Moses, saying, Mosen, dicendo:
JOHN CALVIN
13. And the Lord spoke unto Moses, saying,
13. Loquutus est autem Jehova ad Mosen, dicendo:
14. Bring forth him that hath cursed without the camp, and let all that heard him lay their hands upon his head, and let all the congregation stone him.
14. Educ blasphemum extra castra, et ponant omnes qui audierunt manus suas super caput ejus, et lapidet eum universus coetus.
10. And the son of an Israelitish woman. In what year, and in what station in the desert this occurred, is uncertain. I have, therefore, thought it advisable to couple together two cases, which are not dissimilar. It is probable that between this instance of punishment, and that which will immediately follow, there was an interval of some time: but the connection of two similar occurrences seemed best to preserve the order of the history; one of the persons referred to having been stoned for profaning God's sacred name by wicked blasphemy, and the other for despising and violating the Sabbath. It is to be observed that the crime of the former of these gave occasion to the promulgation of a law, which we have expounded elsewhere: 508 in accordance with the common proverb, Good laws spring from bad habits: for, after punishment had been inflicted on this blasphemer, Moses ordained that none should insult the name of God with impunity.
It was providentially ordered by God that the earliest manifestation of this severity should affect the son of an Egyptian: for, inasmuch as God thus harshly avenged the insult of His name upon the offspring of a foreigner and a heathen, far less excusable was impiety in Israelites, whom God had, as it were, taken up from their mothers' womb, and had brought them up in His own bosom. It is true, indeed, that on his mother's side he had sprung from the chosen people, but, being begotten by an Egyptian father, he could not be properly accounted an Israelite. If, then, there had been any room for the exercise of pardon, a specious reason might have been alleged why forgiveness should be more readily extended to a man of an alien and impure origin. The majesty of God's name, however, was ratified by his death. Hence it follows that it is by no means to be permitted that God's name should be exposed with impunity to blasphemies among the sons of the Church.
We may learn from this passage that during their tyrannical oppression many young women married into the Egyptian nation, in order that their See vol. 2, p. 431, on Leviticus 24:15, 16.