Exoduschapter 5
23 verses · Moses, by tradition · 15th or 13th century BC · The Law
So Moses returned to the LORD and asked, “Lord, why have You brought trouble upon this people? Is this why You sent me?
Introduction
Moses, by tradition, The Law, Exodus Overview.
This chapter records the first meeting between God's messengers and Egypt's king. It was written for a people who remembered that their first obedience to God made their lives harder. Pharaoh was honored as a god in his own land, and he answers as a man who owes no one an account. Listen for the question he asks about the LORD, since the plagues that follow answer it. Listen also for the complaint Moses brings to God at the close, spoken honestly and left open until the next chapter.
Context
- Who
- Israel in the wilderness, hearing how the rescue of their fathers began
- What
- A narrative chapter recording the first demand made to Pharaoh, his refusal, and the heavier labour laid on Israel.
- Where
- Pharaoh's court in the Delta and the brickfields and harvested fields where Israel worked.
- When
- About 1446 BC on the traditional early date, with the late date placing it in the thirteenth century BC.
- Why
- To show Pharaoh's claim that he owes the LORD nothing and to set the question the plagues will answer.
Historical context
The book claims Moses as its writer at Exodus 17:14, Exodus 24:4 and Exodus 34:27, and Julius Wellhausen's Prolegomena to the History of Israel treats it as a later compilation. At the point this chapter records, the man carrying the demand had returned to Egypt from Midian and held no office in Egypt at all.
Show the rest of the historical context, 3 more paragraphs
The period is the slavery, in the decades before the exodus, which on the early reading of 1 Kings 6:1 is around 1446 BC, held by Eugene Merrill, Bryant Wood and Andrew Steinmann. Kenneth Kitchen and James Hoffmeier read the store cities of Exodus 1:11 as pointing to the Ramesside period and date the exodus in the thirteenth century BC. The place is the eastern Nile Delta, the region Genesis calls Goshen, where the state's building sites stood.
The occasion is the first approach to the throne after the bush, made with the elders' assent behind it. Moses and Aaron ask for a release of three days to sacrifice, which the king hears as the loss of a workforce.
A first hearer knew what the straw was for. Nile clay was trodden with chopped straw, moulded and dried in the sun, and Egyptian records of state building keep running daily totals of bricks with the shortfalls noted. He also knew that forced labour for the crown was ordinary in Egypt, and that the men who bore the blows for a short tally were the foremen drawn from the workforce itself.
Significance
A people one generation out of Egypt heard that their rescue opened with a worse week than the one before it. The chapter gave them the language for what they had been bought out of, a quota held while the material for it was withdrawn.
Show the rest of the significance, 1 more paragraph
It also told them what their own fathers had said to Moses when the load grew, which is the first of the complaints the wilderness years repeat. The last two verses put the same question in Moses' mouth and left it standing until the next chapter answered it.
This chapter in Jewish lifeWhat this chapter is in Jewish life and reading.
How it is read
Rashi reads the chapter as a study in who stood and who slipped away. The elders set out with Moses and Aaron, he says, and dropped back one by one "because they were afraid to go there". At Sinai they were kept at a distance for it (Rashi on Exodus 5:1:1). He notes that the two brothers say the plague may light on us rather than on Pharaoh, "but they showed respect to royalty" (Rashi on Exodus 5:3:1). He divides the two ranks of overseer in verse 6, holding the taskmasters to be Egyptians and the bailiffs under them Israelites (Rashi on Exodus 5:6:1). At verse 14 he reads the beating of those bailiffs as the price of mercy. They "spared their fellow-Israelites, not urging them on to their work", and the seventy elders of Numbers 11 were later drawn from them (Rashi on Exodus 5:14:1). The text is the Rosenbaum and Silbermann Rashi of 1929 to 1934, in the public domain. Ibn Ezra's notes on Pharaoh's answer and on the bailiffs' complaint stand by reference alone (Ibn Ezra on Exodus 5:2:1 and 5:15:1).
What the rabbis say
The rabbis take up the demand for a feast in the wilderness at Chagigah 10b:3 and 10b:9. On the heavier load laid on the people they taught in Shemot Rabbah 5:19 and Midrash Lekach Tov, Exodus 5:10:1. On the scattering of the people to gather stubble they taught at Berakhot 9a:14. The Mekhilta carries this chapter at Tractate Nezikin 1:9 and Tractate Vayehi Beshalach 3:17.
Sources: Rashi, Rashi on Exodus 5:1:1, 5:3:1, 5:6:1 and 5:14:1, Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A. M. Silbermann, 1929 to 1934 (public domain); Ibn Ezra, Ibn Ezra on Exodus 5:2:1 and 5:15:1, cited by ref alone under the corpus licence rule; The Babylonian Talmud, Chagigah 10b:3 and 10b:9, and Berakhot 9a:14, cited by ref; The Midrash, Shemot Rabbah 5:19, Midrash Lekach Tov, Exodus 5:10:1, and Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael, Tractate Nezikin 1:9 and Tractate Vayehi Beshalach 3:17, cited by ref.
The heads below are this chapter's scenes. The numbered points under each are its verses.
Let My People Go: Pharaoh Refuses
The demand is freedom for a purpose, and the purpose travels with it. Let my people go occurs nine times in Exodus and seven of those carry the clause that they may serve me, at 4:23, 7:16, 8:1, 8:20, 9:1, 9:13 and 10:3. Here it is a feast in the wilderness, so the first thing Pharaoh is asked to release is worship.
Exodus 5:1
“Moses and Aaron went in--As representatives of the Hebrews, they were entitled to ask an audience of the king, and their thorough Egyptian training taught them how and when to seek it. and told Pharaoh--When introduced, they delivered a message in the name of the God of Israel. This is the first time He is mentioned by that national appellation in Scripture.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
1 more voice on this verseWhat preachers and commentators have said about this verse, in their own words.
Exodus 5:1
“Pharaoh - This king, probably Tothmosis II, the great grandson of Aahmes Exo 1:8, the original persecutor of the Israelites, must have been resident at this time in a city, probably Tanis Exo 2:5, of Lower Egypt, situated on the Nile. The Lord God - Yahweh God of Israel demanded the services of His people. The demand, according to the general views of the pagans, was just and natural; the Israelites could not offer the necessary sacrifices in the presence of Egyptians.”
Pharaoh's question is the one the rest of the book answers. God's stated aim in the plagues uses the same vocabulary back at him, that the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD, at 7:5, 14:4 and 14:18, and at 12:31 Pharaoh himself tells Moses to go and serve the LORD and then asks to be blessed. Adam Clarke reads the question as the ordinary assumption that every nation had its own god rather than as a denial that any god exists.
Exodus 5:2
“Who is the Lord - Who is Jehovah, that I should obey his voice? What claims has he on me? I am under no obligation to him. Pharaoh spoke here under the common persuasion that every place and people had a tutelary deity, and he supposed that this Jehovah might be the tutelary deity of the Israelites, to whom he, as an Egyptian, could be under no kind of obligation. It is not judicious to bring this question as a proof that Pharaoh was an atheist: of this the text affords no evidence.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Exodus 5:2
“And Pharaoh said, Who is the Lord--rather "Jehovah." Lord was a common name applied to objects of worship; but Jehovah was a name he had never heard of. Pharaoh estimated the character and power of this God by the abject and miserable condition of the worshippers and concluded that He held as low a rank among the gods as His people did in the nation.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
The three day march into the desert repeats the wording Moses was given at the bush. God gave him these words at Exodus 3:18, including the title the God of the Hebrews and the length of the march, so Moses delivers the errand as it was framed for him. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown read the partial request as a way of testing the king before the whole intention was disclosed, and the text itself reports only the words.
Exodus 5:3
“We pray thee, let us go three days journey into the desert - And that on a good errand, and unexceptionable: we will sacrifice to the Lord our God - As other people do to theirs; lest if we quite cast off his worship, he fall upon us - With one judgment or other, and then Pharaoh will lose his vassals.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Exodus 5:3
“Three days’ journey - See the Exo 3:18 note. With pestilence, or with the sword - This shows that the plague was well known to the ancient Egyptians. The reference to the sword is equally natural, since the Israelites occupied the eastern district, which was frequently disturbed by the neighboring Shasous.”
Exodus 5:4-5
Pharaoh answers a request about worship with a sentence about work, and his word for it is burdens, the same word that carried the oppression at 1:11 and the scene Moses walked into at 2:11. His reason in verse 5 repeats the fear that started the bondage, that the people of the land now are many, which is what the new king said at 1:9. The reply deals with labour and numbers alone.
Exodus 5:4
“Wherefore do ye, Moses and Aaron - He hints that the Hebrews are in a state of revolt, and charges Moses and Aaron as being ringleaders of the sedition. This unprincipled charge has been, in nearly similar circumstances, often repeated since. Men who have labored to bring the mass of the common people from ignorance, irreligion, and general profligacy of manners, to an acquaintance with themselves and God, and to a proper knowledge of their duty to him and to each other, have been often branded as being disaffected to the state, and as movers of sedition among the people!”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Exodus 5:4
“13 And the taskmasters hasted them, saying, Fulfil your works, your daily tasks, as when there was straw. 14 And the officers of the children of Israel, which Pharaoh's taskmasters had set over them, were beaten, and demanded, Wherefore have ye not fulfilled your task in making brick both yesterday and to day, as heretofore?”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
the people of the land are now numerous: Pharaoh counts the request in lost labor. A large Hebrew workforce resting for a feast means a large loss of output, and he blames Moses and Aaron for it. The growth that alarmed the earlier king in chapter 1 is now counted as his asset. Adam Clarke infers that the order to kill the infant boys had long since lapsed, since the people had multiplied so greatly.
Exodus 5:5
“The people of the land now are many - The sanguinary edict had no doubt been long before repealed, or they could not have multiplied so greatly.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Exodus 5:6-7
Two ranks stand between Pharaoh and the brickfield, the taskmasters who are Egyptians and the officers who are Israelites set over their own countrymen. Verse 14 shows the arrangement working, since it is the Hebrew officers who are beaten when the count falls short. The straw was chopped and mixed into the clay, and Egyptian sun dried brick has been recovered with the straw still in it.
Exodus 5:6
“The task-masters of the people and their officers - The task-masters were Egyptians, (see Clarke on Exo 1:11 (note)), the officers were Hebrews; see Clarke below Exo 5:14 (note). But it is probable that the task-masters Exo 1:11, who are called שרי מסים sarey missim, princes of the burdens or taxes, were different from those termed taskmasters here, as the words are different; נגשים nogesim signifies exactors or oppressors - persons who exacted from them an unreasonable proportion either of labor or money.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
no longer supply the people with straw: Pharaoh answers the request with harder labor. Straw was mixed with mud to bind sun-dried bricks, and the Hebrews must now gather it themselves while making the same number of bricks. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown note that brickmaking was a royal monopoly, and Albert Barnes judges that the new order more than doubled their labor.
Exodus 5:7
“Ye shall no more give the people straw to make brick--The making of bricks appears to have been a government monopoly as the ancient bricks are nearly all stamped with the name of a king, and they were formed, as they are still in Lower Egypt, of clay mixed with chopped straw and dried or hardened in the sun.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
1 more voice on this verse
Exodus 5:7
“Some of the most ancient buildings in Egypt were constructed of bricks not burned, but dried in the sun; they were made of clay, or more commonly of mud, mixed with straw chopped into small pieces. An immense quantity of straw must have been wanted for the works on which the Israelites were engaged, and their labors must have been more than doubled by this requisition.”
Exodus 5:8-9
Tale here means the count, so the quota stands while the material is withdrawn. Pharaoh gives his reason twice, that they be idle, and he calls the message brought to him vain words. A request to be released for the service of God is answered by increasing the service owed to Pharaoh, and the Hebrew root behind both kinds of service is the same one.
Exodus 5:8
“And the tale of the bricks - Tale signifies the number, from the Anglo-Saxon to number, to count, etc. For they be idle; therefore they cry - Let us go and sacrifice - Thus their desire to worship the true God in a proper manner was attributed to their unwillingness to work; a reflection which the Egyptians (in principle) of the present day cast on these who, while they are fervent in spirit serving the Lord, are not slothful in business. See Clarke below Exo 5:17 (note).”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Make the work harder on the men: Pharaoh states the aim of his order plainly. Heavier work will leave the people no strength or time to listen to Moses, whose message he calls lies. Oppression here serves to silence hope. Albert Barnes, on verse 7, judges that gathering their own straw more than doubled the labor of the Israelites.
Exodus 5:9
“Note, The malice of Satan has often represented the service and worship of God as fit employment for those only that have nothing else to do, and the business only of the idle; whereas indeed it is the indispensable duty of those that are most busy in the world.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
1 more voice on this verse
Exodus 5:9
“When both the good and the bad do the same things and suffer the same things, they are to be distinguished by their intentions, not by their acts and penalties. Pharaoh oppressed the people of God with hard labors; Moses afflicted the same people, who had fallen into idolatry, with severe punishments. They did the same things, but they did not aim at the same result. The former was puffed up with pride of power, the latter was animated by love.”
Augustine of Hippo · written before 430 · LETTER 93patristic
Bricks Without Straw
Exodus 5:10-11
Thus saith Pharaoh stands in the same chapter as Thus saith the LORD at verse 1, and the two formulas are carried by two sets of messengers to the same people. A word from God is answered by a word from the throne in the same form. Verse 11 leaves the people to find straw wherever they can and keeps the daily count exactly where it was.
Exodus 5:10
“And the taskmasters of the people went out,.... From the presence of Pharaoh, out of his court, to the respective places where they were set to see that the Israelites did their work: and their officers; the officers of the Israelites, who were under the taskmasters, and answerable to them for the work of the people, and their tale of bricks: and they spake to the people, saying, thus saith Pharaoh, I will not give you straw; that is, any longer, as he had used to do.”
Go and get your own straw: The taskmasters pass on Pharaoh's order word for word. The people must find straw wherever they can, and the quota stays the same. Verse 12 shows the result, with the people scattered over Egypt gathering stubble. John Gill, on verse 12, explains that they gathered the stubble left in the fields after the harvest.
Exodus 5:12-13
A nation settled together in Goshen is spread through all the land of Egypt hunting stubble. Albert Barnes places the search after the barley and wheat harvest, which puts it in the weeks when the hot wind blows across Egypt. The taskmasters hold the daily tasks at the rate that was set when the straw was still being delivered.
Exodus 5:12
“So the people were scattered abroad throughout all the land of Egypt,.... That part of it where they dwelt: to gather stubble instead of straw; straw not being easy to come at, they were obliged to gather stubble that was left in the fields, after the corn was gathered in. Ben Melech observes, that the word signifies small straw, or small sticks of wood, and Kimchi (m), and if so, this must be to burn the bricks with in the furnaces. (m) Sepher Shorash, rad. קשש.”
2 more voices on this verse
Exodus 5:12
“So the people were scattered--It was an immense grievance to the laborers individually, but there would be no hindrance from the husbandmen whose fields they entered, as almost all the lands of Egypt were in the possession of the crown (Ge 47:20).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Exodus 5:12
“Stubble instead of straw - Rather, for the straw: i. e. to be prepared as straw. This marks the season of the year, namely, early spring, after the barley or wheat harvest, toward the end of April. Their suffering must have been severe: at that season the pestilential sand-wind blows over Egypt some 50 days, hence, its name - Chamsin. (compare Gen 41:6 note).”
The taskmasters press for the daily quota as though straw were still supplied. The demand cannot be met, and it leads to the beating of the Israelite foremen in the next verse. Adam Clarke, on verse 14, describes the Egyptian punishment of blows to the soles of the feet, which could leave a man unable to walk for weeks.
Exodus 5:13
“And the taskmasters hasted them, Kept them tight and close to their work, and were urgent on them to make quick dispatch of it: saying, fulfil your works, your daily tasks, as when there was straw; they insisted upon it, that they did the same business at the brickkilns, made the same number of bricks every day, as they used to do when they had straw at hand. See Exo 5:11.”
1 more voice on this verse
Exodus 5:13
“The enmity of the serpent's seed against the seed of the woman is such as breaks through all the laws of reason, honour, humanity, and common justice.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
The blows land on the Israelite officers rather than on the Egyptians who issued the order. Adam Clarke describes the punishment as the bastinado, laid on the soles of the feet, which was the ordinary Egyptian penalty for a minor offence and left a man unable to walk for weeks. A tomb painting found at Thebes shows brickmakers working under overseers with sticks, which is the scene these verses describe.
Exodus 5:14
“And the officers - were beaten - Probably bastinadoed; for this is the common punishment in Egypt to the present day for minor offenses. The manner of it is this: the culprit lies on his belly, his legs being turned up behind erect, and the executioner gives him so many blows on the soles of the feet with a stick. This is a very severe punishment, the sufferer not being able to walk for many weeks after, and some are lamed by it through the whole of their lives.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Exodus 5:14
"The mode of beating was by the offender being laid flat on the ground and generally held by the hands and feet while the chastisement was administered" [WILKINSON]. A picture representing the Hebrews on a brick field, exactly as described in this chapter, was found in an Egyptian tomb at Thebes.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Why Have You Dealt Ill With Us?
Exodus 5:15-16
Israel cried at 2:23 and the cry came up unto God, who heard and remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Here the officers cry to the man who signed the order they are appealing against, and they leave with nothing. They tell him that the fault is in thine own people, which is as near an accusation as a slave may carry to a king.
Exodus 5:15
“Then the officers of the children of Israel came and cried unto Pharaoh,.... Made their complaints to him, perhaps with tears in their eyes, being used so very ill. They little thought it was by Pharaoh's orders; they supposed he knew nothing of it, and therefore hoped to have their grievances redressed by him, but were mistaken: saying, wherefore dealest thou thus with thy servants? so they call themselves, they living in his country, and being under his jurisdiction, though not properly his subjects; however, he had made them his slaves, and so indeed even bondservants.”
The foremen lay the injustice before Pharaoh: no straw is given, the same bricks are demanded, and they are beaten for the shortfall. They place the blame on Pharaoh's own taskmasters. Adam Clarke notes that the Hebrew word here is the ordinary word for sin, so the foremen charge Egypt's officials with wrongdoing.
Exodus 5:16
“The fault is in thine own people - חטאת chatath, the sin, is in thy own people. 1st. Because they require impossibilities; and 2dly, because they punish us for not doing what cannot be performed.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Exodus 5:17-18
Pharaoh repeats the charge instead of answering the complaint. Albert Barnes notes that Egyptian religious texts count idleness among the sins weighed at the final judgment, so the king is reaching for a word his own court would take seriously against men who work in a brickfield. Verse 18 closes the interview by restating the terms, no straw and the same tale of bricks.
Exodus 5:17
Even Pharaoh knew that it was proper for one to seek God when he was unoccupied, and for this reason he reproached Israel: "You are unoccupied, you are idle, and you say, 'We shall offer prayers to the Lord, our God.' " Now leisure itself is good and useful to him who is unoccupied, since it produces quiet for the acquisition of salutary doctrines. But the leisure of the Athenians was evil, "who used to spend all their leisure telling or listening to something new."
Basil of Caesarea · written before 379 · EXEGETIC HOMILIES 18.8patristic
1 more voice on this verse
Exodus 5:17
“Ye are idle - The old Egyptian language abounds in epithets which show contempt for idleness. The charge was equally offensive and ingenious; one which would be readily believed by Egyptians who knew how much public and private labors were impeded by festivals and other religious ceremonies. Among the great sins which, according to Egyptian belief, involved condemnation in the final judgment, idleness is twice mentioned.”
Now get to work: Pharaoh dismisses the appeal and repeats his order unchanged: no straw, and the full quota of bricks. The foremen came for relief and leave with the burden confirmed. Albert Barnes, on verse 17, notes that the charge of idleness was one Egyptians would readily believe, since idleness counted among the grave sins in Egyptian belief.
Exodus 5:19-20
The officers now understand that the order came from the throne and that no appeal is left anywhere. Adam Clarke reads their position as one where they could expect neither justice nor mercy. They place themselves in the way as Moses and Aaron come out, so the meeting in the next verse is arranged rather than accidental.
Exodus 5:19
“Did see that they were in evil case - They saw that they could neither expect justice nor mercy; that their deliverance was very doubtful, and their case almost hopeless.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
who stood waiting to meet them: Moses and Aaron wait outside to hear the result of the audience. The meeting turns the foremen's anger from Pharaoh toward the two men who brought the LORD's message. John Wesley, on verse 21, observes that those called to serve God's people must expect unkind censure from friends as well as threats from enemies.
Exodus 5:20
“And they met Moses and Aaron,.... The officers of the children of Israel, who had been with their complaints to Pharaoh: who stood in the way as they came forth from Pharaoh; they, had placed themselves in a proper situation, that they might meet them when they came out, and know what success they had, and which they were extremely desirous of hearing; by which they might judge in what temper Pharaoh was, and what they might for the future expect from him in consequence of their embassy.”
the LORD look upon you and judge: This is the first time Israel turns on Moses, and the same shape returns at the sea in 14:11, at Marah in 15:24, in the wilderness of Sin at 16:2 and at Rephidim in 17:2. The word murmured does not occur until 15:24, so what stands here is the pattern of the complaint rather than the term Exodus later uses for it. John Wesley observes that men called to public service are tried by the censure of friends as well as by the threats of enemies.
Exodus 5:21
“The Lord look upon you, and judge - These were hasty and unkind expressions; but the afflicted must be allowed the privilege of complaining; it is all the solace that such sorrow can find; and if in such distress words are spoken which should not be justified, yet the considerate and benevolent will hear them with indulgence. God is merciful; and the stroke of this people was heavier even than their groaning. Put a sword in their hand - Given them a pretense which they had not before, to oppress us even unto death.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Exodus 5:21
“The Lord look upon you, and judge - They should have humbled themselves before God, but instead of that they fly in the face of their best friends. Those that are called to public service for God and their generation, must expect to be tried not only by the threats of proud enemies, but by the unjust and unkind censures of unthinking friends.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Exodus 5:22-23
Moses brings the charge to God directly, that God has dealt evil with this people and has not delivered them at all. The text records no rebuke, and the answer at 6:1 is a promise rather than a correction, now shalt thou see what I will do to Pharaoh. Habakkuk 1:2 and Jeremiah 20:7 press the same kind of question, and Scripture keeps the protests of its own prophets on the record.
Exodus 5:22
“And Moses returned unto the Lord - This may imply, either that there was a particular place into which Moses ordinarily went to commune with Jehovah; or it may mean that kind of turning of heart and affection to God, which every pious mind feels itself disposed to practice in any time or place.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
You have not delivered Your people: Moses sets the promise against what has happened: since he spoke in the LORD's name, the people's trouble has grown. He brings the complaint to God directly, and the LORD answers it in 6:1 with the promise of His mighty hand. Albert Barnes finds the boldness of this protest in keeping with Moses' impetuous character.
Exodus 5:23
“The earnestness of this remonstrance, and even its approach to irreverence, are quite in keeping with other notices of Moses’ naturally impetuous character. See Exo 3:13.”
How this psalm is built
The form: Narrative prose, the report of one audience with a king and of the reprisal in the brickfield that followed it, as Henry classes it.
The patterns in this chapter
| Device | What it does | Where to see it |
|---|---|---|
| Thus saith the LORD answered in the same form by Thus saith Pharaoh | Verse 1 opens with the messenger formula of a word from God, and verse 10 opens with the same formula carried from the throne. Two sets of messengers bring the two words to the same people in the same chapter. The published note on verses 10 and 11 makes this pairing the point, and it cites John Gill and Matthew Henry.John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament. | Exodus 5:1, Exodus 5:10 |
| The quota restated five times and never once reduced | The count of bricks is stated again at every stage of the order. Pharaoh sets it in verse 8, the taskmasters carry it in verse 11, and they press it daily in verse 13. Pharaoh restates it in verse 18, and the foremen hear it a last time in verse 19. The material is withdrawn and the number holds, which is the whole cruelty of the chapter said over and over. | Exodus 5:8, Exodus 5:11, Exodus 5:13, Exodus 5:18, Exodus 5:19 |
| One Hebrew root for the service owed to God and the service owed to Pharaoh | Moses asks that the people be released to serve God, and Pharaoh answers by increasing what they owe him. The published note on verses 8 and 9 reports that the Hebrew root behind both kinds of service is the same one, so the request and the punishment are framed in one word. The same note records that Pharaoh gives his reason twice, that the people are idle.Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible. | Exodus 5:1, Exodus 5:8, Exodus 5:9 |
| The order passed down four ranks and the appeal carried back up them | Pharaoh speaks to the taskmasters and the foremen in verse 6, the taskmasters and foremen speak to the people in verse 10, and the taskmasters press the people in verse 13. The appeal then runs the other way, since the foremen go to Pharaoh in verse 15 and get the charge of idleness back. The chapter is built out of these speeches and reports almost no action of its own. | Exodus 5:6, Exodus 5:10, Exodus 5:13, Exodus 5:15 |
| The charge of idleness repeated in place of an answer | Pharaoh calls the people lazy in verse 8, before he has met them, and he calls the foremen slackers twice over in verse 17 when they bring him their complaint. The word stands in the place where a reply to the complaint would go. The published note on verses 17 and 18 cites Albert Barnes and Adam Clarke for the reading. | Exodus 5:8, Exodus 5:17 |
Pharaoh's question in verse 2 is the question the rest of the book answers. He asks who the LORD is and says he does not know Him. God's stated aim in the plagues uses the same vocabulary back at him, that the Egyptians shall know that He is the LORD, at Exodus 7:5, Exodus 14:4 and Exodus 14:18. At Exodus 12:31 Pharaoh himself tells Moses to go and serve the LORD, and then he asks to be blessed. Adam Clarke reads the question as the ordinary assumption that every nation had its own god rather than as a denial that any god exists.
7 more paragraphs on the patterns
The demand itself is the book's standing formula. The site's note on verse 1 reports that let my people go occurs nine times in Exodus. Seven of those nine carry the clause that they may serve Me. The seven stand at Exodus 4:23, Exodus 7:16, Exodus 8:1, Exodus 8:20, Exodus 9:1, Exodus 9:13 and Exodus 10:3. What Pharaoh is first asked to release is worship, and the feast in the wilderness is the stated purpose.
The chapter also opens a pattern that runs to the end of the wilderness years. Verse 21 is the first time Israel turns on Moses. The same shape returns at the sea in Exodus 14:11, at Marah in Exodus 15:24, in the wilderness of Sin at Exodus 16:2 and at Rephidim in Exodus 17:2. The word the book later uses for that complaint does not occur until Exodus 15:24, so what stands here is the pattern rather than the term.
Moses' own protest in verses 22 and 23 is kept on the record without a rebuke. The site's note on those verses sets them beside Habakkuk 1:2 and Jeremiah 20:7, where prophets press the same kind of question, and it cites Matthew Henry and Albert Barnes.
The debated point
Verse 5 has Pharaoh say that the people of the land are now numerous. That is the fear the new king stated at Exodus 1:9, and it touches a question the book dossier carries with its holders. One position reads the figures of Exodus 12:37 and the census of Numbers 1 literally, which gives a total well over two million. It answers the difficulty from the text's own record of extraordinary provision of manna, quail and water. The dossier names this the traditional reading and that of most conservative commentators. The other position holds that the Hebrew word eleph, ordinarily a thousand, carried a secondary sense of a clan or a military unit. The dossier names Colin Humphreys and others for that reading, working from the word's flexible use at Joshua 22:14. It would put the true figure in the tens of thousands. The dossier states no verdict and neither does this row.
Where to go deeper
The whole rescue this chapter opens is set out at The Exodus. The country it happens in is set out at Egypt.
Keep studying
Studies1
Places1
Words12
Subjects1
Sources for this chapter
The summary
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Calvin, Commentaries; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.
The form and classifications
Jamieson, Fausset and Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.
The exposition
Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament; Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament: The Pentateuch and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.