חַי־אָ֙נִי֙ נְאֻם־הַמֶּ֔לֶךְ יְהוָ֥ה צְבָא֖וֹת שְׁמ֑וֹ כִּ֚י כְּתָב֣וֹר בֶּֽהָרִ֔ים וּכְכַרְמֶ֖ל בַּיָּ֥ם יָבֽוֹא׃
אַזױ װי איך לעב, זאָגט דער קיניג – ה׳ פֿון צבָאוֹת איז זײַן נאָמען, אַז װי תָּבוֹר צװישן די בערג, און װי כַּרמֶל בײַם אים, װעט ער קומען.
Rabbeinu Bahya
והכהנים והעם, “and the priests and the people, etc.” The order of things preceding the giving of the Torah (Ten Commandments) was as follows: First G’d commanded Moses “to fence off the people,” i.e. to establish visible boundaries around the mountain which the people were not to breach. This is what Moses referred to in verse 23 when he said to G’d: “the people cannot ascend the mountain for You have warned us “bound the mountain and sanctify it.” What was meant by “bound the people” was the boundary of the mountain. After that G’d told Moses that the people should sanctify themselves and abstain from everything impure for three days including their immersion in a ritual bath and the washing of their garments. Following this procedure, on the morning of the third day, the sixth of Sivan, there was thunder and lightning, a heavy cloud enveloping the mountain, and the blast of the shofar emanating from that direction. At this point G’d’s Shechinah had not yet descended on to the top of the mountain. This is something we learned from Kings I 19,11: when G’d taught Elijah that His manifestation does not occur amidst thunder and lightning, etc. The prophet writes describing that scene: “there was a great and mighty wind splitting mountain and shattering the rocks by the power of the Lord; but the Lord was not in the wind, etc.”
At that point the Israelites were in the grip of tremors due to the overpowering sound of the thunder (and the chorus of the angels we have described earlier). This is the meaning of verse 16. Moses reassured the people in order to lead them out of the camp toward the manifestation of the Shechinah. Once the people were lined up at the base of the mountain G’d descended on the mountain within the fire, and the smoke rose to the heart of the heaven, dark impenetrable cloud. The mountain itself trembled. This trembling of the mountain intensified causing David to say in Psalms 68,9: “the earth trembled, the sky rained because of G’d, yon Sinai, because of G’d, the G’d of Israel.” The meaning of this verse is that the sky rained fire. The word זה in that verse refers to Mount Sinai burning (the word זה in its aramaic meaning). The prophetic words of Devorah (Judges 5,4) contain similar phraseology i.e. ”the earth trembled, the heavens dripped; Yea the clouds dripped water; the mountains quaked before the Lord, Him of Sinai, before the Lord G’d of Israel.” Another verse describing the mountains as “dancing” like rams is found in Psalms 114,6 These various verses are not to be understood allegorically, just as the line “the sea saw and fled” in the same Psalm is not to be understood as a simile but describes an actual event.
Our sages (Megillah 29) state that at the time G’d gave the Ten Commandments these mountains were transferred to the land of Israel and Mount Carmel crossed the sea. When that had happened the blast of the shofar became very strong. When the people observed all this (20,15-18) “the people saw the sounds and the lightning and the sound of the shofar blast.....the people saw and trembled...and stood from afar.”
At that point the Israelites were in the grip of tremors due to the overpowering sound of the thunder (and the chorus of the angels we have described earlier). This is the meaning of verse 16. Moses reassured the people in order to lead them out of the camp toward the manifestation of the Shechinah. Once the people were lined up at the base of the mountain G’d descended on the mountain within the fire, and the smoke rose to the heart of the heaven, dark impenetrable cloud. The mountain itself trembled. This trembling of the mountain intensified causing David to say in Psalms 68,9: “the earth trembled, the sky rained because of G’d, yon Sinai, because of G’d, the G’d of Israel.” The meaning of this verse is that the sky rained fire. The word זה in that verse refers to Mount Sinai burning (the word זה in its aramaic meaning). The prophetic words of Devorah (Judges 5,4) contain similar phraseology i.e. ”the earth trembled, the heavens dripped; Yea the clouds dripped water; the mountains quaked before the Lord, Him of Sinai, before the Lord G’d of Israel.” Another verse describing the mountains as “dancing” like rams is found in Psalms 114,6 These various verses are not to be understood allegorically, just as the line “the sea saw and fled” in the same Psalm is not to be understood as a simile but describes an actual event.
Our sages (Megillah 29) state that at the time G’d gave the Ten Commandments these mountains were transferred to the land of Israel and Mount Carmel crossed the sea. When that had happened the blast of the shofar became very strong. When the people observed all this (20,15-18) “the people saw the sounds and the lightning and the sound of the shofar blast.....the people saw and trembled...and stood from afar.”