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Exodus 34 · a question people ask

Why did Moses cover his face?

In the text

Exodus doesn't give a reason. It gives the order of events. The people "were afraid to come near him" (34:30), yet Moses called them and they came, and he spoke with them (34:31-32). "When Moses was done speaking with them, he put a veil on his face" (34:33). He took it off when he went in before the LORD, and after he came out and spoke to the people, "The children of Israel saw Moses’ face, that the skin of Moses’ face shone; so Moses put the veil on his face again" (34:35). Exodus doesn't say whether the shining faded. Paul, writing to the Corinthians, calls the glory of Moses' face one "which was passing away" (2 Corinthians 3:7), and says Moses "put a veil on his face so that the children of Israel wouldn’t look steadfastly on the end of that which was passing away" (2 Corinthians 3:13).

The verses

“But if the service of death, written engraved on stones, came with glory, so that the children of Israel could not look steadfastly on the face of Moses for the glory of his face, which was passing away,”
2 Corinthians 3:7 · World English Bible
“and not as Moses, who put a veil on his face so that the children of Israel wouldn’t look steadfastly on the end of that which was passing away.”
2 Corinthians 3:13 · World English Bible

From Favor's study of Exodus 34

Exodus 34: The LORD proclaims his name

When the LORD proclaimed his own name, the first words after "The LORD! The LORD" were "a merciful and gracious God" (34:6), and that description of himself is said back to him again and again, from Numbers 14:18 to Jonah 4:2. Moses came down with a shining face he didn't know about (34:29), and Paul says the veil passes away in Christ (2 Corinthians 3:14).

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Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain. Every answer cites the verses it rests on. What we believe · All Bible questions