Shemot 24

Then He said to Moses: 'Go up to God — you, and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of the sons of Israel — and bow down from afar.

And Moses alone shall draw near to God; but they shall not draw near; and the people shall not go up with him.'

And Moses came and recounted to the people all the words of God and all the ordinances; and all the people answered with one voice and said: 'All the words which God has commanded, we shall do.'

And Moses wrote down all the words of God; and he rose early in the morning, and built an altar at the foot of the mountain, and twelve platforms, corresponding to the twelve tribes of Israel.

And he sent the firstborn of the sons of Israel, and they brought up offerings, and slaughtered peace-offerings to God from the cattle.

And Moses took some of the blood, and placed it in basins and buried it; and the remainder of it he sprinkled upon the altar.

And he took the book of the covenant, and read it aloud to the people; and they said: 'All that God has commanded, we shall accept and do.'

And Moses took some of the blood, and sprinkled it upon the people, and said: 'This is the blood of the covenant which God has made with you, concerning all these ordinances.'

Then Moses and Aaron went up — Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of the sons of Israel.

And they beheld the light of the God of Israel; and beneath it was like a fashioning of the whiteness of sapphire, and like the very sky in its purity.

And upon the chosen ones of the sons of Israel He did not send His affliction; and they beheld the light of God and lived, and they ate and drank.

And God said to Moses: 'Go up to Me to the mountain, and remain there; I shall give you the two tablets of gem, and the laws and the commandments which I have written, to guide them by them.'

And Moses arose, and Joshua his attendant; and Moses went up to the mountain of God.

And he said to the elders: 'Sit here for us until we return to you; and behold, Aaron and Hur are with you — whoever has a matter, let him approach them.'

And Moses went up to the mountain, and the cloud covered the mountain.

And the light of God settled upon Mount Sinai; and the cloud covered it six days; and He called to Moses on the seventh day from within the cloud.

And the appearance of the light of God was like a consuming fire at the top of the mountain, in the presence of the sons of Israel.

When Moses entered into the midst of the cloud — upon going up to the mountain — he remained in it forty days and forty nights.