the Second Week after Easter
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Thai King James Bible
เอ็กโซโด 20:20
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from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge
Fear not: 1 Samuel 12:20, Isaiah 41:10
prove: Exodus 15:25, Exodus 15:26, Genesis 22:1, Genesis 22:12, Deuteronomy 8:2, Deuteronomy 13:3
his fear: Genesis 20:11, Deuteronomy 6:2, Deuteronomy 10:12, Joshua 24:14, Nehemiah 5:15, Job 28:28, Proverbs 1:7, Proverbs 3:7, Isaiah 8:13
Reciprocal: Leviticus 25:17 - fear Deuteronomy 4:10 - fear me Joshua 4:24 - ye might 1 Kings 8:40 - fear thee 2 Chronicles 6:31 - fear thee Luke 19:21 - I feared Acts 7:38 - in the church Revelation 1:17 - Fear not
Gill's Notes on the Bible
And Moses said unto the people,.... By representatives and messengers, the heads of the tribes and elders:
fear not; be not afraid of God with a slavish fear; be not afraid of the thunders and lightnings, as if they were like one of the plagues of Egypt, which terrified Pharaoh and his people; be not afraid of being consumed by them, they will do you no hurt; be not afraid of dying by the hand of God, at his presence, and through the voice of his words spoken to you; be of good courage, for the design of God is not to destroy you, but to instruct you, and do you good:
for God is come to prove you; whether, being now freed by him from Egyptian bondage, they would take and own him for their King, and be subject to his laws and government; whether they would abide by what they had said, all that the Lord hath spoken will we do, Exodus 19:8, whether they thought they had purity and righteousness enough to answer to the divine law, and whether they imagined they had strength enough to fulfil it, and whether they needed a mediator between God and them or not: some Jewish writers q give a different sense of this clause, as if the coming of God to them in this grand and majestic manner was to exalt them, and make them great and honourable among the nations of the world; taking the word used to be derived from a root, which signifies to lift up, as a banner or ensign is lifted up on high: but the former sense is best;
and that his fear may be before your faces; not a slavish fear of death, of wrath, and damnation, before dehorted from; but a reverence of the divine Majesty, an awe of his greatness and glory, a serious regard to his commands, delivered in so grand a manner, and a carefulness to offend him by disobeying them:
that ye sin not: by breaking the law, and transgressing the precepts of it, which they might be deterred from, as it might be reasonably thought, when they reflected with what solemnity, and in what an awful manner it was delivered to them.
q Jarchi in loc. Medrash apud Kimchi in Sepher Shorash. rad. גסה & Ben Melech in loc.
Barnes' Notes on the Bible
Compare Deuteronomy 5:22-31. Aaron Exodus 19:24 on this occasion accompanied Moses in drawing near to the thick darkness.
Exodus 20:22 to Exodus 23:33 is a series of laws which we may identify with what was written by Moses in the book called the book of the covenant, and read by him in the audience of the people Exodus 24:7.
The document cannot be regarded as a strictly systematic whole. Portions of it were probably traditional rules handed down from the patriarchs, and retained by the Israelites in Egypt.
Clarke's Notes on the Bible
Verse Exodus 20:20. And Moses said - Fear not: for God is come to prove you, and that his fear may be before your faces — The maxim contained in this verse is, Fear not, that he may fear - do not fear with such a fear as brings consternation into the soul, and produces nothing but terror and confusion; but fear with that fear which reverence and filial affection inspire, that ye sin not - that, through the love and reverence ye feel to your Maker and Sovereign, ye may abstain from every appearance of evil, lest you should forfeit that love which is to you better than life. He who fears in the first sense can neither love nor obey; he who fears not in the latter sense is sure to fall under the first temptation that may occur. Blessed is the man who thus feareth always.