Deuteronomy 5:24

24 You said, "The LORD our God has let us see how great and glorious he is. We've heard his voice come from the fire. Today we've seen that people can live even if God speaks to them.

Deuteronomy 5:24 Meaning and Commentary

Deuteronomy 5:24

And ye said, behold, the Lord our God hath showed us his glory
and his greatness
In descending on Mount Sinai in the manner he did, and giving the law from thence with such solemnity; for there was a glory in the ministration of it, as the apostle argues ( 2 Corinthians 3:7-11 ) , it being delivered with so much majesty, and such a glorious apparatus attending it; see ( Deuteronomy 33:2 ) . Aben Ezra interprets this of the appearance of fire in which the Lord was, "and his greatness", of the thunders and lightnings, and the voice of the trumpet:

and we have heard his voice out of the midst of the fire;
the ten words, as the same interpreter rightly notes, which were vocally and audibly expressed out of the fire:

we have seen this day, that God doth talk with man, and he liveth;
they had proof of it in themselves; God had been talking with them out of the fire, and yet it did not reach and consume them, but they were still alive.

Deuteronomy 5:24 In-Context

22 These are the commandments the LORD spoke to your whole assembly on the mountain. He spoke in a loud voice from the fire, the cloud, and the gloomy darkness. Then he stopped speaking. He wrote the commandments on two stone tablets and gave them to me.

23 But when you heard the voice coming from the darkness and saw the mountain blazing with fire, all the leaders and heads of your tribes came to me.

24 You said, "The LORD our God has let us see how great and glorious he is. We've heard his voice come from the fire. Today we've seen that people can live even if God speaks to them.

25 Why should we die? This great fire will consume us! If we continue to hear the voice of the LORD our God, we'll die!

26 Who has ever heard the voice of the living God speak from a fire, as we did, and lived?