33:19. He answered: I will shew thee all good, and I will proclaim in the name of the Lord before thee: and I will have mercy on whom I will, and I will be merciful to whom it shall please me.
33:20. And again he said: Thou canst not see my face: for man shall not see me, and live.
33:21. And again he said: Behold there is a place with me, and thou shalt stand upon the rock.
33:22. And when my glory shall pass, I will set thee in a hole of the rock, and protect thee with my righthand till I pass:
33:23. And I will take away my hand, and thou shalt see my back parts: but my face thou canst not see.
See my back parts... The Lord by his angel, usually spoke to Moses in the pillar of the cloud; so that he could not see the glory of him that spoke familiarly with him. In the vision here mentioned he was allowed to see something of him, in an assumed corporeal form: not in the face, the rays of which were too bright for mortal eye to bear, but to view him as it were behind, when his face was turned from him.
Exodus Chapter 34
The tables are renewed: all society with the Chanaanites is forbid: some precepts concerning the firstborn, the sabbath, and other feasts: after forty days' fast, Moses returneth to the people with the commandments, and his face appearing horned with rays of light, he covereth it, whensoever he speaketh to the people.
34:1. And after this he said: Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the former, and I will write upon them the words, which were in the tables, which thou brokest.
34:2. Be ready in the morning, that thou mayst forthwith go up into Mount Sinai, and thou shalt stand with me upon the top of the mount.