Exodus 34:30-35

34:30 When Aaron and all the Israelites saw Moses, the skin of his face shone; ¹  and they were afraid to approach him. 34:31 But Moses called to them, so Aaron and all the leaders of the community came back to him, and Moses spoke to them. 34:32 After this all the Israelites approached, and he commanded them all that the Lord had spoken to him on Mount Sinai. 34:33 When Moses finished ²  speaking ³  with them, he would ⁴  put a veil on his face. 34:34 But when Moses went in ⁵  before the Lord to speak with him, he would remove the veil until he came out. ⁶  Then he would come out and tell the Israelites what he had been commanded. ⁷  34:35 When the Israelites would see ⁸  the face of Moses, that ⁹  the skin of Moses’ face shone, Moses would put the veil on his face again, until he went in to speak with the Lord. ¹⁰ 

¹ tn This clause is introduced by the deictic particle הִנֵּה (hinneh); it has the force of pointing to something surprising or sudden.

² tn Heb “and Moses finished”; the clause is subordinated as a temporal clause to the next clause.

³ tn The Piel infinitive construct is the object of the preposition; the whole phrase serves as the direct object of the verb “finished.”

⁴ tn Throughout this section the actions of Moses and the people are frequentative. The text tells what happened regularly.

⁵ tn The construction uses a infinitive construct for the temporal clause; it is prefixed with the temporal preposition: “and in the going in of Moses.”

⁶ tn The temporal clause begins with the temporal preposition “until,” followed by an infinitive construct with the suffixed subjective genitive.

⁷ tn The form is the Pual imperfect, but since the context demands a past tense here, in fact a past perfect tense, this is probably an old preterite form without a vav consecutive.

⁸ tn Now the perfect tense with vav consecutive is subordinated to the next clause, “Moses returned the veil….”

⁹ tn Verbs of seeing often take two accusatives. Here, the second is the noun clause explaining what it was about the face that they saw.

¹⁰ tn Heb “with him”; the referent (the Lord) has been specified in the translation for clarity.