Deuteronomy 5:4

4 He spoke to us face to face in the mount out of the midst of fire.

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 a covenant with us in Horeb.

3 He made not the covenant with our fathers, but with us, who are now present and living.

4 He spoke to us face to face in the mount out of the midst of fire.

5 I was the mediator and stood between the Lord and you at that time, to shew you his words, for you feared the fire, and went not up into the mountain, and he said:

6 I am the Lord thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.