was first of all to go down again and repeat to the people the “rights” which God had communicated to him, and only when this had been done, to ascend again with the persons named. According to Exo 24:3 and Exo 24:12 (? 9), this is what Moses really did. But Moses alone was to go near to Jehovah: the others were to worship afar off, and the people were not to come up at all.
verses 3-4
The ceremony described in Exo 24:3-11 is called “the covenant which Jehovah made with Israel” (Exo 24:8). It was opened by Moses, who recited to the people “all the words of Jehovah” (i.e., not the decalogue, for the people had heard this directly from the mouth of God Himself, but the words in Exo 20:22-26), and “all the rights” (ch. 21-23); whereupon the people answered unanimously (אחד קול), “All the words which Jehovah hath spoken will we do.” This constituted the preparation for the conclusion of the covenant. It was necessary that the people should not only know what the Lord imposed upon them in the covenant about to be made with them, and what He promised them, but that they should also declare their willingness to perform what was imposed upon them. The covenant itself was commenced by Moses writing all the words of Jehovah in “the book of the covenant” (Exo 24:4 and Exo 24:7), for the purpose of preserving them in an official record. The next day, early in the morning, he built an altar at the foot of the mountain, and erected twelve boundary-stones or pillars for the twelve tribes, most likely round about the altar and at some distance from it, so as to prepare the soil upon which Jehovah was about to enter into union with the twelve tribes. As the altar indicated the presence of Jehovah, being the place where the Lord would come to His people to bless them (Exo 20:24), so the twelve pillars, or boundary-stones, did not serve as mere memorials of the conclusion of the covenant, but were to indicate the place of the twelve tribes, and represent their presence also.
Verse 5
After the foundation and soil had been thus prepared in the place of sacrifice, for the fellowship which Jehovah was about to establish with His people; Moses sent young men of the children of Israel to prepare the sacrifices, and directed them to offer burnt-offering and sacrifice slain-offerings, viz., שׁלמים, “peace-
