24:9 Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and the seventy elders of Israel went up, 3 24:10 and they saw 4 the God of Israel. Under his feet 5 there was something like a pavement 6 made of sapphire, clear like the sky itself. 7 24:11 But he did not lay a hand 8 on the leaders of the Israelites, so they saw God, 9 and they ate and they drank. 10
62:9 But those who harvest the grain 17 will eat it,
and will praise the Lord.
Those who pick the grapes will drink the wine 18
in the courts of my holy sanctuary.”
62:1 “For the sake of Zion I will not be silent;
for the sake of Jerusalem 19 I will not be quiet,
until her vindication shines brightly 20
and her deliverance burns like a torch.”
1:18 He is the head of the body, the church, as well as the beginning, the firstborn 21 from among the dead, so that he himself may become first in all things. 22
1 tn The construction is a cognate accusative with the verb, expressing a specific sacrifice.
2 tn Heb “bread, food.” Presumably this was a type of peace offering, where the person bringing the offering ate the animal being sacrificed.
3 tn The verse begins with “and Moses went up, and Aaron….” This verse may supply the sequel to vv. 1-2. At any rate, God was now accepting them into his presence.
5 sn S. R. Driver (Exodus, 254) wishes to safeguard the traditional idea that God could not be seen by reading “they saw the place where the God of Israel stood” so as not to say they saw God. But according to U. Cassuto there is not a great deal of difference between “and they saw the God” and “the
6 sn S. R. Driver suggests that they saw the divine Glory, not directly, but as they looked up from below, through what appeared to be a transparent blue sapphire pavement (Exodus, 254).
7 tn Or “tiles.”
8 tn Heb “and like the body of heaven for clearness.” The Hebrew term שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) may be translated “heaven” or “sky” depending on the context; here, where sapphire is mentioned (a blue stone) “sky” seems more appropriate, since the transparent blueness of the sapphire would appear like the blueness of the cloudless sky.
7 tn Heb “he did not stretch out his hand,” i.e., to destroy them.
8 tn The verb is חָזָה (khazah); it can mean “to see, perceive” or “see a vision” as the prophets did. The LXX safeguarded this by saying, “appeared in the place of God.” B. Jacob says they beheld – prophetically, religiously (Exodus, 746) – but the meaning of that is unclear. The fact that God did not lay a hand on them – to kill them – shows that they saw something that they never expected to see and live. Some Christian interpreters have taken this to refer to a glorious appearance of the preincarnate Christ, the second person of the Trinity. They saw the brilliance of this manifestation – but not the detail. Later, Moses will still ask to see God’s glory – the real presence behind the phenomena.
9 sn This is the covenant meal, the peace offering, that they are eating there on the mountain. To eat from the sacrifice meant that they were at peace with God, in covenant with him. Likewise, in the new covenant believers draw near to God on the basis of sacrifice, and eat of the sacrifice because they are at peace with him, and in Christ they see the Godhead revealed.
9 tn Heb “and your houses,” referring to entire households. The pronouns “you” and “your” are plural in the Hebrew text.
10 tn Heb “the
11 tn Heb “the
12 tn See note at Deut 12:12.
13 tn Heb “in all the sending forth of your hands.”
13 tn Heb “for eating to fullness and for beautiful covering[s].”
15 tn Heb “it,” the grain mentioned in v. 8a.
16 tn Heb “and those who gather it will drink it.” The masculine singular pronominal suffixes attached to “gather” and “drink” refer back to the masculine noun תִּירוֹשׁ (tirosh, “wine”) in v. 8b.
17 map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.
18 tn Heb “goes forth like brightness.”
19 tn See the note on the term “firstborn” in 1:15. Here the reference to Jesus as the “firstborn from among the dead” seems to be arguing for a chronological priority, i.e., Jesus was the first to rise from the dead.
20 tn Grk “in order that he may become in all things, himself, first.”
21 tn Grk “Behold.”
22 tn Grk “come in to him.”