1 The LORD said to Moses, "Leave this place, you and the people you brought up from the land of Egypt, and go up to the land I swore to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob when I said, 'I will give it to your descendants.'
2 I will send an angel ahead of you and drive out the Canaanites, Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites.
3 Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey. But I will not go up among you, because you are a stiff-necked people, and I might destroy you on the way."
4 When the people heard these grim words, they went into mourning, and no one put on any jewelry.
5 For the LORD had told Moses, "Say to the children of Israel, 'You are a stiff-necked people. If I went up among you even for a moment, I would destroy you. Now take off your jewelry, and I will decide what to do with you.'"
6 So from Mount Horeb on, the children of Israel stripped off their jewelry.
7 Moses would take the tent and set it up outside the camp, at some distance from it, and he called it the tent of meeting. Anyone seeking the LORD would go out to the tent of meeting outside the camp.
8 Whenever Moses went out to the tent, all the people would get up and stand at the entrances of their tents, watching Moses until he entered the tent.
9 As Moses went into the tent, the pillar of cloud would come down and stay at the entrance of the tent while the LORD spoke with Moses.
10 When all the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the entrance of the tent, they would all get up and bow down, each at the entrance of his own tent.
11 The LORD would speak to Moses face to face, the way a man speaks with his friend. Then Moses would go back to the camp, but his young aide Joshua son of Nun did not leave the tent.
12 Moses said to the LORD, "Look, you keep telling me, 'Lead this people up,' but you have not told me whom you will send with me. And yet you have said, 'I know you by name, and you have found favor with me.'
13 So now, if I have indeed found favor with you, let me know your ways, so that I may know you and keep finding favor with you. Remember too that this nation is your people."
14 He answered, "My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest."
15 Moses said to him, "If your presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here.
16 How else will anyone know that I and your people have found favor with you? Is it not by your going with us, so that we, I and your people, stand apart from every other people on the face of the earth?"
17 The LORD said to Moses, "This very thing you have asked I will also do, because you have found favor with me and I know you by name."
18 Then Moses said, "Show me your glory, I pray."
19 He replied, "I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim the name of the LORD in your presence. I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will show compassion to whom I will show compassion.
20 But you cannot see my face," he said, "for no one may see me and live."
21 The LORD said, "There is a place near me where you may stand on the rock.
22 When my glory passes by, I will put you in a crevice of the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by.
23 Then I will remove my hand, and you will see my back; but my face must not be seen."