How did the Ten Words arrive? The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan describes it with cosmic theatre. "The first word, as it came forth from the mouth of the Holy One, whose Name be blessed, was like storms, and lightnings, and flames of fire, with a burning light on His right hand and on His left. It winged its way through the air of the heavens, and was made manifest unto the camp of Israel, and returned, and was engraven on the tables of the covenant that were given by the hand of Moses, and were turned in them from side to side: and then called He, and said: Sons of Israel My people, I am the Lord your God, who brought you out free from the land of Mizraim, from the house of the bondage of slaves" (Exodus 20:2).
What was the first word made of?
Not air. Not sound. The Targum pictures each commandment as a living creature of fire — storms and lightnings braided together, a burning light flanking the divine mouth on right and left. The word is not said; it is born. It leaves God's mouth as a body of flame.
How did it reach Israel?
It flew. The Targum's verb is winged — the word traveled through the air of the heavens, circled, and revealed itself to every Israelite in the camp. Then it returned to its origin, and in that return it engraved itself into the stone tablets. The letters, the Targum adds, were legible from both sides — turned in them from side to side — a miracle later rabbis would call the first impossible geometry.
Why start with the Exodus?
The content of the first word is not a rule. It is a memory. I am the Lord your God, who brought you out free from the land of Mizraim. Before commandment there is rescue. Before obligation there is love. The Targum insists on the word free — the Israelites did not merely leave Egypt, they left the house of the bondage of slaves. Redemption is the ground every commandment stands upon.
The takeaway: the Torah begins not by telling Israel what to do but by telling them who saved them. Duty grows from gratitude, not the other way around.