from WL Worcester (H Blackmer, ed.), 
The Sower.  Helps to the Study of the Bible in Home and Sunday School
 
(Boston: Massachusetts New-Church Union, n.d.)

Table of Contents
 

 

Lesson 44

Exodus 32: On Tablets of Stone

The Story

Primary

The Commandments which the children of Israel had heard spoken were also given them by the Lord written on two stones, so that they should not be changed. The Lord called Moses again up into the mountain, and Joshua, his helper, went perhaps part way with him. Do you remember Joshua? Moses was in the mountain forty days and forty nights while the Lord taught him many laws which he should teach the people, and the Lord gave him the Ten Commandments written on two tablets of stone. The tablets were slabs of stone, not too heavy for Moses to carry in his hands. Moses was bringing these precious tablets to the people.

But now he heard the sound of voices from the camp in the plain below. Joshua thought it was the sound of war, but Moses knew it was the voice of singing. They came nearer to the camp and saw the people feasting and dancing before an idol, a golden calf. The people had grown tired waiting for Moses and had cried to Aaron to make them an image such as those worshiped by people who did not know the Lord. The Lord had just taught them in the first of the Ten Commandments not to make and worship images. So soon they disobeyed and brought to Aaron golden ornaments, and he made this idol. They could not have the tablets of stone which the Lord had given if they were so quick to disobey. Moses cast them out of his hands and broke them beneath the mount.

After a time Moses cut out two other tablets by the Lord's command at the foot of the mountain, like the tablets that were broken, and took them up into the mountain, and on them the Lord wrote the same words which were on the first tablets, the Ten Commandments. These were the tablets which were presently put into the ark and went with the children of Israel in all of their journey, and were brought at last into the temple in Jerusalem.

Junior

I have been telling the younger children how the children of Israel got the precious stone tablets with the Ten Commandments written on them, which they kept afterward in the ark in the tabernacle and temple. Let me look up with you the verses which tell the story. We must look back first to Exod. 24:12-18 to learn how the Lord had called Moses up into the mountain to teach him many laws and to give him the Commandments written; how Moses went up (and Joshua perhaps part way with him), and was in the mountain forty days and forty nights. Turn next to Exod. 32:1-10. We read here of the idol, the golden calf, which Aaron and the people made while Moses was in the mountain - just what the Lord had commanded them not to do. They no doubt had seen such idols in Egypt where sacred bulls were worshiped. Now we can read Exod. 32:15-19, how Moses was bringing the precious tablets down to the people and how he broke them at the foot of the mount.

Exod. 34:1-8 tells how the Lord told Moses to cut out new tablets at the foot of the mountain like unto the first, and to bring them up into the mountain, and that He would write upon them the same words which were on the first tablets which were broken. Moses obeyed. In Exod. 34:29-35, we see Moses coming down from the mountain with these second tablets, the ones which were kept in the ark in the tabernacle and temple. When Moses came from the mountain the skin of his face shone so that he covered his face with a veil when he spoke with the people.

Let us draw the two tablets. On one stone were written the first commandments which tell our duty to the Lord, and on the other stone the last commandments which tell our duty to one another. The command to honor father and mother seems to belong to both, for we are to honor the heavenly Father and our earthly parents. It was perhaps partly on one stone and partly on the other. And remember that the Hebrew writing was from right to left. (T. 286, 456; A. 9416; E. 1026)

Children will think of the tablets as not too big for Moses to carry in his hands. We have another hint presently when we are told the size of the ark in which the tablets were kept, three feet nine inches long, and two feet three inches wide. The tablets must have been somewhat smaller.

Now let us read the Commandments from the tables.

1. Who heard the Ten Commandments spoken at Mount Sinai? Who received the other laws from the Lord and gave them to the people?

2. Tell me about the first tables. Where did Moses get them? Who wrote the Commandments upon them? What became of these tables?

3. Tell me about the second tables. Who made them? Who wrote upon them? What was done with these tables?

4. What idol was made at Sinai? Of what was it made? Who made it?

5. Why should the people have known better?

Spiritual Study

Intermediate

Both the writing of the Commandments and the stone on which they were written express the fixedness of the Commandments. They are the Lord's truth and cannot be changed. Compare Pilate's saying, "What I have written, I have written." (A. 8620)

To worship an idol is to live for and worship some ambition of our own and not the Lord. And what in particular is represented by worshiping an ox or calf? Cattle in a good sense represent affections for good things of the world and for natural usefulness. But if the things of the world are made the chief end of life, we are making them an idol and worshiping it. They are then the five yoke of oxen which keep us from the marriage feast of heaven. (Luke 14:19) We change our glory into the similitude of an ox that eateth grass. (Ps. 106:20) The worship of cattle by the Egyptians was in keeping with their character, for they lived for worldly things. There was the same tendency with the children of Israel; and the calf at Sinai especially represented their care only for the forms and ceremonies of worship, not valuing its spirit. (A. 10393, 10394) We think of gold as representing something good, love to the Lord and one another, but it can mean, and does mean here, evils made to appear good. (A. 9391, 10406)

The tablets on which the Commandments were written were like the letter of the Word which contains its heavenly meaning. The breaking of the first tablets is said to mean "that the sense of the letter would have been different if the Word had been written among other people, or if the people had not been of such a quality." The first tablets given to Moses suggest a more beautiful and heavenly letter which might have been given if the people had been capable of receiving and caring for it. But incapable of this, a letter was provided taken from the facts of their own history and from earthly things - the tablets cut out by Moses at the foot of the mountain. But note well that the Lord wrote on these tablets the same words that were written on the first tablets which were broken. The same heavenly and Divine truth is contained in the letter which we have which might have been given in a different and more lovely letter. (A. 10453)

How beautifully the shining of Moses’ face as he came from the mountain with the Commandments suggests the shining of the Divine through the letter of the law and of all the Word! Remember the shining of the Lord's face as the sun in the mountain of transfiguration. (A. 10691)

How can we understand Exod. 32:10-14, which speak of the Lord as angry and repenting? Read carefully A. 10431, 10440.

to next Lesson