountain. They announced that Israel was bankrupt when it came to keeping the law.
- Rewritten. God wrote the same ten words again. He never softened the standard; He only changed where it sat.
- Hidden. The second tablets went into the ark. There God no longer displayed the law with all its terrors.
- Mingled. From then on God dealt with Israel by grace mixed with law. Without that mixture He could not have brought them into the land.
- Fulfilled. The ark pictures Christ. He magnified the law. He is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. The law written on the heart is still ahead.
And I turned and came down from the mountain, and put the tables in the ark which I had made; -- and they are there, as Jehovah commanded me.
Moses is retelling Israel's history to the people. Here he reaches the moment after the golden calf, when God gave the law a second time. The striking detail is not the writing but the storage. Before the new tablets came down the mountain, a wooden chest — the ark — was already waiting.
Exodus tells us what happened on the mountain. This verse tells us what Moses had built before he climbed it again.
Deuteronomy 10:5 shows us what Exodus does not. The serious crisis that had arisen made it necessary for Moses to prepare the ark before he went back up to God. Then, as soon as he returned to the people, he could place the two stone tablets there. Perhaps the ark was not overlaid with gold yet; that was left for Bezalel to finish later (Ex. 37:2).
The chest Moses made was not the finished ark that Exodus describes later.
The ark of acacia wood that Moses made was only temporary. In Ex. 37 we read how the skilled Bezalel made an ark of acacia wood and covered it with "pure gold," and this ark finally held the tablets of testimony. So the temporary ark mercifully bridged the gap between Moses receiving the law and the setting up of the tabernacle.
Moses smashed the first tablets at the foot of the mountain. Why could he not simply carry the second set into the camp?
The law was broken the first time. How could Moses go and put the tablets of the law beside the golden calf? That would put the ten commandments in the camp along with the sin which had already violated the law. And the very first word of that law was, "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me."
The need for a special container is itself an indictment. Every Israelite home should have kept God's commands safe.
These tablets should have been safe, "unbroken," in the tent of any Israelite. But that was not the case. They needed a special chest, and so Moses speaks of the ark of acacia wood... The one thing Moses would remind them of was the need for a chest to keep the law safe, and for a special guard to carry it (Deut. 10:8). All this would bring home to them how holy the law was, and how completely they had to obey it — may we not say, their guilt too, and their helplessness? God had to provide a shrine for what should have been enshrined in their hearts.
Moses ends with a quiet report: the tablets are still where he put them.
Blessed fact! "There they are." Yes, covered up in that ark which spoke of Christ. He magnified the law and made it honourable. He established every last detail of it, to the glory of God and the everlasting blessing of His people. The broken pieces of the first tablets told the sad and humbling story of Israel's utter failure and ruin. But the second tablets, shut up whole in the ark, set forth the glorious truth that Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Gentile.
Writers read the ark as a picture of Christ. The contrast between the two givings of the law shows where the law finally rests.
...since Israel had proved incapable of the law, it is shut up in Christ — and afterwards written on their hearts. This gives a very remarkable contrast in the place of the law after failure, when man has shown himself a sinner. Before, Moses carries the tablets down to Israel and breaks them in front of their eyes. Now, in giving the law, God provides that it should be shut up in the ark of the covenant — as in fact it is in Christ. Afterwards it may be written in the heart, when He owns the people.
- Failure. Israel broke the first commandment with the golden calf, so the first tablets lay shattered. The law could not sit beside the sin that defied it.
- Provision. God did not withdraw the law. He commanded a chest for it in advance, so the second tablets had a place the moment they came down.
- Indictment. The very need for a chest exposes the people. God supplied a shrine for what their own hearts should have held.
- Preservation. No one ever broke the second tablets. "There they are" reports a law kept whole and safe, beyond the reach of human hands.
- Fulfilment. The ark pictures Christ. In Him the law is shut up and honoured, and afterwards written on the hearts of the people He owns.
(And the children of Israel took their journey from Beeroth-Bene-Jaakan to Moserah there Aaron died, and there he was buried; and Eleazar his son exercised the priesthood in his stead.
This verse drops a short travel note into the middle of Moses' account of Israel's worst failure and his own pleading for them. Why does a list of stopping places sit here at all? And why place Aaron's death here, nearly forty years after the golden calf?
Verses 6 and 7 stand apart from the argument of the chapter. They sit here for their subject, not their order in time.
Moses does not follow the order of time in the first part of the tenth chapter. Verses 6 and 7 are a parenthesis. So the opening of verse 8, "At that time," does not connect with the death of Aaron. It refers to the time when the broken covenant was restored. Higher critics have made much of this as a glaring contradiction. There is no such contradiction here. Once you see verses 6 and 7 as a parenthesis, the difficulty disappears. But why would Moses bring in such a historical statement here? He is describing the gracious results of his pleading for the people. Not only was the covenant restored, but the priesthood was set up and kept up. Moses reminds the people of this gracious gift from their God by recalling the time when Aaron died and his son Eleazar received the high priesthood in his place.
Aaron made the calf, yet he was not struck down then. The years between that sin and his burial measure how long God bore with Israel, and the stopping places trace the road.
There is no discrepancy at all. Aaron died in the last year of the wilderness journey, and Levi's separation came some thirty-eight years earlier. The two are not confused here. The truth is that the solemn circumstances seem to recall to Moses' mind Israel's dreadful lapse when "they made the calf, the one that Aaron made"… It was not then and there that Aaron died, as he sadly deserved. The pleading of Moses prevailed so far for his brother and for the people that Aaron lived until near the end of the desert wanderings. The people, instead of perishing all at once, lived to take their journey from a land of wells (Beeroth) to Mosera, where Aaron died at Mount Hor. Such was the patient goodness of God to both, and the long interval only made it more striking.
The paragraph sets a death beside a calling, and the pairing is deliberate.
It is simply a parenthesis. In it the lawgiver groups together, in a very striking and forceful way, circumstances chosen with holy skill from the people's history. They show at once both the government and the grace of God. The death of Aaron displays the first; the choosing and raising up of Levi presents the second.
Aaron held the highest place in Israel's worship, and he still lost his life. Moses puts that before a people he is urging to obey.
They were to remember Aaron's high position as the high priest of Israel. Even so, he was stripped of his robes and lost his life for disobeying the word of the Lord. How important, then, that they should take heed to themselves! The government of God was not something to trifle with. Aaron's high place only made it more necessary to deal with his sin, so that others might fear.
The second half of the verse is the point of the whole parenthesis. Eleazar steps in, and the service goes on.
I take verses 1 to 9 to be a parenthesis, with verse 10 connecting directly to chapter 9:29. After Israel turned away from God, He set up a system of patient grace in Israel: the law, but now inside the ark; the priesthood; a land with brooks of water; and levitical service with no inheritance but the Lord. The death of Aaron showed, through Eleazar taking his place, that the priesthood continued.
The verse starts at Beeroth Bene-jaakan — the wells of the sons of Jaakan — and each stop after it holds more water. Some writers read that, with Eleazar's succession, as a picture of Christ risen and of what follows for those He leads.
The death of Aaron and the succession of Eleazar are the central points… In Eleazar the priesthood of Aaron continues despite his death, and in the power of resurrection. This connects in a telling way with the rapid advance of the people, who now press on through all opposition right up to the border of the land. Our great High Priest, His work finished and risen out of death, is able to lead His people on… First, before Aaron's death — the wells of the (Horite) sons of Jaakan. After Mosera, when Eleazar has succeeded Aaron, comes Gudgodah, a name said to mean "a well with much water." Then Jotbath, which the text openly calls "a land with brooks of water." So there is progress.
- Parenthesis. Verses 6–7 interrupt the argument on purpose. "At that time" in verse 8 reaches back to the restored covenant, not to Aaron's burial.
- Purpose. Moses lists the travel note among the gracious results of his pleading: Aaron lived on for decades, and the priesthood carried on.
- Government. Aaron's grave at Mosera is a warning: Israel's highest office holder lost his robes and his life for disobeying God.
- Grace. Beside that death stands Levi, chosen and raised up — one paragraph holding both sides of how God deals with His people.
- Continuity. The priest dies; the priesthood does not. Eleazar serves in his place, and the people press on — from wells, to much water, to a land with brooks.
From thence they journeyed unto Gudgodah; and from Gudgodah to Jotbathah, a land of water-brooks.)
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
At that time Jehovah separated the tribe of Levi, to bear the ark of the covenant of Jehovah, to stand before Jehovah to do service unto him, and to bless in his name, unto this day.
The chapter looks back at Israel's worst failure, the golden calf. In the middle of that account Moses stops to note that God set one tribe apart. Why mention Levi here, and why Levi of all tribes?
The setting apart of Levi sits right beside a note about Aaron's death. The two events were decades apart. Is that a mistake?
There is no discrepancy at all. The passage does not confuse Aaron's death, in the last year of the wilderness journey, with the setting apart of Levi some thirty-eight years earlier. These solemn events seem to bring back to Moses' mind the terrible failure of Israel, when they made the calf that Aaron made. He remembers Levi too. That tribe had once betrayed a stranger for a sister's sake, and now they set themselves apart to the Lord in the blood of their idolatrous brothers.
So why place them side by side? One man's fall and one tribe's faithfulness teach one lesson.
The death of Aaron displayed the awful result of disobedience. The lifting up of Levi shows the precious fruit of obedience... Why was Aaron judged? Because of his rebellion at the waters of Meribah. Why was Levi blessed? Because of his reverent obedience at the foot of Mount Horeb. Why are both grouped together in Deuteronomy 10? To press one thing on the heart and conscience of the people: they must obey their covenant God completely.
Levi had no claim on this honour. The tribe was carrying a punishment for an old crime.
Levi was scattered in Israel as a punishment for that terrible sin, committed centuries before at Shechem. But now, for our encouragement, see the grace of God. The very punishment, the scattering in Israel, becomes an unspeakable blessing. God chooses this tribe to draw near to Him. He scatters them through Israel so that they may spread the knowledge of God and His Word there.
Grace here does more than forgive. It promotes.
They were also to remember how the Lord dealt with Levi. Grace shines there with wonderful brightness. God took the fierce, cruel, self-willed Levi out of the depths of his moral ruin. He brought him near to Himself, to carry the ark of the covenant of the LORD, to stand before the LORD, to minister to Him, and to bless in His name.
Levi's new place began with a hard choice.
It was a searching test — a test that required Levi to set aside every claim of the flesh... It was obedience at any cost to God's call, and so complete separation from the evil into which Israel had fallen. God often tests His people in the same way. Whenever confusion and decline have set in, the only path for the godly is the one Levi took: full-hearted, unquestioning obedience. Such a path must be painful. It costs those who take it some of the closest ties of their lives, ties of family and kindred. But it is the only path of blessing.
Centuries later this verse fixed a disaster. David had first moved the ark on a new cart, copying his enemies.
David said that no one but the Levites should carry the ark of God, for the LORD had chosen them to carry the ark and to minister to Him forever. He said it as though he had made a great discovery, and so it was. But four hundred years earlier it had been plainly written... I can hear him saying, "What a foolish man I was to imitate the Philistines."
These duties still have an echo today.
That ark spoke of Christ. Inside it were the golden pot of manna, Israel's food in the wilderness; Aaron's rod that budded, Christ's priestly grace in resurrection; and the tables of stone, for the law was hidden in Him. Israel had to carry that ark and its contents through the desert. We too, as Christians, have to carry the ark. In the wilderness there were priests, Levites, and the ordinary people, or warriors. Today every Christian is a priest in worship. Every Christian is a Levite for service. And every Christian is one of the ordinary people, in everyday work and in the fight against the enemy.
- Grace first. The tribe punished for cruelty is the tribe brought nearest to God. Its punishment — scattering — became the way the knowledge of God spread through Israel.
- Grace tested. God claimed Levi at the golden calf, where obedience meant breaking the closest family ties. That is still the path when God's people go wrong.
- Grace assigned. The separated life has three duties: carry the ark, stand before the LORD to minister, bless in His name.
- Grace obeyed. Moses sets Levi beside Aaron's death. Judgment on one and blessing on the other make the same appeal: obey God.
- Grace applied. David learned that only those God chooses may carry the ark. Today every Christian is a priest in worship and a Levite for service.
Therefore Levi has no portion nor inheritance with his brethren; Jehovah is his inheritance, according as Jehovah thy God told him.
Moses breaks off his appeal to remind Israel of a tribe that came away from the division of the land with nothing — and with everything. Why did one family get no field of its own? And what does it mean that God gave them Himself instead?
Verses 1–9 sit inside Moses' larger argument as a deliberate aside. One writer reads the whole block as a picture of what God set up after Israel's collapse at the golden calf.
I take these verses to be all a parenthesis, and verse 10 to connect directly with chapter 9:29, showing that after the apostasy of Israel, the law (but now in the ark), the priesthood, and a land of rivers of waters, and levitical service with no inheritance but the Lord, was set up as a system of patient grace in Israel.
The events are not in date order, and that is the point. The passage sets two very different men side by side for a moral reason.
Do not let any question about the order of events in the passage above trouble you. It is simply a parenthesis. In it the lawgiver gathers together, in a very striking and forceful way, events chosen with holy skill from the history of the people. They show at once both the government and the grace of God. The death of Aaron shows the first; the choice and lifting up of Levi shows the second.
Levi's family record was violence. That is what makes his new position so striking.
And then they were to remember the Lord's dealings with Levi, in which grace shines so brightly. God took the fierce, cruel, self-willed Levi out of the depths of his moral ruin. He brought him near to Himself, "to bear the ark of the covenant of the LORD, to stand before the LORD to minister to him, and to bless in his name."
Jacob had once sentenced Levi to be broken up and scattered among his brothers. Having no land carried out that sentence — and turned it inside out.
Levi's name means "joined," and it fits the history of the tribe. Their first father joined Simeon in deeds of violence. As punishment this brought on them the sentence, "I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel." But the result is true blessing. The sentence falls more fully on Levi than on Simeon, and it only blesses Levi more fully. He is joined to the Lord, and the Lord becomes his portion. If he is scattered in Israel, it is as spiritual seed to bring forth fruit to God all over the land.
The verse traces this arrangement back to a word God had already spoken to Levi. It can still look like a loss. The same writer presses the opposite reading.
The subject of inheritance is dealt with next. "I am their inheritance… I am their possession." The priests have no inheritance, no possession in Israel. Compare Numbers 18:20; Deuteronomy 10:9; Deuteronomy 18:1. Is this a loss? Can it be a loss to be an heir of God, to have Him as one's inheritance and possession? Instead it expresses the highest possible place of nearness and blessing. What God is becomes the portion of those so blessed... The whole man is lifted up to Him, in whom all his resources are found and from whom all his expectation must come.
Their portion was a Person, not a plot of ground. So they had to live by confidence in what God had said, and that showed in their ministry.
God chose to give the Levites no inheritance in the land. The offerings made by fire to the LORD, the God of Israel — yes, the LORD Himself — were their inheritance, as He had said to them. The Lord's workmen stood on different ground from the rest of His people. They were called to a special confidence in His provision for them and in His word about them. If they failed in this, could they wonder that their words had little power?
One writer brings the same arrangement straight over to believers today.
These provisions for the priests were necessary because they had no inheritance in the land, as the other tribes had. They were to realise that God was their portion and inheritance. We may wonder whether they understood and valued this as they should have. But what about ourselves today? Being priests, believers have no earthly inheritance. Yet even now God is our portion and inheritance. We also have the wonderful prospect of an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven (1 Peter 1:4).
- Sentence. Levi's lack of land began as Jacob's judgment on violence — "I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel."
- Grace. God turned that scattering into the tribe's honour. He lifted Levi out of moral ruin to carry the ark, serve Him, and bless in His name.
- Exchange. Levi lost a field and gained a Person. Having God as your inheritance is not a loss. It is the nearest place there is.
- Dependence. A portion like that calls for daily trust. When servants stop counting on God's word about them, their words lose power.
- Inheritance. Believers stand in the same line. They are priests with no earthly portion. God is their portion now, and He keeps an unfading inheritance for them in heaven.
But I stood upon the mountain according to the former days, forty days and forty nights; and Jehovah listened unto me also at that time Jehovah would not destroy thee.
After the golden calf, Moses went back up the mountain for a second forty days and nights. Their survival hung on one clause — the Lord listened to him again — which answers why God did not destroy them.
Moses traces the rebellion to its root and sets God's patience against it.
In Deuteronomy 10 we find the provision of Jehovah's goodness stated in a very striking way. When Moses mentions the story of their rebellion, it leads him back to trace how this spirit showed itself as early as Horeb. When it is a question of rebellion, we must go to the root of it. We are also shown the astonishing patience of Jehovah. With it come the destruction of the first tablets, the writing of fresh ones, and the place where they were to be kept.
The people were about to enter a good land, and the danger was that they would credit themselves for it.
This chapter and the first eleven verses of the tenth are aimed against the spirit of self-righteousness... They had been rebels. They owed their existence entirely to the mercy of God, and the intercession of Moses secured it. So they were to understand that God did not give them the good land for their righteousness. They were a stiff-necked people... Mercy alone had saved them and had brought about their restoration.
God's answer to Moses was more than a stay of execution. It came with orders to move on.
Moses stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights the second time, just as he had when the law was first given. His pleading for Israel turned God's judgment away (v.10). Rather than destroying Israel, God gave Moses orders to proceed on the journey to the land of Canaan (v.11).
Moses stood between God and the guilty. On God's side the outcome was never in doubt.
The pleading of Moses is most beautiful and instructive. It is so because in it he was a picture of the great Mediator... The mediation of Moses prevailed: God intended it to prevail... Notice this. God said to Moses, "Your people," but the Holy Spirit, writing this record, says, "His people." It tells us that the counsels of grace stand fast, despite the sins of that people.
But Moses could go only so far.
Moses, though he took the place of intercessor, was not perfect in the knowledge of grace. He could only say to the people, "perhaps I shall make atonement." He could not put away sin. It was altogether different with Christ. He could put away sin. He did make atonement. There was no perhaps with Him.
God did not give the second set of tablets on the same terms as the first. That change is why Israel could go on at all.
When God gave the law a second time, He did not give it as before. The Lord proclaimed His name as One abundant in goodness and truth. At the same time He showed that He would by no means clear the guilty. In other words, the first time it was pure law, pure righteousness. It ended in the golden calf, that is, in pure unrighteousness on the part of the people. Justice demanded their destruction. But on the pleading of Moses, God brings in a mixed system, partly law and partly grace.
What was Moses doing through those second forty days on the mountain?
And what do you think Moses was doing during that second forty days? I believe he downright enjoyed God. He enjoyed the Lord's company those forty days and forty nights... He was in the enjoyment of His grace, as well as the deep sense of the mercy of the Lord. He had the sense that God would spare His people, guilty though they were. That was a wonderful forty days for Moses.
- Ruin. After the golden calf, Israel had no claim left on God. Moses traces their rebellion back to its root at Horeb, so no one could boast of righteousness.
- Mediator. Moses stood between God and the people as a picture of the great Mediator. His pleading prevailed because God meant it to prevail. Moses could only say "perhaps"; Christ made atonement with no perhaps.
- Mercy. With the second tablets God proclaimed His name as abundant in goodness and truth. Pure law would have destroyed Israel, so He brought in law mixed with grace.
- Marching orders. God did more than spare them. He sent them on toward Canaan, so mercy moved the people forward.
- Joy. Those forty days in God's company left Moses enjoying the very mercy he had pleaded for.
And Jehovah said unto me, Rise up, take thy journey before the people, that they may enter in and possess the land, which I swore unto their fathers to give unto them.
Moses is retelling the worst moment in Israel's history — the golden calf. His point is that the nation still stands only because God listened to him on the mountain. This verse is God's answer at the end of those forty days. It is not a sentence of destruction. It is an order to march toward the land God had promised on oath.
The verse follows the second forty days on the mountain. The two halves belong together: God heard, so Israel moves.
The law was given a first time and then a second time. On both occasions Moses stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights. His prayer for Israel turned God's judgment aside (v.10). Rather than destroying Israel, God gave Moses orders to proceed on the journey to the land of Canaan (v.11).
This verse closes a section, and one writer points to where its foundation lies.
Verses 1-11 take up the standing of the restored people. The basis of it all lies in Exodus 34:1-9, which stands on its own. At verse 28 it passes on to Moses, along with the people — a state of things under a mediator, and under government (see verse 27).
God gives the command to set out to Moses, and only after Moses has spent forty days pleading. That order matters. Israel had already broken the Sinai covenant before it could carry them anywhere.
Israel never entered the land under the Sinai covenant — that is, under simple law. All this happened at Mount Sinai, and Israel broke the covenant at once. Only through the mediation of Moses could they find the way in again. They are placed under the law once more, but the government of patience and grace is added to it.
Notice what God does not say. He does not say the land is theirs because they have improved. He points back to what He swore to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The calf never touched that promise.
But they failed under this law, as the sin of the golden calf (Exodus 32) witnessed. This, however, did not touch the promises to Abraham. Moses' prayer rests on these promises and on the oath of God. It was because of these promises that they came into the land at all.
Another writer puts the weight on God's resolve, not on anything in Israel.
The Lord would keep His promise to the fathers, despite every obstacle. He would give Israel full possession of the land. He had sworn to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob that He would give it to their descendants as an everlasting inheritance.
Israel entered the land and later lost it. That history does not cancel the oath this verse rests on.
But blessed be the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! Israel has failed under law and government, but He has not failed in His rich and precious sovereign grace and mercy. He will keep the covenant and the mercy He swore to their fathers. Not the smallest part of His covenant promise will ever fail... He cannot do this on the ground of Israel's obedience. But He can and will do it through the blood of the everlasting covenant, the precious blood of Jesus, His eternal Son.
Straight after this verse Moses turns to what God asks — fear, love, service, obedience. The demand comes after the rescue, and it is for their own good.
It was all for their real good, their deep, full blessing, to walk in the way of the divine commandments. The path of whole-hearted obedience is the only path of true happiness; and blessed be God, those who love the Lord can always walk this path.
- Heard — Moses stayed on the mountain forty days a second time, and the Lord listened. He did not destroy Israel.
- Sent — the answer to that prayer was not just survival. God told Moses to rise and lead the people on toward Canaan.
- Mediated — Israel never entered the land under the broken Sinai covenant. Moses' mediation reopened the way in, with patience and grace added to law.
- Sworn — they entered on the strength of the oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The golden calf never touched it.
- Kept — Israel failed under law and government, but God has not failed. He will make good what He swore, through the blood of the everlasting covenant. And the obedience He asks for is for their own good.