Albert Barnes Commentary 2 Corinthians 3:13

"and [are] not as Moses, [who] put a veil upon his face, that the children of Israel should not look stedfastly on the end of that which was passing away:" — 2 Corinthians 3:13 (ASV)

And not as Moses. Our conduct is not like that of Moses. We make no attempt to conceal anything regarding the nature, design, and duration of the gospel. We leave nothing intentionally shrouded in mystery.

Which put a veil over his face. That is, when he came down from Mount Sinai and his face shone (Exodus 34:33: And till Moses had done speaking with them, he put a vail on his face.). This veil he took off when he went to speak with God but put on again when he delivered His commands to the people.

Moses himself has not declared what the design of this was. The statement he makes in Exodus would lead us to suppose that it was on account of the exceeding brightness and dazzling splendor that shone around him, making it difficult to look intently at him.

Paul himself seems to intimate in 2 Corinthians 3:7 that this was partly the reason. However, in this verse, he intimates that there was another design: that Moses might be, as Doddridge expresses it, "a kind of type and figure of his own dispensation."

That the children of Israel. Mr. Locke understands this to refer to the apostles and supposes that it means, "We do not veil the light so that the obscurity of what we deliver should hinder the children of Israel from seeing in the law, which was to be done away, Christ who is the end of the law." But this interpretation is forced and unnatural.

The phrase rendered "that" (prov to) evidently connects what is affirmed here with the statement about Moses. It shows that the apostle means to say that Moses put the veil on his face in order that the children of Israel should not be able to see to the end of his institutions.

Paul here distinctly affirms that Moses had such a design and that the putting on of the veil was emblematic of the nature of his institutions. No one can prove that this was not his design. In a land and time when types, emblems, and allegorical modes of speech were much used, it is highly probable that Moses meant to intimate that the end and full purpose of his institutions were intentionally concealed.

Could not steadfastly look. This means they could not gaze intently upon (atenisai). See the notes on 2 Corinthians 3:7.

They could not clearly discern it; there was obscurity arising from the fact of the intentional concealment. He did not intend that they should clearly see the full purport and design of the institutions which he established.

To the end. eiv to telov. This refers to the end, purpose, design, or ultimate result of the law which he established. Many different interpretations have been proposed for this.

The meaning seems to me to be this: There was a glory and splendor in that which the institutions of Moses typified, which the children of Israel were not then permitted to behold.

There was a splendor and luster in the face of Moses, which they could not gaze upon, and therefore he put a veil over it to diminish its intense brightness. In like manner, there was a glory and splendor in the ultimate design and scope of his institutions—in that to which they referred—which they were not then able (that is, prepared) to look on, and the exceeding brightness of which he intentionally concealed.

This was done by obscure types and figures that resembled a veil thrown over a dazzling and splendid object. The word "end," then, I suppose, does not refer to termination or close, but to the design, scope, or purpose of the Mosaic institutions—to that which they were intended to introduce and foreshadow.

THAT END was the Messiah and the glory of His institutions. (See the notes on Romans 10:4: Christ is the end of the law.) And the meaning of Paul, I take to be, is that there was a splendor and a glory in the gospel, which the Mosaic institutions were designed to typify, so great that the children of Israel were not fully prepared to see it. Therefore, he intentionally threw over that glory the veil of obscure types and figures, just as he threw over his face a veil that partially concealed its splendor.

Thus interpreted, there is consistency in the entire passage and very great beauty. Paul, in the following verses, proceeds to state that the veil, in the view of the Jews of his time, was not removed. They still looked to the obscure types and institutions of the Mosaic law rather than to the glory which these were designed to foreshadow, as if they should choose to look on the veil on Moses' face rather than on the splendor it concealed.

Of that which is abolished. Or rather, to be abolished (tou katargoumenou); its nature, design, and intention was that it should be abolished. It was never intended to be permanent, and Paul speaks of it here as a thing that was known and indisputable: that the Mosaic institutions were intended to be abolished.