Deuteronomy 4:33
That a people should hear the voice of God speaking out of the midst of fire, as thou hast heard, and lived:
Open Deuteronomy 4:33 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- ut audiret populus vocem Dei loquentis de medio ignis, sicut tu audisti, et vixisti :
- Septuagint (Swete)
- εἰ ἀκήκοεν ἔθνος φωνὴν θεοῦ ζῶντος λαλοῦντος ἐκ μέσου τοῦ πυρός, ὃν τρόπον ἀκήκοας σὺ καὶ ἔζησας·
- Hebrew (WLC)
- הֲשָׁ֣מַֽע עָם֩ ק֨וֹל אֱלֹהִ֜ים מְדַבֵּ֧ר מִתּוֹךְ הָאֵ֛שׁ כַּאֲשֶׁר שָׁמַ֥עְתָּ אַתָּ֖ה וַיֶּֽחִי
Haydock's commentary
And lived. It was generally supposed, that those who had seen a vision of God, or of his angel, would instantly die. See Genesis xvi. 13. (Haydock) (Chap. v. 24.)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St John Chrysostom The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on Paul's Epistle to the Romans, Homily VI on Rom. ii. 17, 18
Since he has set all aside, the hearing, the teaching, the name of the Jew, the circumcision, and all the other particulars by his saying that “he is not a Jew which is one outwardly, but he which is one inwardly;” he next sees an objection which starts up, and against this makes his stand. Now what is this objection? If, he means, these things are no use, what reason was there for that nation being called, and the circumcision too being given? What does he then and how does he solve it? By the same means as he did before: for as there, he told, not of their praises, but the benefits of God; nor their well doings (for to be called a Jew and to know His Will and to approve the things which are more excellent, was no well doing of their own, but came of the grace of God: and this the Prophet also says, upbraiding them; “He hath not done so to any nation, neither hath he showed His judgment …
St John Chrysostom The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on the Gospel of St. John, John 5.31,32
How then saith Moses, “The Lord spake, and Moses answered”? ( Ex. xix. 19 ); and David, “He had heard a tongue which he knew not” ( Ps. lxxxi. 5 ); and Moses again, “Is there any such people which hath ‘heard the voice of God’?” ( Deut. iv. 33 .)
The Fathers are given as they wrote. Where a passage lays the Passion on the Jewish people, the Church teaches that it cannot be charged against all the Jews then living, nor against the Jews of today, and that all sinners were its authors (CCC 597, 598).