Exodus 24:12

the tables of stone on which the Decalogue was inscribed. They are mentioned frequently in the sequel; and, remarkably enough, by different expressions, corresponding to the three principal Pent. sources: -in Exodus 31:18 b E, as here, says "tables of stone"; P says "the two tables of the testimony" (Exodus 31:18 a, Exodus 32:15 a, Exodus 34:29); J and Dt. say "the two tables of stones" (Exodus 34:1; Exodus 34:4; Deuteronomy 4:13; Deuteronomy 5:22 [Heb. 19], Exodus 9:9-11; Exodus 10:1; Exodus 10:3)" (Di.): Dt. says also (cf. p. 175) -the tables of the covenant" (Exodus 9:9; Exodus 9:11; Exodus 9:15).

and the direction (tôrâh) and the commandment, which I have written, to direct them(i.e. the people)] What these words refer to is a difficult and uncertain question. It cannot be the Decalogue; for not only must it be something different from the -tables of stone," but the Decalogue would not be spoken of as tôrâh. It cannot be the -Book of the Covenant"; for this has been already both -given" to Moses and -written" (vv.4, 7). As nothing is spoken of as -written" by Jehovah, except the Decalogue, it is an extremely probable conjecture that the words -which I have written" are out of place, and ought to follow -the tables of stone": -the direction and the commandment" may then refer to something future (-will give"): but it still remains a question what that is. It cannot be the directions about the Tabernacle contained in chs. 25 31 (even granting that these were by the same hand as Exodus 24:12-15 a); for these would not be called tôrâh. Most probably (Bä. xlix) the reference is to the -commandment, and the statutes, and the judgements," which Moses is said in Deuteronomy 5:31 to have received at Horeb, but in Exodus 6:1 to have first formally promulgated to the people on the eve of their entering Canaan. And the -commandment," &c., thus referred to, seem to have been in fact the -judgements" of Exodus 21:2 to Exodus 22:17. These -judgements" (cf. on v.3), it is probable, were originally recorded by E at the point of the narrative where Dt. now stands. The Deuteronomist puts his version of the -judgements," is of other older laws, into Moses" mouth not at Horeb but in the steppes of Moab: when, then, Dt. was combined with JE, the compiler could not well put the two versions side by side, so he put back the earlier version (Exodus 21:2 to Exodus 22:17) into conjunction with the rest of E's laws Horeb (cf. Kuenen, Hex.§ xiii. 32; Bä. l.c.; McNeile, p. xxvii. f.)