Augustine of Hippo : What does it mean that, by commanding the Sabbath to be kept, the Scripture says, "It will be an everlasting covenant in me and in the children of Israel?" (Exodus 31,16.17) It does not say: between me and the children of Israel. Does he say it this way perhaps because the Sabbath means rest and we have no rest except in it? Because, evidently, he calls the children of Israel all his people, that is, the descendants of Abraham. And there is one Israel according to the flesh and another according to the spirit. For if only Israel were called descendants according to the flesh, the Apostle would not say: See Israel according to the flesh (1 Corinthians 10,18). Here, of course, it indicates that there is an Israel according to the spirit, who is a Jew in the interior and in the circumcision of the flesh (Rm 2,29). Therefore, perhaps it is necessary to make a separation, reading like this: It will be an eternal covenant in me. And then the other meaning would be: And for the children of Israel it will be an eternal sign, that is, a sign of an eternal thing, as, for example, the stone was Christ, because the stone signified Christ (Cf 1Co 10,4). Therefore, it is not necessary to unite the phrase thus: It will be eternal covenant in me and in the children of Israel, as if this covenant was in God and in the children of Israel. But it must be put like this: It will be eternal covenant in me - because in God eternal rest has been promised - and for the children of Israel it will be an eternal sign, because the children of Israel received this sign to keep it, a sign that means rest eternal for the true Israelites, that is, for the children of the promise (Cf Galatians 4,28) and for those who will see God face to face as it is. 140 (Exodus 31.18). Immediately after he ceased speaking with him, he gave Moses on Mount Sinai the two tables of the covenant, tablets of stone, written by the finger of God. Even though God has spoken so much, he gives Moses two tablets of stone, called tables of the covenant, which they would have to put in the ark. It is not strange that all the other things that God commanded are understood to depend on those ten commandments, written in the two tables, if they are investigated with diligence and understood correctly. Just as these ten commandments depend, in turn, on those two, the love of God and neighbor, on which all the law and the prophets depend (Matthew 22,40). 141 (Exodus 32.2). Aaron orders the people to remove the earrings from the ears of women and daughters to make divinities with them. It is not absurd to think that he wanted to send them a difficult thing to somehow separate them from that purpose. However, that very difficult fact, that there was gold there to make an idol, I think it refers to those who are grieved if the Lord commands them to do something similar to get eternal life or endure it with calm spirit. 142 (Exodus 32.8). When the Lord tells Moses what the people did with the calf, with the idol of gold that they had made, he tells him that the people exclaimed thus: These are your gods, Israel, who brought you out of the land of Egypt (Exodus 32,9). It is not read anywhere that the Israelites said that, but God reveals that this was their intention. They carried in their hearts the content of those words, which could not be concealed from God. — QUESTIONS ON EXODUS, Q. 139 (tr. J. Litteral, draft)