How Did Moses Remember So Much of the Law?

We sometimes only remember that Moses received the 10 Commandments.  That is true.  God gave him more – a lot more.   Exodus 20 – 31 provides a lot of very detailed instructions.  Someone recently asked in one of our studies how Moses remembered all that information.

This blog post does not address some other fundamental issues such as how many times Moses went to the mountain, who went with him each time, what was said when, how Moses spoke to so many people and how they answered back to him, whether or not the incidents are given in chronological order, how Moses anointed the people, and more. It does address the specific question which was given.  This blog post considers two other answers to that question and concludes with what we think is the right answer.

We are not the first people to consider this question.  How Moses wrote down so much specificity has been the source of much debate for a long time.  It is unlikely to be settled soon.  Still, commentators continue to come up with plausible explanations.    Two of these are probably worth mentioning here.

First, commentators point out that Moses was up on Mt. Sinai for a long time.  Exodus 24:18 states that he was there for forty days.  Our math has never been that great, but even if one only considers this “this trip” that is still basically what we call a “chapter” every 3 ½ days.  That seems like a lot of time to convey the information.

A second explanation many commentators make is that Moses may have been writing things down as he went.  In fact, some go even further.  They point out that the phrase “then God said to Moses” or “God said to Moses” appears multiple times throughout these chapters.  They reason that God was already talking to Moses so there would be no need to reiterate the obvious.  They further reason that this indicates a pause, where God was in fact giving Moses a chance to “catch up.”  Finally, they also point out that while most people believe Moses wrote all or at least most of the first five books of the Bible, most agree he did that a much later date, but the law was exception.   They conclude that Exodus 24:4 observes that “Moses wrote down all the words of the Lord.”

We believe that Moses was inspired by God when he was writing anything we find in scripture.   We know this because all scripture is inspired by God (as Paul points out to Timothy in his second letter, II Timothy 3:16-17).  God can perform any miracles He wants to do.  How he choose to perform the miracle of Moses remembering so many details is up to Him.  He certainly could have used the methods described above to help pull this off, or He may not have used them at all.