Exodus 24:1

1 The Lord told Moses, "You, Aaron, Nadab, Abihu, and seventy of the older leaders of Israel must come up to me and worship me from a distance.

Exodus 24:1 Meaning and Commentary

Exodus 24:1

And he said unto Moses
Who said? no doubt a divine Person, and yet what this Person said is,

come up unto the Lord;
meaning either to himself, or one divine Person called to Moses to come up to another: according to the Targum of Jonathan, it was Michael, the prince of wisdom; not a created angel, but the eternal Word, Wisdom, and Son of God; who said this on the seventh day of the month, which was the day after the giving of the law, or ten commands; though Jarchi says this paragraph was before the ten commands, and was said on the fourth of Sivan; but the Targumist seems most correct:

come up unto the Lord, thou and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy
of the elders of Israel;
Nadab and Abihu were the two eldest sons of Aaron, ( Exodus 6:23 ) and the seventy elders were not all the elders of Israel, but were so many of them selected out of them, the chief and principal; who were heads of tribes and families, and were no doubt many, if not all of them, of those who by the advice of Jethro were chosen to be rulers of thousands, hundreds, and fifties; these were called to come up to the Lord on the mountain, but not to the top of it, only Moses went thither:

and worship ye afar off:
from the people, and even at a distance from Moses; for he only was admitted near to God, as the following verse shows.

Exodus 24:1 In-Context

1 The Lord told Moses, "You, Aaron, Nadab, Abihu, and seventy of the older leaders of Israel must come up to me and worship me from a distance.

2 Then Moses alone must come near me; the others must not come near. The rest of the people must not come up the mountain with Moses."

3 Moses told the people all the Lord's words and laws for living. Then all of the people answered out loud together, "We will do all the things the Lord has said."

4 So Moses wrote down all the words of the Lord. And he got up early the next morning and built an altar near the bottom of the mountain. He set up twelve stones, one stone for each of the twelve tribes of Israel.

5 Then Moses sent young Israelite men to offer whole burnt offerings and to sacrifice young bulls as fellowship offerings to the Lord.