Because (Exodus ch. 24, v. 13) it is written, “Moses and Joshua rose up,” there could arise in someone that opinion, as if they rose from sleep and nightly rest, and so ascended the mountain. Then indeed the day would be the third from the Law’s giving — that is, the eighth of the third month, [and] the 52nd of the exodus. For it is agreed [that] on the day after the law-giving Moses gave his effort to the victims and to ratifying the covenant by the sprinkling of blood; then that he ascended to the foot of the mountain with Aaron, Nadab, Abihu, and 70 elders, and saw the Lord, as is there narrated (from v. 1 to 12). Yet it must be said [that] Moses ascended Sinai with Joshua on that same morrow of the law-giving. For those earlier [things] were done in the morning time, as is plain from v. 4; and Moses had time enough left to ascend about noon, or certainly after. And that he ascended then, the whole continuation of the text declares. For whether he still dined with them and tasted…
(col. 116)
…of the offered victims [something] (v. 11); or — what to some may seem more probable — was altogether unfed and undined, [it] is at once added: “And the Lord said to Moses: Come up to me.” For these words are either a new and repeated command, or altogether the same [one] which had already begun to be recounted above (v. 1) — as [it] seems to Abulensis after q. 15. Whichever one judge, he will nevertheless see, through the following words (v. 13, “And Moses and Joshua rose up”), [that] nothing else is signified than that Moses at once girded himself to comply with that command; and thus, without any delay or hesitation, began to ascend higher, together with Joshua, [his] minister most intimate and most dear of all. For the word “to rise” is regularly taken in Scripture for the very setting-about of some work or journey, and especially when haste and speed are signified — as [in] Deuteronomy 9, v. 12: “Arise, and go down hence quickly”; Mark 10, v. 1: “Rising up thence, he came into the coasts of Judea”; Luke 1, v. 39: “Mary rising up in those days went into the hill country with haste.” Nay, that a greater acceleration be expressed, “early” is sometimes added — as [in] Jeremiah 7: “rising early to me”; Jeremiah 7 [again]: “I spoke to you, rising early”; Hosea ch. 5, v. [15]: “in their tribulation they will rise early to me.” [The same] which, in Psalm 15 [16], is said otherwise: “Their infirmities were multiplied; afterward they made haste.” For Cicero and his brother were not waking from sleep when he wrote, at the end of the second [book] On Divination: “When these things had been said, we rose” — but he says they went away, either because they had been sitting in the Library which was in the Lyceum, [and] rose thence. The Law, therefore, was confirmed on the day after it had been given; and then, with Moses, our Joshua ascended Mount Sinai — that is, on the seventh day of the third month, the 51st of the Egyptian liberty inclusive, the 52nd exclusive.