Exodus 34

Modern English Version

The New Stone Tablets

34 Now the Lord said to Moses, “Cut out for yourself two tablets of stone like the first, and I will write on these tablets the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke. ² Be ready in the morning, and come up in the morning to Mount Sinai, and present yourself there to Me on the top of the mountain. ³ No one is to come up with you. Do not let anyone be seen anywhere on the mountain, and the flocks or herds may not graze in front of the mountain.”

⁴ So he cut out two tablets of stone like the first, and Moses rose up early in the morning and went up to Mount Sinai, just as the Lord had commanded him, and took in his hand the two tablets of stone. ⁵ Then the Lord descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord. ⁶ The Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in goodness and truth, ⁷ keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of fathers on the children and on the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.”

⁸ Moses made haste and bowed to the ground and worshipped. ⁹ He said, “If now I have found favor in Your sight, O Lord, let my Lord, I pray, go among us, for we are a stiff-necked people. Pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for your inheritance.”

The Covenant Renewed

¹⁰ Then He said: Indeed, I am going to make a covenant before all your people. I will do wonders such as have not been done in all the earth nor in any nation. And all the people among whom you live will see the work of the Lord, for it is a fearful thing that I will do with you. ¹¹ Obey what I command you this day. Indeed, I am going to drive out before you the Amorite, the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite. ¹² Watch yourself so that you make no covenant with the inhabitants of the land where you are going, lest it become a snare in your midst. ¹³ But you shall destroy their altars, break their sacred pillars, and cut down their Asherah poles^{[a] 14} (for you shall not worship any other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God), ¹⁵ lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and they prostitute themselves with their gods, and sacrifice to their gods, and someone invites you to eat of his sacrifice. ¹⁶ And then you take of their daughters for your sons, and their daughters prostitute themselves after their gods. They will make your sons prostitute themselves after their gods.

¹⁷ You shall make no molded gods for yourselves.

¹⁸ You shall keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread. For seven days you are to eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you, in the month of Aviv, for in the month of Aviv you came out of Egypt.

¹⁹ Every firstborn of the womb belongs to Me, and every firstborn male among your livestock, whether ox or sheep. ²⁰ But you must redeem with a lamb the firstborn of a donkey, and if you fail to redeem him, then you must break his neck. You must redeem all the firstborn of your sons.

No one may appear before Me empty-handed.

²¹ You shall work six days, but on the seventh day you must rest. Even at the time of plowing and harvest you must rest.

²² You must observe the Feast of Weeks, the first fruits of the wheat harvest, and the Feast of Ingathering at the end of the year. ²³ Three times in the year all your males must appear before the Lord God, the God of Israel. ²⁴ For I will drive out the nations before you and enlarge your borders. No man will covet your land when you go up to appear before the Lord your God three times in the year.

²⁵ You must not offer the blood of My sacrifice with leaven, nor is the sacrifice of the Feast of the Passover to be left until the following morning.

²⁶ The first of the first fruits of your land you must bring to the house of the Lord your God.

You must not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk.

²⁷ Then the Lord said to Moses: Write down these words, for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel. ²⁸ So he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights. He did not eat bread or drink water. And He wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments.

Moses’ Radiant Face

²⁹ When Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of testimony in the hands of Moses, when he came down from the mountain, Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone while he talked with Him. ³⁰ So when Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, amazingly, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come near him. ³¹ But Moses called to them, and Aaron and all the rulers of the congregation returned to him, and Moses spoke to them. ³² Afterward all the children of Israel drew near, and he commanded them all that the Lord had spoken to him on Mount Sinai.

³³ When Moses finished speaking with them, he put a veil over his face. ³⁴ But whenever Moses went in before the Lord to speak with Him, he took the veil off until he came out. Then he came out and spoke to the children of Israel what he had been commanded. ³⁵ The children of Israel saw the face of Moses, that the skin of Moses’ face shone, and then Moses put the veil over his face again until he went in to speak with Him.