Then the Lord said to Moses: Write down these words, for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel.

So Moses was there with the Lord for forty days and forty nights, without eating any food or drinking any water, and he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the ten words.

As Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of the covenant in his hands, he did not know that the skin of his face had become radiant while he spoke with the Lord.

When Aaron, then, and the other Israelites saw Moses and noticed how radiant the skin of his face had become, they were afraid to come near him.

Only after Moses called to them did Aaron and all the leaders of the community come back to him. Moses then spoke to them.

Later, all the Israelites came up to him, and he enjoined on them all that the Lord had told him on Mount Sinai.

When Moses finished speaking with them, he put a veil over his face.

Whenever Moses entered the presence of the Lord to speak with him, he removed the veil until he came out again. On coming out, he would tell the Israelites all that he had been commanded.

Then the Israelites would see that the skin of Moses’ face was radiant; so he would again put the veil over his face until he went in to speak with the Lord.