Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Exodus 33:22
And it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth by, that I will put thee in a cleft of the rock, and will cover thee with my hand while I pass by:
That thou mayst not be undone by thy own desires, nor swallowed up with the sight of my glory.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
And it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth by,…. The displays of his grace and goodness are made:
that I will put thee in a clift of the rock; in one of the clefts, made by smiting it, through which the waters gushed out for the relief of the Israelites, and their flocks: and we are told c, that to this day, on the summit of Mount Sinai, by the Arabians called Gibel el Mousa, or the mountain of Moses, is perceived a large chasm in the rock, said to be the cave where Moses hid himself from God, when the glory of the Lord passed before him. Now this cleft may be an emblem of Christ, as crucified, smitten, wounded and slain; who was smitten by the law and justice of God, as this rock was smitten by the rod of Moses: and had gashes and wounds made in him like the clefts of a rock, being pierced with the nails and spear: and in these clefts of the rock saints dwell by faith, So 2:14:
and will cover thee with my hand; with his cloud, as Ben Melech, and so may denote the cloudiness, obscurity, and darkness of the legal dispensation: but here it seems to denote imperfection, not being able to bear the full sight of the divine glory, and which angels themselves cannot bear, but cover their faces; and also the danger of being consumed, were it not that saints are in Christ, and covered and secured in him, otherwise God is a consuming fire:
while I pass by thee; or his glory, the glory of all his perfections, wisdom, holiness, justice, power, and faithfulness, and especially of his grace, mercy, and goodness in Christ.
c Egmont and Heyman’s Travels, vol. 2. p. 167. see a Journal from Cairo, &c. p. 28, 29. Ed. 2.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
(22) And will cover thee with my hand.Kalisch observes with justice that the mysteriousness of this obscure section attains its highest climax in the three last verses (Exo. 33:21-23). Human language is, by its very nature, unfit for the expression of sublime spiritual truths, and necessarily clothes them in a materialistic garment which is alien to their ethereal nature. All that we can legitimately gather from this verse and the next is that Moses was directed to a certain retired position, where God miraculously both protected him and shrouded him, while a manifestation of His glory passed by of a transcendent character, and that Moses was allowed to see, not the full manifestation, but the sort of after-glow which it left behind, which was as much as human nature could endure.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
a cliff = the clift or hollow.
My hand. Figure of speech Anthropopatheia (App-6).
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
in a clift: Psa 18:2, Son 2:3, Isa 2:21, Isa 32:2, 1Co 10:4, 2Co 5:19
cover thee: Deu 33:12, Psa 91:1, Psa 91:4, The rock on which Moses stood, and in the clift of which he was sheltered, was doubtless an emblem of Christ; in whose person, character, and salvation alone, sinners may by faith see the glory of God, and live; for there it appears in softened splendour; as the sun, when his brightness is diminished by a mist, is beheld more distinctly by the human eye. – Scott
Reciprocal: 1Ki 19:9 – unto a cave Son 2:14 – clefts