And he gave unto Moses, when he had made an end of communing with him upon mount Sinai, two tables of testimony, tables of stone, written with the finger of God. Ex. xxxi, 18. After all the preceding laws and instructions, when the forty days of Moses' continuance on the mount were nearly ended, the Lord gave him the tables of stone before spoken of, [xxiv, 12,] with the ten commandments written on them by his own immediate power. They are here called the "two tables of testimony," because the laws written on them were the substance of that will of God which he testified to them; and likewise, because by giving this law to them, and by placing in it the ark under the mercy-seat, from above which he displayed his glory, he testified his special favor to that nation, and the way in which it would be continued to them. The stones on which the law of the ten commandments was written, denotes its perpetual, unchangeable obligation; in which it differed from the other laws, which would after a time be superseded. By the finger of God the Holy Spirit may be meant, and he writes this law in the hearts of all the spiritual children of Israel, having prepared them for that purpose.