“It was, upon Moses’ descent from Mount Sinai, and the two tablets of the Testimony were in the hand of Moses upon his descent from the mountain and Moses did not know that the skin of his face was radiant upon His speaking with him” (Exodus 34:29). “He wrote upon the tablets” – it teaches that the first and the second were identical, Ten Commandments. How were they configured? There were five on this tablet and five on that tablet, in accordance with the statement of Rabbi Yehuda.
Rabbi Neḥemya says: Ten on this tablet and ten on that tablet, as it is stated: “It was, upon Moses’s descent from Mount Sinai, [and the two tablets of the Testimony].”12This is expounded to mean that on each of the two tablets, the entire Testimony consisting of the Ten Commandments was inscribed. The writing was bearing them,13The engraved letters miraculously held up the stone tablets. but they appeared as though they were in Moses’s hand, as it is stated: “And the two tablets of the Testimony were in the hand of Moses.”
“Moses did not know that the skin of his face was radiant.” From where did Moses receive the rays of splendor? The Rabbis say: From the cave, as it is stated: “It will be with the passage of My glory” (Exodus 33:22). Rabbi Berekhya HaKohen said in the name of Rabbi Shmuel: The length of the tablets was six handbreadths and their width six handbreadths.
Moses was grasping two handbreadths, the Divine Presence two handbreadths, and there were two handbreadths in the middle. It was from there that Moses received the rays of splendor.14From his closeness to God at that time. Rabbi Yehuda bar Naḥman says in the name of Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish: While he was writing with a quill, a bit [of ink] remained. He passed [the quill] over his head and from it the rays of splendor were formed for him, as it is stated: “Moses did not know that the skin of his face was radiant [upon His speaking with him].”15As God spoke to Moses and Moses wrote what God said, the rays of splendor were formed.