No Living Eye Beholds the Glory and the Word Spoken for Israel

Rabbi Dosa says: Behold it says, "For no man shall see Me and live." In their lifetimes they do not see, but they do see at the hour of their death. And so it says, "Before Him shall bow all who go down to the dust, and he whose soul He did not keep alive" (Psalms 22:30). Rabbi Akiva says: "For no man shall see Me and live", even the living creatures that bear the throne do not see the glory. Rabbi Shimon ben Azzai said: I am not as one refuting the words of my teacher but as one adding to his words. "For no man shall see Me and live", even the ministering angels, whose life is eternal life, do not see the glory. "Saying", go out and say to them words of persuasion, it is for your sake that He speaks with me. And so we find that during all thirty-eight years that Israel were in the wilderness and were as ones rebuked by Heaven, there was no speech with Moses, as it is said, "And it came to pass, when all the men of war had finished dying from among the people, that the LORD spoke to me, saying." Elazar ben Dahavai says: One might think He spoke with him for his own sake. Scripture teaches, "saying", it was for the sake of Israel that He spoke with him, and He did not speak with him for his own sake.