Did Moses see God face to face, or only his back?

The passages

Exodus 33:11

“The Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend.”

And the Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend. And he turned again into the camp: but his servant Joshua, the son of Nun, a young man, departed not out of the tabernacle.

Exodus 33:18–23

Moses asks to see God’s glory; God says, “Thou canst not see my face”, and lets him see only his “back parts” as his glory passes.

And he said, I beseech thee, shew me thy glory. And he said, I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee; and will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy. And he said, Thou canst not see my face: for there shall no man see me, and live. And the Lord said, Behold, there is a place by me, and thou shalt stand upon a rock: And it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth by, that I will put thee in a clift of the rock, and will cover thee with my hand while I pass by: And I will take away mine hand, and thou shalt see my back parts: but my face shall not be seen.

Deuteronomy 34:10

No prophet arose in Israel like Moses, “whom the Lord knew face to face”.

And there arose not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face,

Deuteronomy 5:4

Moses tells all Israel, “The Lord talked with you face to face in the mount out of the midst of the fire”.

The Lord talked with you face to face in the mount out of the midst of the fire,

Deuteronomy 4:12

At Sinai Israel “heard the voice of the words, but saw no similitude; only ye heard a voice”.

And the Lord spake unto you out of the midst of the fire: ye heard the voice of the words, but saw no similitude; only ye heard a voice.

Exodus 33:11 says that the Lord spoke with Moses “face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend”, and Deuteronomy says the Lord knew him face to face. Yet nine verses later God tells Moses, “Thou canst not see my face”, and shows him only his back. Critics ask which is true.

The answer

‘Face to face’ is a Hebrew idiom for direct, personal dealing, not a claim to have looked on God’s face. Deuteronomy shows this clearly. Moses tells all Israel, “The Lord talked with you face to face in the mount out of the midst of the fire” (Deuteronomy 5:4), and yet he has just reminded them that at Sinai they “saw no similitude; only ye heard a voice” (4:12, 15). They spoke with God ‘face to face’ without seeing any form at all. So in Exodus 33:11 the phrase means that God spoke with Moses directly and openly, “as a man speaketh unto his friend”. Numbers 12:8 explains the same privilege: God spoke with Moses “mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in dark speeches”, not in dreams and visions as with other prophets. The same verse says that Moses would behold “the similitude of the Lord”, using the word (Hebrew temunah, ‘form’) that Deuteronomy 4:12 uses for what Israel did not see. Keil and Delitzsch explain that this was not God’s essential nature or unveiled glory, which no one can see, but a form in which the invisible God made himself plainly known to Moses. Deuteronomy 34:10, “whom the Lord knew face to face”, describes that closeness.

In verse 18 Moses asks for something more: “shew me thy glory”. That is when God answers that no one can see his face and live (33:20). Moses was allowed to see only God’s ‘back’ (Hebrew achor), the trailing edge of his glory once it had passed by (33:22–23). This is human language for what God allowed him to see; God has no body (see the entry on whether God has a body). Moses talked with God as a friend, but he did not see God as he is. See also the entry on whether anyone can see God.

From the classic commentators

Face to face, or, mouth to mouth, as Numbers 12:8. Not that God hath face or mouth, or that Moses could behold it, which is denied, Exodus 33:20. But the sense is, he spake with him freely and familiarly, and immediately, not by an angel in a dream or vision, as he did to other prophets.Matthew Poole, Commentary on Exodus 33:11, at Bible Hub

Did Moses see God face to face, or only his back?

The passages

The objection

The answer

From the classic commentators

Sources

Further reading