Deuteronomy 5:4

4 The Lord spoke to you face to face from the fire on the mountain.

Deuteronomy 5:4 Meaning and Commentary

Deuteronomy 5:4

The Lord talked with you face to face in the mount
Meaning, not in that free, friendly, and familiar manner, in which he sometimes talked with Moses, of whom this phrase is used, ( Exodus 33:11 ) , but publicly, audibly, clearly, and distinctly, or without the interposition of another; he did not speak to them by Moses, but to them themselves; he talked to them without a middle person between them, as Aben Ezra expresses it: without making use of one to relate to them what he said; but he talked to them directly, personally:

out of the midst of the fire;
in which he descended, and with which the mountain was burning all the time he was speaking; which made it very awful and terrible, and pointed at the terrors of the legal dispensation.

Deuteronomy 5:4 In-Context

2 The Lord our God made an Agreement with us at Mount Sinai.

3 He did not make this Agreement with our ancestors, but he made it with us, with all of us who are alive here today.

4 The Lord spoke to you face to face from the fire on the mountain.

5 (At that time I stood between you and the Lord in order to tell you what the Lord said; you were afraid of the fire, so you would not go up on the mountain.) The Lord said:

6 "I am the Lord your God; I brought you out of the land of Egypt where you were slaves.