The encounter at Sinai where God spoke to Israel from the top of a flaming mountain may be likened to the consummation of a marriage. Indeed, in the prophets God refers to Himself as a husband to Israel.

“Fear not, for you will not be ashamed; be not confounded, for you will not be disgraced; for you will forget the shame of your youth, and the reproach of your widowhood you will remember no more. For your Maker is your husband, the Lord of hosts is his name; and the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer, the God of the whole earth he is called. For the Lord has called you like a wife deserted and grieved in spirit, like a wife of youth when she is cast off, says your God. For a brief moment I deserted you, but with great compassion I will gather you. (Is 54:4-7)

He also characterizes their straying after pagan gods as adultery.

Oh that my head were waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people! Oh that I had in the desert a travelers’ lodging place, that I might leave my people and go away from them! For they are all adulterers, a company of treacherous men. They bend their tongue like a bow; falsehood and not truth has grown strong in the land; for they proceed from evil to evil, and they do not know me, declares the Lord. (Je 9:1-3)

In that light consider in the abstract what constitutes the consummation of a human marriage. The man and woman physically come together and there is a transfer of information. The seed that the man puts into his bride is pure information. The physical sperm might be likened to a computer flash drive – simply a vehicle to move information from one place to another. The woman receives that information, adds information of her own and brings forth new life.

The word of God is also information. In Genesis 1, he created and formed everything with His word – God said, Let there be…“ Thus, for God to speak to His bride was in fact intended to be a consummation. Sadly, the bride would not:

Now when all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, the people were afraid and trembled, and they stood far off and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, lest we die.” (Ex 20:18-19)

Although this is textually recorded after the Ten Commandments, rabbinic sources indicate that it actually took place between the second and the third commandments.

I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

You shall have no other gods before me.

You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments. (Ex 20:2-6)

Note that these first statements are in the first person. This then shifts to the third person:

You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain. (Ex 20:7)

Since the bride would not allow the word of God to be written upon their hearts, He gave those same words written on the tablets of stone. In this sense, the stone tablets were a metaphor for hearts of stone. The prophet Ezekiel uses that image for the New Covenant:

Thus says the Lord God: “I will gather you from the peoples and assemble you out of the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel.” And when they come there, they will remove from it all its detestable things and all its abominations. And I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in my statutes and keep my rules and obey them. And they shall be my people, and I will be their God. (Eze 11:17-20)

Similarly, Jeremiah:

But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.” (Je 31:33-34)

Note that the word translated as “law” is the Hebrew Torah. Hence, the essence of the New Covenant is that God’s Torah would be written on hearts of flesh as originally intended. The content of that word will not change. It is the same as that received by Moses at Sinai. Only the medium will change, not the message.

The obvious question then is, how does the imposition of a set of laws advance the idea of human liberty?