EXODUS 34
25 “You shall not offer the blood of my sacrifice with anything leavened, or let the sacrifice of the Feast of the Passover remain until the morning. 26 The best of the firstfruits of your ground you shall bring to the house of the Lord your God. You shall not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk.”27 And the Lord said to Moses, “Write 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 neither ate bread nor drank water. And he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments.
– Exodus 34:25-28
EXODUS 34 WRITING THE TEN COMMANDMENTS
A poem by ILMA inspired by these verses
The Lord asked Moses to stay with him in writing the covenant
He was with the Lord forty days and forty nights
He didn’t eat bread or drake water as he wrote the words
It is God who told him what needs to be written on those tablets.
According to inspiredscriptures.com In Canaan, if one wished to gain favor with a deity, he or she would slay a young goat in milk and present it to the deity (The Ras Shamra tablets, Archeology and Bible History, by Joseph P. Free. pg 105). Orthodox Jews, however, now interpreted these verses to prohibit serving animal meat with cheese. But this interpretation is incorrect. Abraham once served a meal with meat and cheese (milk and curds) (Gen. 18:7-8).In Exodus 23:19 the Israelites were commanded to bring the best of the firstfruits of their soil to the house of God and they were prohibited to cook a young goat in its mother’s milk. In Deuteronomy 14:21, they were prohibited to eat anything that they found already dead. They can give it to foreigners in their town or sell it to these foreigners, but they were not to eat it.
When Moses fasted forty days and forty nights, it was a foreshadowing of Jesus’ fasting those same number of days and nights in the desert and he was tempted by the devil. When Moses was told to write the words of the covenant, he needed to be pure. If we serve the Lord, we also need to be holy and pure as God is holy.
REFLECTION
- Why do you think Moses fasted when he was writing the ten commandments?
