Exodus 33:1-6
New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition
The Command to Leave Sinai
33 The Lord said to Moses, “Go, leave this place, you and the people whom you have brought up out of the land of Egypt, and go to the land of which I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying, ‘To your descendants I will give it.’(A) 2 I will send an angel before you, and I will drive out the Canaanites, the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.(B) 3 Go up[a] to a land flowing with milk and honey, but I will not go up among you, or I would consume you on the way, for you are a stiff-necked people.”(C)
4 When the people heard these harsh words, they mourned, and no one put on ornaments.(D) 5 For the Lord had said to Moses, “Say to the Israelites, ‘You are a stiff-necked people; if for a single moment I should go up among you, I would consume you. So now take off your ornaments, and I will decide what to do to you.’ ” 6 Therefore the Israelites stripped themselves of their ornaments, from Mount Horeb onward.
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- 33.3 Heb lacks Go up
Exodus 33:1-6
New English Translation
33 The Lord said to Moses, “Go up[a] from here, you and the people whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, to the land I promised on oath[b] to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, saying, ‘I will give it to your descendants.’[c] 2 I will send an angel[d] before you, and I will drive out the Canaanite, the Amorite, the Hittite, the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite.[e] 3 Go up[f] to a land flowing with milk and honey. But[g] I will not go up among you, for you are a stiff-necked people, and I might destroy you[h] on the way.”
4 When the people heard this troubling word[i] they mourned;[j] no one put on his ornaments. 5 For[k] the Lord had said to Moses, “Tell the Israelites, ‘You are a stiff-necked people. If I went up among you for a moment,[l] I might destroy you. Now take off your ornaments[m] that I may know[n] what I should do to you.’”[o] 6 So the Israelites stripped off their ornaments by Mount Horeb.
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- Exodus 33:1 tn The two imperatives underscore the immediacy of the demand: “go, go up,” meaning “get going up” or “be on your way.”
- Exodus 33:1 tn Or “the land which I swore.”
- Exodus 33:1 tn Heb “seed.”
- Exodus 33:2 sn This seems not to be the same as the Angel of the Presence introduced before.
- Exodus 33:2 sn See T. Ishida, “The Structure and Historical Implications of Lists of Pre-Israelite Nations,” Bib (1979): 461-90.
- Exodus 33:3 tn This verse seems to be a continuation of the command to “go up” since it begins with “to a land….” The intervening clauses are therefore parenthetical or relative. But the translation is made simpler by supplying the verb.
- Exodus 33:3 tn This is a strong adversative here, “but.”
- Exodus 33:3 tn The clause is “lest I consume you.” It would go with the decision not to accompany them: “I will not go up with you…lest I consume (destroy) you in the way.” The verse is saying that because of the people’s bent to rebellion, Yahweh would not remain in their midst as he had formerly said he would do. Their lives would be at risk if he did.
- Exodus 33:4 tn Or “bad news” (NAB, NCV).
- Exodus 33:4 sn The people would rather have risked divine discipline than to go without Yahweh in their midst. So they mourned, and they took off the ornaments. Such had been used in making the golden calf, and so because of their association with all of that they were to be removed as a sign of remorse.
- Exodus 33:5 tn The verse simply begins “And Yahweh said.” But it is clearly meant to be explanatory for the preceding action of the people.
- Exodus 33:5 tn The construction is formed with a simple imperfect in the first half and a perfect tense with vav (ו) in the second half. Heb “[in] one moment I will go up in your midst and I will destroy you.” The verse is certainly not intended to say that God was about to destroy them. That, plus the fact that he has announced he will not go in their midst, leads most commentators to take this as a conditional clause: “If I were to do such and such, then….”
- Exodus 33:5 tn The Hebrew text also has “from on you.”
- Exodus 33:5 tn The form is the cohortative with a vav (ו) following the imperative; it therefore expresses the purpose or result: “strip off…that I may know.” The call to remove the ornaments must have been perceived as a call to show true repentance for what had happened. If they repented, then God would know how to deal with them.
- Exodus 33:5 tn This last clause begins with the interrogative “what,” but it is used here as an indirect interrogative. It introduces a noun clause, the object of the verb “know.”
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