The commentators on this passage take the words [Illustration: Hebrew] “In the third month,” as if it were written: “On the first day of the third month,” and thus make the succeeding words, “on this day,” also relate to the _first_ day of the month. _Vide_ Gesenius, _Thesaur._ p. 404, b.:--“_tertiis calendis post exitum_,” and p. 449, b.:--_tertio novilunio_, i.e. _calendis mensis tertii_. Ewald, _Gesch. des v. Israels_, vol. ii. p. 189:--“_The day (?) of the third month (which is, however, of the new moon, therefore the first day)_.” But the Seventy did not understand it thus, in any case, as they translate:--“τοῦ δὲ μηνὸς τοῦ τρίτου τῇ ἡμέρᾳ ταύτῃ.” The Jewish tradition seems also not to have taken its meaning thus, as the Jews celebrated the Giving of the Law, which, according to Exodus, xix. 11, 15, occurred on the third day after their arrival, upon the fifth or sixth day of the third month, together with that on the fiftieth day after the harvest-feast (Leviticus, xxiii. 15, 16), subsequent to the Exode, according to which the arrival at Sinai must fall on the _third_ day of the third month. It is not to be understood how [Illustration: Hebrew] without any suffix should be used for “new-moon day,” though it has lost that analogical meaning in all the different places, and only signifies _month_, even in such places where the “day of the new moon” is intended (such as Exodus xl. 2, 17; Numbers i. 1; xxxiii. 38), where it is particularly added [Illustration: Hebrew] “on the first (day) of the month,” against which passages like Numbers, ix. 1, and xx. 1, cannot be produced, because there is as little ground to understand the _first_ of the month, as in Exodus xix. 1, and the Seventy do not translate ἐν ἡμέρᾳ μιᾷ, or νουμηνίᾳ, as in the other passages, but only as the simple sense of the words is:--“ἐν τῷ μηνὶ τῷ πρώτῳ”. There would only thus remain one passage, xix. 1, from which one might conclude such an ambiguous use of [Illustration: Hebrew], because here certainly the following words, “on _this_ day,” point to a certain single day which is not, however, now to be guessed from our text. But this, in my opinion, is no unimportant reason for supposing a transposition or a later interpolation of these two verses. The latter idea is also accepted by Ewald, as he (Gesch. v. Isr. vol. i. p. 75) refers the narrative xix. 3, 24, to the oldest source, but not the two first verses. It has been already mentioned that Josephus (_Ant._ iii. 2, 5), who also does not understand the words as referring to the _first_ day of the months, transposes the passage, and, indeed, _to the same place_ whither I, without knowing it, had placed it in my former report (p. 48), i.e. _immediately after the battle_ of the _Amalekites_, to which “this day” most naturally refers. If this be true, the original text also expressed that the Israelites were not only by Horeb but by Sinai, near Raphidîm in Wadi Firân, where they fought