[b-hebrew] Ex 33 & 34 - Glory & Face
Read, James C
K0434995 at kingston.ac.uk
Mon Sep 12 16:29:22 EDT 2005
What I find absurd is that we all agree that Moshe could not look at Yah's face and
yet not so long ago we were debating wether Abraham saw an angel or actually saw
Yah himself.
Several points are interesting here:
18 At this he said: Cause me to see, please, your glory. 19 But he said: I myself shall cause all my goodness to pass before your face, and I will declare the name of Jehovah before you
1)Moshe requests to see Yah's glory.
2)Yah equates his glory to his 'goodness' and also to the declaration of his name.
21And Jehovah said further: Here is a place with me, and you must station yourself upon the rock. 22 And it has to occur that while my glory is passing by I must place you in a hole in the rock, and I must put my palm over you as a screen until I have passed by
3)The metaphorical palm blocks Moshe's vision until *Yah* has passed by *NOT* his glory
4)Yah's name is declared and his goodness (i.e. his glory) is clearly defined, as follows:
And Jehovah proceeded to come down in the cloud and station himself with him there and declare the name of Jehovah. 6 And Jehovah went passing by before his face and declaring: Jehovah, Jehovah, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abundant in loving-kindness and truth, 7 preserving loving-kindness for thousands, pardoning error and transgression and sin, but by no means will he give exemption from punishment, bringing punishment for the error of fathers upon sons and upon grandsons, upon the third generation and upon the fourth generation.
In conclusion:
Moshe requested what was not humanly possible, to see Yah himself. However, Yah shows himself in a far
superior way than as in a physical demonstration, i.e.by revealing his perona by virtue of his godly
qualities:
Jehovah, Jehovah, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abundant in loving-kindness and truth, 7 preserving loving-kindness for thousands, pardoning error and transgression and sin, but by no means will he give exemption from punishment, bringing punishment for the error of fathers upon sons and upon grandsons, upon the third generation and upon the fourth generation.
Interstingly, Jesus apostles requested to see the Father and he replied that watching his pattern was
the way to see the Father. Evidently because to see Yah means to understand his personality as opposed
to seeing his physical form.
Compare Hebrews 11:27:
By faith he left Egypt, but not fearing the anger of the king, for he continued steadfast as seeing the One who is invisible
Notice the reference to Yah being invisible, yet paradoxically Moshe saw him. How? In a spiritual sense,
by getting to know him on a personal level and becoming his close friend.
ANTHROPOMORPHISMS
As has been demonstrated,it is widely understood by many that physical references to Yah can be
understood as a mechanism of describiing Yah while working within the limitations of a language
which is physically orientated, i.e. they are just metaphors.
Following this line of reasoning it is possible to understand that the references to Yah's palm
and his back are metaphorical just as the reference tohis 'finger' which wrote the ten commandments.
Yah's blocking Moshe's vision with his palm can be understood as Yah using his power to block Moshe's
vision and Yah's 'back' can be understood as the aftereffects of his 'passing by' e.g. When you see a
bright light for a few seconds which suddenly dissappears,you continue to see its aftereffects in the
form a glow in your eyes (caused by temporarily burnt retinas). I don't know if that was followable or
not. I do garble a bit sometimes.
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