Exodus 34:12

_TAKE HEED TO THYSELF, LEST THOU MAKE A COVENANT WITH THE INHABITANTS OF THE LAND WHITHER THOU GOEST, LEST IT BE FOR A SNARE IN THE MIDST OF THEE:_ Take heed to thyself, lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land. Since the Canaanites were gross idolaters, and their rites were infamous for cruelty and lust, the Israelites were forewarned against forming any sort of league with them, lest they should be seduced into a fondness for their pagan revelries. All participation in those revolting abominations was denounced under the severest penalties-whether prostration before their images offering sacrifices on their altars, or frequenting their consecrated groves, which covered a great part of the country. So far from any countenance or toleration being given to any of these, every monument of the odious and malignant superstition was to be destroyed....

10-17 The Israelites are commanded to destroy every monument of idolatry, however curious or costly; to refuse all alliance, friendship, or marriage with idolaters, and all idolatrous feasts; and they were reminded not with idolaters, and all idolatrous feats; and they were reminded not to repeat the crime of making molten images. Jealously is called the rage of a man, Proverbs 6:34; but in God it is holy and just displeasure. Those cannot worship God aright, who do not worship him only....

The precepts contained in these verses are, for the most part, identical in substance with some of those which follow the Ten Commandments and are recorded in “the Book of the covenant” (Exo. 20–23; see Exodus 24:7). Exodus 34:13 CUT DOWN THEIR GROVES - This is the first reference to what is commonly known as grove-worship. The original word for “grove” in this connection אשׁרה _'ăshêrāh_ is different from that so rendered in Genesis 21:33. Our translators supposed that what the law commands is the destruction of groves dedicated to the worship of false deities...

EXPOSITION THE RENEWAL OF THE COVENANT. Dazed, as it would seem, by the splendour of the vision which he had beheld, Moses forgot that God had already pledged himself to renew the covenant, and lead the people in person to Canaan. In his forgetfulness, he once more set himself to intercede with God on their behalf, and besought him— 1. That he would go up with them; 2. That he would pardon them; and 3. That he would once more take them as his inheritance (Exodus 34:9). Without replying separately to these requests, God formally renews the covenant; promises not only to go up with the people, but to work miracles for them (Exodus 34:10), and to d

TAKE HEED TO THYSELF,.... This is said not to Moses, but to the people of Israel, as a caution to them when they should enter the land of Canaan, and possess it: LEST THOU MAKE A COVENANT WITH THE INHABITANTS OF THE LAND WHITHER THOU GOEST: enter into a league and alliance, to live friendly and amicably, and support and assist each other against the common enemy; whereas they were to smite the seven nations and destroy them, and show them no mercy, Deuteronomy 7:1 LEST IT BE FOR A SNARE IN THE MIDST OF THEE; be the means of drawing them into the same sinful practices with themselves, especially into idolatrous ones, and so of bringing ruin and destruction on them....

CHAPTER 34 THE RESULT: THE SECOND COVENANT AND THE GLORY _ 1. The command to hew two tables of stone (Exodus 34:1)_ 2. The proclamation of Jehovah (Exodus 34:5) 3. Moses' worship and prayer (Exodus 34:8) 4. The covenant restated (Exodus 34:10) 5. The second tables written (Exodus 34:27) 6. The glory upon the face of Moses (Exodus 34:29) The command is given to Moses to hew two tables of stone like the first, which Jeho

EXODUS 34:1 J. THE COVENANT WORDS. After removing Exodus 34:5, the sublime account of the revelation of Yahweh's nature as mercy and truth in their unity, which follows on Exodus 33:23, the remainder is the sequel of J's account of the descent upon Sinai in Exodus 19, and the clauses (Exodus 34:1; Exodus 34:3) referring to the first (tables) are glosses of the editor who displaced this section (_cf._ p. 183). And it may be that originally, as in Deuteronomy 10:1

IT. they....

The (re-)establishment of the covenant, with the laws upon which it is based. The passage belongs in the main to E; but it has probably been enlarged in parts with hortatory additions by the compiler. We have met with some such additions before, in Exodus 20:22 to Exodus 23:33; and they are found elsewhere also in connexion with laws, as in Leviticus 18:1-5; Leviticus 18:24-29; Leviticus 20:22-24 (H), and Deuteronomy 12-26 _passim_....

THE TEXT OF EXODUS TRANSLATION 34 And Je-ho-vah said unto Mo-ses, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first: and I will write upon the tables the words that were on the first tables, which thou brakest. (2) And be ready by the morning, and come up in the morning unto mount Si-nai, and present thyself there to me on the top of the mount. (3) And no man shall come up with thee; neither let any man be seen throughout all the mount; neither let the flocks nor herds feed before that mount. (4) And he hewed two tables of stone like unto the first; and Mo-ses rose up early in the morning, and went up unto mount Si-nai, as Je-ho-vah had commanded him, and took in his hand two tables of stone. (5) And Je-ho-vah descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of Je-ho-vah. (6) And Je-ho-vah passed by before him, and proclaimed, Je-ho-vah, Je-ho-vah, a God merciful...