---
title: "Exodus 33 – Catholic Bible (CPDV) & Latin Vulgate · Bless"
url: https://blessbible.app/bible/exodus/33/
description: "The people mourn for their sin. Moses pitcheth the tabernacle without the camp.… Exodus 33 in the Catholic Public Domain Version, with the Latin Vulgate."
---

# Exodus 33

Exodus 33 is chapter 33 of 40 in the Book of Exodus. Here are all 23 verses in the Catholic Public Domain Version, with the Latin of the Clementine Vulgate beside them.

> The people mourn for their sin. Moses pitcheth the tabernacle without the camp. He converseth familiarly with God. Desireth to see his glory.
>
> — Bp. Richard Challoner, chapter summary

## Exodus 33 (Catholic Public Domain Version)

1. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: “Go forth, ascend from this place, you and your people, whom you led away from the land of Egypt, into the land that I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying: To your offspring, I will give it.
2. And I will send an Angel to precede you, so that I may cast out the Canaanite, and the Amorite, and the Hittite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite,
3. and so that you may enter into a land flowing with milk and honey. For I will not go up with you, since you are a stiff-necked people, lest perhaps I may destroy you on the way.”
4. And upon hearing this very bad news, the people mourned; and no one put on his finery according to custom.
5. And the Lord said to Moses: “Say to the sons of Israel: You are a stiff-necked people. I should at once go up into your midst and destroy you. Now immediately put aside your ornaments, so that I may know what to do to you.”
6. Therefore, the sons of Israel put aside their ornaments before Mount Horeb.
7. Also, Moses took the tabernacle and pitched it beyond the camp at a distance, and he called its name: ‘Tabernacle of the Covenant.’ And all the people, who had any kind of question, went out to the Tabernacle of the Covenant, beyond the camp.
8. And when Moses went out to the tabernacle, all the people rose up, and each one stood at the door of his pavilion, and they beheld the back of Moses until he entered the tent.
9. And when he had gone into the Tabernacle of the Covenant, the pillar of cloud descended and stood at the door, and he spoke with Moses.
10. And all discerned that the pillar of cloud stood at the door of the Tabernacle. And they stood and worshipped at the doors of their tents.
11. But the Lord spoke to Moses face to face, just as a man is used to speaking to his friend. And when he returned to the camp, his minister Joshua, the son of Nun, a young man, did not withdraw from the Tabernacle.
12. Then Moses said to the Lord: “You instruct me to lead this people away, and you do not reveal to me whom you will send with me, particularly since you have said: ‘I know you by name, and you have found favor before me.’
13. If, therefore, I have found favor in your sight, show your face to me, so that I may know you and may find grace before your eyes. Look favorably on your people, this nation.”
14. And the Lord said, “My face will precede you, and I will give you rest.”
15. And Moses said: “If you will not yourself precede us, then do not lead us away from this place.
16. For how will we be able to know, I and your people, that we have found grace in your sight, unless you walk with us, so that we may be glorified out of all the people who live upon the earth?”
17. Then the Lord said to Moses: “This word also, which you have spoken, I will do. For you have found grace before me, and I have known you by name.”
18. And he said, “Show me your glory.”
19. He responded: “I will show you all that is good, and I will call out with the name of the Lord before you. And I will take pity on whomever I will, and I will be lenient to whomever it will please me.”
20. And again he said: “You are not able to see my face. For man shall not see me and live.”
21. And again, he said: “Behold, there is a place with me, and you shall stand upon the rock.
22. And when my glory will cross over, I will set you in a cleft of the rock, and I will protect you with my right hand, until I pass by.
23. And I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back. But my face you are not able to see.”

## Exodus 33 in Latin (Clementine Vulgate, 1592)

1. Locutusque est Dominus ad Moysen, dicens: Vade, ascende de loco isto tu, et populus tuus quem eduxisti de terra Ægypti, in terram quam juravi Abraham, Isaac et Jacob, dicens: Semini tuo dabo eam:
2. et mittam præcursorem tui angelum, ut ejiciam Chananæum, et Amorrhæum, et Hethæum, et Pherezæum, et Hevæum, et Jebusæum,
3. et intres in terram fluentem lacte et melle. Non enim ascendam tecum, quia populus duræ cervicis es: ne forte disperdam te in via.
4. Audiensque populus sermonem hunc pessimum, luxit: et nullus ex more indutus est cultu suo.
5. Dixitque Dominus ad Moysen: Loquere filiis Israël: Populus duræ cervicis es: semel ascendam in medio tui, et delebo te. Jam nunc depone ornatum tuum, ut sciam quid faciam tibi.
6. Deposuerunt ergo filii Israël ornatum suum a monte Horeb.
7. Moyses quoque tollens tabernaculum, tetendit extra castra procul, vocavitque nomen ejus, Tabernaculum fœderis. Et omnis populus, qui habebat aliquam quæstionem, egrediebatur ad tabernaculum fœderis, extra castra.
8. Cumque egrederetur Moyses ad tabernaculum, surgebat universa plebs, et stabat unusquisque in ostio papilionis sui, aspiciebantque tergum Moysi, donec ingrederetur tentorium.
9. Ingresso autem illo tabernaculum fœderis, descendebat columna nubis, et stabat ad ostium, loquebaturque cum Moyse,
10. cernentibus universis quod columna nubis staret ad ostium tabernaculi. Stabantque ipsi, et adorabant per fores tabernaculorum suorum.
11. Loquebatur autem Dominus ad Moysen facie ad faciem, sicut solet loqui homo ad amicum suum. Cumque ille reverteretur in castra, minister ejus Josue filius Nun, puer, non recedebat de tabernaculo.
12. Dixit autem Moyses ad Dominum: Præcipis ut educam populum istum: et non indicas mihi quem missurus es mecum, præsertim cum dixeris: Novi te ex nomine, et invenisti gratiam coram me.
13. Si ergo inveni gratiam in conspectu tuo, ostende mihi faciem tuam, ut sciam te, et inveniam gratiam ante oculos tuos: respice populum tuum gentem hanc.
14. Dixitque Dominus: Facies mea præcedet te, et requiem dabo tibi.
15. Et ait Moyses: Si non tu ipse præcedas, ne educas nos de loco isto.
16. In quo enim scire poterimus ego et populus tuus invenisse nos gratiam in conspectu tuo, nisi ambulaveris nobiscum, ut glorificemur ab omnibus populis qui habitant super terram?
17. Dixit autem Dominus ad Moysen: Et verbum istud, quod locutus es, faciam: invenisti enim gratiam coram me, et teipsum novi ex nomine.
18. Qui ait: Ostende mihi gloriam tuam.
19. Respondit: Ego ostendam omne bonum tibi, et vocabo in nomine Domini coram te: et miserebor cui voluero, et clemens ero in quem mihi placuerit.
20. Rursumque ait: Non poteris videre faciem meam: non enim videbit me homo et vivet.
21. Et iterum: Ecce, inquit, est locus apud me, et stabis supra petram.
22. Cumque transibit gloria mea, ponam te in foramine petræ, et protegam dextera mea, donec transeam:
23. tollamque manum meam, et videbis posteriora mea: faciem autem meam videre non poteris.

## Catechism of the Catholic Church

Paragraph numbers and the Catechism's own section headings (never quoted); text at vatican.va.
- cf. CCC ¶ 697: The Name, Titles, and Symbols of the Holy Spirit ([vatican.va index](https://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/_INDEX.HTM))
- CCC ¶ 142: Man's Response To God ([vatican.va index](https://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/_INDEX.HTM))
- CCC ¶ 2576: In the Old Testament ([vatican.va index](https://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/_INDEX.HTM))
- CCC ¶ 210: I Believe in God ([vatican.va index](https://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/_INDEX.HTM))
- cf. CCC ¶ 2583: In the Old Testament ([vatican.va index](https://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/_INDEX.HTM))

## The saints

- “Prayer is nothing else than being on terms of friendship with God.” — St. Teresa of Ávila, The Way of Perfection, ch. 26, 1566 (On this theme: verse 11)

## Bishop Challoner's notes

Bp. Richard Challoner, notes on the Douay-Rheims (1750); they comment on its older wording.
- Verse 11: “Face to face” … That is, in a most familiar manner. Though as we learn from this very chapter, Moses could not see the face of the Lord.
- Verse 12: In the language of the scriptures, God is said to know such as he approves and loves: and to know by name, those whom he favours in a most singular manner, as he did his servant Moses.
- Verse 23: The Lord by his angel, usually spoke to Moses in the pillar of the cloud; so that he could not see the glory of him that spoke familiarly with him. In the vision here mentioned he was allowed to see something of him, in an assumed corporeal form: not in the face, the rays of which were too bright for mortal eye to bear, but to view him as it were behind, when his face was turned from him.

## Read at Mass (US)

- Tue, Jul 27, 2027 (computed): Tuesday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time — First Reading, Exodus 33:7-11; 34:5b-9, 28

Dates after May 31, 2027 are computed by Bless from the US Lectionary cycle — confirm with your parish.

Source: Catholic Public Domain Version (Ronald L. Conte Jr., 2009), public domain; Latin: Clementine Vulgate (1592).