Exodus 33

¹ Yahweh spoke to Moses: "Go up hence, you and the people whom you brought up from the land of Egypt, to the land about which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob, saying: To your seed shall I give it. ² And I will send before you My messenger. I will drive out the Canaanite, the Amorite, the Hittite, the Perizzite, the Hivite and the Jebusite. ³ And I shall bring you into a land gushing with milk and honey. For I shall not go up among you, for you are a stiff-necked people, lest I should finish you on the way." ⁴ When the people heard this evil word, they mourned, and no man set his ornaments on him; ⁵ for Yahweh had said to Moses: "Say to the sons of Israel: You stiff-necked people! If for one moment I should go up among you, I would finish you! And now, take down your ornaments off you that I may know what I should do to you." ⁶ So the sons of Israel despoiled themselves of their own ornaments from Mount Horeb onward. ⁷ As for Moses, he took the tent and stretched it out outside the camp, far from the camp; and he called it the tent of appointment; and it came to be that everyone seeking Yahweh went forth to the tent of appointment which was outside the camp. ⁸ Also it came to be as Moses went forth to the tent, all the people rose and stationed themselves, each man, at the portal of his tent and looked after Moses until he entered the tent. ⁹ It came to be as Moses entered the tent that the cloud column descended and stood at the portal of the tent, and He spoke with Moses. ¹⁰ When all the people saw the cloud column standing at the portal of the tent, all the people rose and bowed themselves down, each man at the portal of his tent. ¹¹ So Yahweh spoke to Moses face to face, just as a man speaks to his associate. When he returned to the camp then his minister, Joshua son of Nun, a youth, did not remove himself from the midst of the tent. ¹² Moses said to Yahweh: "See! You are saying to me: Bring up this people, but You have not let me know whom You shall send with me. Yet You have said: I know you by name, and moreover you have found grace in My eyes. ¹³ And now, I pray, if I have found grace in Your eyes let me know I pray, Your way that I may know You and that I may find grace in Your eyes; see that this nation is Your people." ¹⁴ And He said: "My presence, shall it go that I may give rest to you?" ¹⁵ So he said to him: "If Your presence is not going, do not bring us up hence! ¹⁶ Whereby shall it be known, indeed, that I find grace in Your eyes, I and Your people? Is it not by Your going with us that we may be distinguished, I and Your people, from all the peoples who are on the surface of the ground?" ¹⁷ Yahweh said to Moses: "Moreover, this matter of which you have spoken I shall do, for you find grace in My eyes, and I know you by name." ¹⁸ Now he said: "Show me, I pray, Your glory." ¹⁹ And He said: "I shall pass all My goodness before you and proclaim My name, Yahweh, before you; I will be gracious to whom I am being gracious and will have compassion for whom I am having compassion." ²⁰ He also said: "You cannot see My face, for no human shall see Me and live." ²¹ Then Yahweh said: "Behold! There is a place by Me, and you will station yourself on the rock. ²² So it will come to be when My glory passes by that I will place you in a fissure of the rock. And I will overshadow you with My palm until I pass by. ²³ Then I will take away My palm, and you will see My back, yet My face shall not appear."