I don’t understand the question. Why did he re-write the Commandments? Because Yahweh told him to. But Scripture has always told us that Moses was instructed to re-write the Commandments.In Ex 34:1-4 Moses was commanded to re-write the Ten Commandments to replace the tablets he broke. Is there a reason for this? In all the chronologies I’ve studied, I don’t recall the re-writing of the Ten Commandments being part of them.
Ah, now I understand. It seems that there was a judicial reason for Moses breaking the Tablets. I believe it was to show that the Israelites had broken their end of the Covenant promises.I know Moses rewrote the Commandments because God told him to, but my question had to do with the rationale of why God told him to do it. Maybe there is no real reason other than to replace what was broken, but I was curious if there was a deeper theological reason.
I just found out that Jewish tradition has an interesting explanation for this which utilizes the “husband-wife” metaphor. Moses, as representative of the sons of Israel, is commanded by Yhwh to hew and carve the second set just like a husband, upon discovering that his wife had violated the first pact, would forgive her but would then require the latter to draw the renewed second agreement. The story goes on about how the angels objected, saying that Moses might then claim to be the author of the tablets or even go so far as to change their content and form, but God had such immense trust in His servant.With that in my mind, it would seem that God instructed Moses to rewrite the 10 Commandments to show that the Covenant was still on. Although I do find it significant that God had Moses rewrite it, instead of God doing it Himself.