Kommentar zu Schemot 33:7

ומשה AND MOSES, from the time of the sin and henceforth,

NOW MOSES TOOK THE TENT AND WOULD PITCH IT WITHOUT THE CAMP. Rashi wrote: “This was practiced by Moses from the Day of Atonement until the Tabernacle was set up [five and a half months later — on the first day of Nisan], but not afterwards. For on the seventeenth day of Tammuz the Tablets of the Law were broken, on the eighteenth he burnt the calf and brought the sinners to judgment, and on the nineteenth he ascended the mountain and stayed there for forty days. On the first of Ellul it was said to him, and come up in the morning⁴³⁵Further, 34:2. to receive the second Tablets. There he spent another forty days [which terminated on the tenth day of Tishri]. On the tenth of Tishri the Holy One, blessed be He, became reconciled with Israel, and He handed over to Moses the second Tablets, whereupon Moses came down the mountain and began to command them concerning the work of the Tabernacle. This occupied them till the first of Nisan, and from that time on, since the Tabernacle was set up, G-d only communicated with him from there.” This also is the opinion of Rabbi Abraham ibn Ezra, that all this [narrated here in Verses 7-11] took place after Moses brought down the second Tablets [the account of which is narrated further on in 34:1-10], there being no strict chronological order in the narrative of the Torah.
But it does not appear to me to be correct, for what reason is there to mention this [practice of Moses] here in the middle of the section? The words of our Rabbis in all Midrashim are also to the effect that Moses did this on account of their sin with the calf. Thus they explained⁴³⁶Shemoth Rabbah 45:3. [that Moses said], “One who is excommunicated from the master, is also excommunicated from the disciple,” and as Rashi mentioned [that G-d said to Moses], “I am angry and you are angry; if so, who will bring them near to Me?” Now if the removal of the Tent was after the Day of Atonement [as Rashi and Ibn Ezra have it], the Holy One, blessed be He, as well as Moses, was already in [complete] reconciliation with them! Rather, it appears that on the day that he came down from the mountain — on the seventeenth of Tamuz — he burnt the calf and punished the worshippers.⁴³⁷And not, as Rashi has it, that the burning of the calf and the punishing of the sinners took place on the eighteenth of Tammuz. On the next day, [i.e., on the eighteenth of Tammuz] he told them that he would go up to G-d to seek atonement for them,⁴³⁸Above, 32:30. and so he went up to the mountain where the Glory was. This is the sense of the verse, And Moses returned unto the Eternal,⁴³⁹Ibid., Verse 31. and prayed briefly: Oh, this people have sinned a great sin,⁴³⁹Ibid., Verse 31. and G-d answered him, Whosoever hath sinned against Me, etc.;⁴⁴⁰Ibid., Verse 33. And now go, lead the people,⁴⁴¹Ibid., Verse 34. and the plague began.⁴⁴²Ibid., Verse 35. Then He commanded him, Depart, go up hence, thou and the people etc.,⁴⁴³Verse 1 here. and Moses told this to Israel, and they mourned, and stripped themselves of the ornaments.⁴⁴⁴Verses 4-6. Then Moses realized that the matter was a very long one, and did not know what the end thereof would be, therefore he took the tent and pitched it outside the camp so that the Divine Glory would communicate with him from there, for it was no longer dwelling in the midst of the people, and if the tent were to be in the midst of the camp, He would not communicate with him from there. Scripture continues, and it came to pass, that every one that sought the Eternal…,⁴⁴⁵In Verse 7 here. meaning that everyone who sought the Eternal used to go out to him.⁴⁴⁶Ramban interprets the Hebrew yeitzei (the imperfect — “was going out”) as yotzei (a participle — taking of the nature of both a verb and an adjective — “used to go out”). Rashi explained it likewise. Then Scripture [in Verse 8-11] completed the narrative of all that happened whilst the tent was there until the Tabernacle was set up, which was, according to the opinion of our Sages, from the Day of Atonement until the first day of Nisan.⁴⁴⁷See Ramban further, 40:2.
I have seen in Pirkei d’Rabbi Eliezer [the following text]:⁴⁴⁸Chapters of Rabbi Eliezer, Chapter 46. “Rabbi Yehoshua ben Korcha says: “[After the Revelation] Moses spent forty days on the mountain, studying the Written Law at daytime, and the Oral Law at night. After the forty days he took the Tablets and came back to the camp. On the seventeenth of Tammuz he broke the Tablets and killed the sinners of Israel, and then stayed in the camp forty days until he burnt the calf and ground it like dust of the earth. Thus he eliminated idolatry from Israel, and established each tribe in its place. On the first of Ellul the Holy One, blessed be He, said to him, come up unto Me into the mount⁴⁴⁹Deuteronomy 10:1. [to be given the second Tablets]. Then the ram’s horn was sounded throughout the camp, announcing to the people that Moses was going up the mountain, so that [they might not be alarmed by his absence] and not be misled anymore after idols. [On that day] the Holy One, blessed be He, was exalted by the sound of that ram’s horn, as it is said, G-d is gone up amidst shouting, the Eternal amidst the sound of the horn.⁴⁵⁰Psalm 47:6. “For by the sound of this horn Israel vowed eternally never again to be deceived by the idols” (R’dal; see my Hebrew commentary, p. 518). And thus likewise the Sages ordained that we blow the horn every year on the first day of Ellul.”⁴⁵¹The Shofar is now sounded in the synagogue every morning during the whole month of Ellul, except on the Sabbaths and on the day before the New Year. Thus far are the words of this Agadah. And if this is so, then the whole section from: Moses took the tent, applied to the time from the eighteenth of Tammuz till the end of the forty days [i.e., up to the first of Ellul], and from the Day of Atonement till the first of Nisan [when the Tabernacle was set up]. But this exposition does not fit in well with what Scripture says, And I fell down before the Eternal, as at the first, forty days and forty nights; I did neither eat bread etc.,⁴⁵²Deuteronomy 9:18. and it is further written there, So I fell down before the Eternal the forty days and forty nights that I fell down; because the Eternal had said He would destroy you,⁴⁵³Ibid., Verse 25. and it is impossible that all this refers to the last forty days [i.e., between the first of Ellul and the Day of Atonement], since He told him, Hew thee two Tablets of stone… and come up unto Me into the mount,⁴⁴⁹Deuteronomy 10:1. thus these last forty days were already those of G-d’s good-will, after He had already nullified the decree that He would destroy you!⁴⁵⁴From all this it is thus obvious that there was an intervening period of forty days [i.e. from the eighteenth of Tammuz to the twenty-ninth of Ab] when Moses was on the mountain interceeding for Israel. So how could the Pirkei d’Rabbi Eliezer hold that there were only two ascents of forty-day periods of Moses? — In his commentary to that Midrash, Rabbi David Luria answers Ramban’s question by suggesting that the phrase He would destroy you does not refer to the beginning of that verse, so I fell down before the Eternal, but reverts to the very beginning of the incident of the calf, when G-d had said He would destroy them. The verse itself can still apply then to the final forty days, which culminated on the Day of Atonement.

וקרא לו אהל מועד, in order for the people to know that there G’d would communicate with him as opposed to within the boundaries of the encampment of the people.

יקח, meaning לקח, he had taken.

ומשה יקח את האהל, “and Moses would take the tent, etc.;” Rashi writes that what is described in our verse did not happen until after the Day of Atonement, when Moses had returned from the Mountain for the third and last time. Moses continued pitching his camp outside the people’s camp until after the Tabernacle had been assembled and inaugurated. [based on Tanchuma. Ed.] Nachmanides writes that he cannot agree with the above. He feels that there would have been no point in mentioning this at this juncture, seeing that Moses had not even ascended the Mountain for the second time as yet. Moreover, according to our sages, the only reason why Moses removed his tent from the camp was that the people were in disgrace, and just as G’d had seen fit to remove His presence from the people, G’d’s pupil, disciple, merely emulated his Master. After the Day of Atonement, when the people’s sin had been forgiven, what would be the point in positioning his tent outside the boundaries of the camp at that time? Following his reasoning, Nachmanides therefore feels that Moses on the 17th of Tammus, the day he had returned from the Mountain for the first time and had smashed the Tablets, he also burned the golden calf, instructed the Levites to execute active idol worshippers. On the following day he told the people that he would ascend the Mountain again and pray there for forgiveness. He did so and offered a short prayer. This was the occasion when G’d told him that He would not accept his offer to save the people and to die in their stead and to have his name blotted out from the Book of Life. He told the people that he had been told that G’d would punish the guilty and not be content with their leader assuming their guilt and punishment. He then instructed them to remove their jewelry, telling them that the process of mourning would be drawn out, and that forgiveness, if at all, would not be instant, and he told the people to observe mourning. Moses moved his own tent to an area that was not spiritually contaminated by the people’s sin, and in this manner he hoped to maintain his ability to communicate with the Shechinah on a reciprocal basis. This could not be expected within the camp, as the spiritual contamination caused by the golden calf episode had not yet been cleansed. In fact, the Torah itself testifies that until after the inauguration of the Tabernacle Moses could not communicate with the Shechinah while within the camp. [(compare Exodus 40,34-38 and Leviticus 1,1) (compare also Moses’ comments in Leviticus 9,7-24) In all these verses the return of the Shechinah to the camp is illustrated. All of this took place only at the beginning of Nissan of the second year, [some eight and half months after Moses smashed the Tablets. Ed.] Concerning Rashi’s statement that Moses burned the calf on the 18th of Tammuz and that on that same day he executed the people who had been actively engaged in worshipping the calf, and that on the 19th he ascended the Mountain again, this is difficult, for if we do not consider the day of his ascent as a day belonging to the forty days, seeing that this day did not have the preceding night with it, as Moses had still been in camp then, (compare Talmud Shabbat quoted by Rashi) we will be left with two days missing, if according to tradition Moses was supposed to have returned on the 10th day of Tishrey from his last ascent and stay on the mountain. Even if we were to assume that Moses ascended again already on the 18th day of Tammuz, we are still short a day if he spent 40 days on the Mountain and returned on the 10th of Tishrey. Unless the actual daylight hours of Moses’ ascending or descending the Mountain are counted as whole days, the calculations do no jive.

ומשה יקח את האוהל, “and Moses would take the tent, etc.” The word יקח in this instance is the present tense. It means Moses would do this on a regular basis. The words הרחק מן המחנה mean that Moses had to go some distance away from the encampment of the Israelites seeing the Israelites were in a state of disgrace vis-a-vis heaven due to their great sin. Moses applied the ruling we have learned in Rashi that whenever the student is in a state of disgrace so is his teacher. Hence Moses had to leave the environment of people whose sin had caused the Shechinah to withdraw.

He thought: one who is ostracized by the master. . . I.e., B’nei Yisrael are ostracized by the Master, which is Hashem. Then too, [they should be] ostracized by the disciple, who is me; for I am Hashem’s disciple.

V. 7. ומשה יקח kann wohl schwerlich wie das יקימו V. 8. ירד V. 9 u. f. als erzählendes Futurum gefasst werden. Ein solches Futurum historicum steht nur bei sich dauernd wiederholenden Vorgängen. Das Aufbrechen des Zeltes geschah ja aber nur einmal. Wir glauben daher, das יקח imperativisch verstehen zu sollen. Es gehört noch zum Inhalte der VV. 1—3 u. 5 an Mosche gerichteten Gottesrede. Nicht aus eigenem Entschlusse, sondern in Folge göttlichen Geheißes geschah die Verlegung des Zeltes in eine Entfernung außerhalb des Lagers. Es kam damit das כי לא אעלה בקרבך dem Volke zur konkreten Anschauung. Indem gleichwohl Gott noch dem Mosche für jeden, Gott, d. h. die Erkenntnis seines Willens, Suchenden nahe blieb, war damit zugleich die Fortdauer einer Verbindung des Volkes mit Gott, und somit die Hoffnung auf eine Wiederherstellung gewährende Zukunft, die ja schon das ואדעה מה אעשה לך (V. 5) ahnen ließ, angedeutet.

ומשה יקח את האהל, “meanwhile Moses took his own tent far beyond the limits of the camp of the Israelites;” according to our author the word אהל here is a reference to the ornaments-jewelry that had been removed from the male Israelites, and which Moses merited as pointed out in the Talmud tractate Shabbat folio 88, where Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish is quoted as proving from Scripture that at some time in the future this jewelry will be restored to their original owners. He based this on Isaiah 35,10. This is also why we read after Moses’ return from the Mountain that his face was shining so brilliantly that the people were blinded until he covered his forehead with a kind of veil. (Exodus 34,9) An alternate interpretation: the word אהל here is closely related to אור, light, where we find the word בהלו נרו עלי ראשי, “when His lamp shone over my head;” (Job 29.3)

ומשה יקח, “Moses had taken, etc;” this has been written in the future tense as it relates to what he had done after bringing the second set of Tablets down from the Mountain.

יקח את האהל USED TO TAKE THE TENT — יקח expresses an action continually going on — he used to take his tent and pitch it without the camp. He said, “One who has been placed under an interdict by the Master must be placed under an interdict by His disciple also” (Since God had stated that He would not dwell amongst the people, Moses, the disciple, also felt compelled to remove from their midst) (Midrash Tanchuma, Ki Tisa 27).

הרחק, he treated the people as if they were outcasts seeing that G’d was not willing to communicate with Moses while he was within the camp of the Israelites.

Two thousand amohs.. The reason [for this distance] was so everyone who sought Hashem could come on Shabbos to the tent, as was the arrangement in Yericho in Yehoshua’s time (Midrash Tanchuma ch. 27).

הרחק DISTANT [FROM THE CAMP] — two thousand cubits, just as it is stated, (Joshua 3:4) Yet there shall be a space between you (the Israelites) and it (the Ark) about 2,000 cubits by measure” (Midrash Tanchuma, Ki Tisa 27).

Even the ministering angels. . . Rashi derives this from כל מבקש ה' , which is an inclusive term.

וקרא לו AND HE CALLED IT — This does not mean that he so named it once for all but that whenever he spoke of it he used to call it the tent of meeting, i. e. a meeting-place for those who sought instruction in the Torah.

כל מבקש ה׳ EVERY ONE WHO SOUGHT THE LORD — Hence (from the fact that anyone who visited Moses is described here as “one who seeks the Lord”) we may learn that he who makes a call on (Hebrew: seeks) a scholar (זקן is a Rabbinical term for a wise man; cf. Kiddushin 32b: אין זקן אלא חכם) may be regarded as paying his respects to the Divine Presence (Midrash Tanchuma, Ki Tisa 27).

יצא אל אהל מועד WENT OUT UNTO THE APPOINTED TENT — יֵצֵא (the imperfect) has here the meaning of יוֹצֵא (the participle: cf. Rashi on יקח וכו׳), i. e. he used to go out. Another explanation of והיה כל מבקש ה׳ is: The word כל, “every one”, implies: even the ministering angels used to go out unto the appointed tent; whenever these enquired where was the place of the Divine Glory their fellow-angels used to answer them: See, He (God) is in the tent of Moses.