John Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible.

John Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible.

Genesis 50:1



INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS 50



This chapter contains a short account of what happened from the death of Jacob to the death of Joseph, and is chiefly concerned with the funeral of Jacob; it first gives an account how Joseph was affected with his father's death, of his orders to the physicians to embalm him, and of the time of their embalming him, and of the Egyptians mourning for him, Ge 50:1, next of his request to Pharaoh to give him leave to go and bury his father in Canaan, and his grant of it, Ge 50:4 and then of the grand funeral procession thither, the mourning made for Jacob, and his interment according to his orders, Ge 50:7 upon the return of Joseph and his brethren to Egypt, they fearing his resentment of their former usage of him, entreat him to forgive them; which they said they did at the direction of their father, to which Joseph readily agreed, and comforted them, and spoke kindly to them, and bid them not fear any hurt from him, for whatever were their intention, God meant it, and had overruled it for good, Ge 50:14 and the chapter is concluded with an account of Joseph's age and death, and of his posterity he saw before his death, and of the charge he gave to his brethren to carry his bones with them, when they should depart from Egypt, Ge 50:22.



Ver. 1. And Joseph fell upon his father's face,.... Laid his own face to the cold face and pale cheeks of his dead father, out of his tender affection for him, and grief at parting with him; this shows that Joseph had been present from the time his father sent for him, and all the while he had been blessing the tribes, and giving orders about his funeral:



and wept upon him; which to do for and over the dead is neither unlawful nor unbecoming, provided it is not carried to excess, as the instances of David, Christ, and others show:



and kissed him; taking his farewell of him, as friends used to do, when parting and going a long journey, as death is. This was practised by Heathens, who had a notion that the soul went out of the body by the mouth, and they in this way received it into themselves: so Augustus Caesar died in the kisses of Livia, and Drusius in the embraces and kisses of Caesar {w}. Joseph no doubt at this time closed the eyes of his father also, as it is said he should, and as was usual; see

Ge 46:4.



{w} Vid. Kirchman. de Funer. Rom. l. 1. c. 5.





Genesis 50:2



Ver. 2. And Joseph commanded his servants, the physicians, to embalm his father,.... Which he did, not merely because it was the custom of the Egyptians, but because it was necessary, his father's corpse being to be carried into Canaan to be interred there, which would require time; and therefore it was proper to make use of some means for the preservation of it, and these men were expert in this business, which was a branch of the medicinal art, as Pliny {x} and Mela {y} suggest; and of these Joseph had more than one, as great personages have their physicians ready to attend them on any occasion, as kings and princes, and such was Joseph, being viceroy of Egypt. Herodotus {z} says the Egyptians had physicians peculiar to every disease, one for one disease, and another for another; and Homer {a} speaks of them as the most skilful of all men; though the Septuagint render the word by

entafiastai, the "buriers", such who took care of the burial of persons, to provide for it, and among the rest to embalm, dry, and roll up the bodies in linen:



and the physicians embalmed him; the manner of embalming, as Herodotus {b} relates, was this,



"first with a crooked iron instrument they extracted the brain through the nostrils, which they got out partly by this means, and partly by the infusion of medicines; then with a sharp Ethiopian stone they cut about the flank, and from thence took out all the bowels, which, when they had cleansed, they washed with palm wine (or wine of dates), and after that again with odours, bruised; then they filled the bowels (or hollow place out of which they were taken) with pure myrrh beaten, and with cassia and other odours, frankincense excepted, and sewed them up; after which they seasoned (the corpse) with nitre, hiding (or covering it therewith) seventy days, and more than that they might not season it; the seventy days being ended, they washed the corpse, and wrapped the whole body in bands of fine linen, besmearing it with gum, which gum the Egyptians use generally instead of glue.''



And Diodorus Siculus {c}, who gives much the same account, says, that every part was retained so perfectly, that the very hairs of the eyebrows, and the whole form of the body, were invariable, and the features might be known; and the same writer tells us, that the expense of embalming was different; the highest price was a talent of silver, about one hundred and eighty seven pounds and ten shillings of our money, the middlemost twenty pounds, and the last and lowest were very small. The embalmers he calls tariceutai, and says they were in great esteem, and reckoned worthy of much honour, and were very familiar with the priests, and might go into holy places when they pleased, as the priests themselves.



{x} Plin. Nat. Hist. l. 11. c. 37. {y} De Orbis Situ, l. 1. c. 9. {z} Euterpe, sive, l. 2. c. 84. {a} Odyss. 4. {b} lbid. c. 86. {c} Bibliothec. l. 1. p. 81, 82.





Genesis 50:3



Ver. 3. Forty days were fulfilled for him,.... Were spent in embalming him:



for so are fulfilled the days of those that are embalmed; so long the body lay in the pickle, in ointment of cedar, myrrh and cinnamon, and other things, that it might soak and penetrate thoroughly into it: and so Diodorus Siculus {d} says, that having laid more than thirty days in such a state, it was delivered to the kindred of the deceased:



and the Egyptians mourned for him seventy days; during the time of their embalming him; for longer than seventy days the body might not lie in the pickle, as before observed, from Herodotus. According to Diodorus Siculus {e}, the Egyptians used to mourn for their kings seventy two days: the account he gives is, that



"upon the death of a king, all Egypt went into a common mourning, tore their garments, shut up their temples, forbid sacrifices, kept not the feasts for seventy two days, put clay upon their heads {f}, girt linen clothes under their breasts; men and women, two or three hundred together, went about twice a day, singing in mournful verses the praises of the deceased; they abstained from animal food, and from wine, and all dainty things; nor did they use baths, nor ointments, nor lie in soft beds, nor dared to use venery, but, as if it was for the death of a beloved child, spent the said days in sorrow and mourning.''



Now these seventy days here are either a round number for seventy two, or two are taken from them, as Quistorpius suggests, to make a difference between Jacob, and a king of theirs, who yet being the father of their viceroy, they honoured in such a manner. Jarchi accounts for the number thus, forty for embalming, and thirty for mourning; which latter was the usual time for mourning with the Jews for principal men, and which the Egyptians added to their forty of embalming; see Nu 20:29



{d} lBibliothec. l. 1. p. 82. {e} lbid. p. 65. {f} Vid. Pompon. Mela de Situ Orbis, l. 1. c. 9.





Genesis 50:4



Ver. 4. And when the days of his mourning were past,.... The forty days before mentioned, in which both the Egyptians and Jacob's family mourned for him. An Arabic writer {g} says, the Egyptians mourned for Jacob forty days, which was the time of embalming; but the text is express for sventy days:



Joseph spake unto the house of Pharaoh; to the court of Pharaoh, the principal men there; so the Targum of Jonathan and the Septuagint version, to the great men or princes of the house of Pharaoh: it may seem strange that Joseph, being next to Pharaoh in the administration of the government, should make use of any to speak for him to Pharaoh on the following account. It may be, that Joseph was not in so high an office, and in so much power and authority, as in the seven years of plenty and the seven years of famine; and it is certain that that branch of his office, respecting the corn, must have ceased; or this might have been a piece of policy in Joseph to make these men his friends by such obliging treatment, and by this means prevent their making objections to his suit, or plotting against him in his absence; or if it was the custom in Egypt, as it afterwards was in Persia, that no man might appear before the king in a mourning habit, Es 4:2 this might be the reason of his not making application in person: moreover, it might not seem so decent for him to come to court, and leave the dead, and his father's family, in such circumstances as they were: besides, he might speak to them not in person, but by a messenger, since it is highly probable he was now in Goshen, at a distance from Pharaoh's court; unless it can be supposed that these were some of Pharaoh's courtiers who were come to him in Goshen, to condole his father's death:



saying, if now I have found grace in your eyes, speak, I pray you, in the ears of Pharaoh; however, as these men had the ear of Pharaoh, and an interest in him, Joseph entreats the favour of them to move it to him:



saying, as follows, in his name.



{g} Elmacinus, p. 43. apud Hottinger. Smegma, c. 8. p. 380.





Genesis 50:5



Ver. 5. My father made me swear, saying, lo, I die,.... Having reason to believe he should not live long, he sent for Joseph, and took an oath of him to do as follows; this Joseph would have observed to Pharaoh, to show the necessity of his application to him, and the reasonableness of his request. The words of dying men are always to be regarded; their dying charge is always attended to by those who have a regard to duty and honour; but much more when an oath is annexed to them, which among all nations was reckoned sacred:



in the grave which I have digged for me in the land of Canaan, there shalt thou bury me; it was usual with persons in their lifetime to prepare graves or sepulchres for themselves, as appears from the instances of Shebna, Joseph of Arimathea, and others, and so Jacob provided one for himself; and when he is said to "dig" it, it is not to be supposed that he dug it himself, but ordered it to be dug by his servants, and very probably this was done at the time he buried Leah. Onkelos renders it, "which I have bought", possessed or obtained by purchase; and so the word is used in Ho 3:2 but the cave of Machpelah, in which Jacob's grave was, was not bought by him, but by Abraham; for to say, as some Jewish writers {h} suggest, that he bought Esau's part in it with a mess of pottage, is without foundation; it is better to take the words in the first sense. And now, since it was Jacob's desire, yea, his dying charge, to be buried in the grave he had provided for himself, the mention of this to an Egyptian king could not fail of having its desired effect; since the Egyptians, as the historian {i} says, were more careful about their graves than about their houses:



now therefore let me go up, I pray thee; to the land of Canaan, which lay higher than Egypt;



and bury my father; there, in the grave he has provided for himself:



and I will come again: to the land of Egypt; this he would have said, lest it should be thought he only contrived this to get an opportunity of going away to Canaan with all his wealth and riches.



{h} R. David Kimchi Sepher Shorash. rad. hrk Ben Melech in loc. {i} Diodor. Sic. Bibliothec. l. 1. p. 47.





Genesis 50:6



Ver. 6. And Pharaoh said,.... To Joseph, by the courtiers that waited upon him at Joseph's request, who having delivered it to him had this answer:



go up, and bury thy father, as he made thee swear; the oath seems to be the principal thing that influenced Pharaoh to grant the request, it being a sacred thing, and not to be violated; otherwise, perhaps, he would not have chosen that Joseph should have been so long absent from him, and might have thought a grave in Egypt, and an honourable interment there, which he would have spared no cost to have given, might have done as well, or better.





Genesis 50:7



Ver. 7. And Joseph went up to bury his father,.... According to his request; having obtained leave of Pharaoh, and being desirous of paying his last respects, and doing his last office to so dear a parent, with all the honour and decency this service could be done with:



and with him went up all the servants of Pharaoh; a great number of them, some must be left to wait upon him; who these were the next words explain:



the elders of his house: his senators and counsellors, his courtiers and principal officers of state:



and all the elders of the land of Egypt; governors of provinces and cities, the chief officers, civil and military; all which was done by the orders of Pharaoh, out of respect to Joseph and his family, and to make the funeral procession grand and honourable.





Genesis 50:8



Ver. 8. And all the house of Joseph, and his brethren, and his father's house,.... Joseph and his two sons, and his servants, and his eleven brethren and their sons that were grown up, and as many of his father's domestics as could be spared attended the funeral:



only their little ones, and their flocks, and their herds, they left in the land of Goshen; there must be some servants left, though they are not mentioned, to take care of the little ones, and of the flocks and herds; and these being left behind, plainly show they intended to return again, and did not make this an excuse to get out of the land.





Genesis 50:9



Ver. 9. And there went up with him both chariots and horsemen,.... Which was done both for the sake of honour and grandeur, and for safety and defence, should they be attacked by robbers in the deserts, or opposed by the Canaanites, and be refused the use of the cave of Machpelah, and the right to it disputed:



and it was a very great company; both for quantity and quality; the attendants at this funeral were very numerous, and many of them great personages, and upon the whole was a very honourable company, as the word {k} signifies, and made a very great figure and grand appearance:



or a very great army {l}, consisting of chariots and horsemen fit for war; if there should be any occasion for it: and the Jews {m} pretend that Esau came out with a large army, and met Joseph at the cave of Machpelah, and endeavoured to hinder the burial of Jacob there, where he lost his life, having his head struck off with the sword of Chushim, the son of Dan: some say it was Zepho, the grandson of Esau, with the sons of Esau, that made the disturbance there, on which a battle ensued, in which Joseph was the conqueror, and Zepho was taken captive,

See Gill on "Ge 36:11", the Jews {n} give us the order and manner of the above procession thus; first Joseph, next the servants of Pharaoh, or the princes, then the elders of the court of Pharaoh, then all the elders of the land of Egypt, then the whole house of Joseph, next to them the brethren of Joseph, who were followed by their eldest sons, and after them were the chariots, and last of all the horses.



{k} dbk "honorabilis"; so Abendana. {l} hnxmh "exercitus ille"; Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Drusius, Schmidt. {m} T. Bab. Sotah, fol. 13. 1. Targum Jon. in ver. 13. Pirke Eliezer, c. 39. Shalshalet Hakabala, fol. 5. 1. {n} R. Bechai apud Hottinger. Smegma, c. 8. p. 381.





Genesis 50:10



Ver. 10. And they came to the threshingfloor of Atad,.... Which was either the name of a man the owner of it, or of a place so called from the thorns and brambles which grew here, and with which the threshingfloor was surrounded, as Jarchi says, see Jud 9:14 and it was usual to make a hedge of thorns round about a threshingfloor {o}, that it might be preserved; mention is made in the Talmud {p} of the wilderness of Atad, perhaps so called from the thorns and brambles in it: Jerom says {q} it was three miles from Jericho and two from Jordan, and was in his time called Bethagla, the place of a circuit, because there they went about after the manner of mourners at the funeral of Jacob. This, according to some {r}, was two hundred and forty miles from On, where Joseph was supposed to live, sixteen from Jerusalem, and forty from Hebron, where Jacob was buried: nay, Austin {s} says it was above fifty miles from that place, as affirmed by those who well knew those parts:



which is beyond Jordan; as it was to those that came out of Egypt:



and there they mourned with a great and very sore lamentation; being now entered into the country where the corpse was to be interred; and perhaps they might choose to stop here and express tokens of mourning, that the inhabitants might be apprised of their design in coming, which was not to invade them and make war upon them, only to bury their dead: this mourning seems to be made chiefly by the Egyptians, which was done in an external way, and it may be by persons brought with them for that purpose; since both the name of the place after given was from their mourning there, and the mourning of Joseph is next observed as distinct from theirs:



and he made a mourning for his father seven days; which was the time of mourning, afterwards observed by the Jews, see 1Sa 31:13, this Joseph ordered and observed after he had buried his father, as Aben Ezra says, is affirmed by their ancient Rabbins, and perhaps might be at this same place upon their return.



{o} T. Bab. Sotah, fol. 13. 1. & Gloss. in ib. Aruch in voc. Nrg fol. 39. 4. {p} T. Hieros. Nedarim, fol. 40. 1. {q} De locis Heb. fol. 87. G. {r} Bunting's Travels, p. 79, 80. {s} Quaest. is Gen. l. 1. p. 54. "inter opera ejus", tom. 4.





Genesis 50:11



Ver. 11. And when the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites,.... Who were at this time in the possession of the country where the threshingfloor of Atad was: when they



saw the mourning in the floor of Atad; for so large a company of people, and such a grand funeral procession, brought multitudes from all the neighbouring parts to see the sight; and when they observed the lamentation that was made, saw their mournful gestures and actions, and heard their doleful moan:



they said, this is a grievous mourning to the Egyptians; they concluded they must have lost some great man, to make such a lamentation for him:



wherefore the name of it was called Abelmizraim, which is beyond Jordan; they changed the name of the place, and gave it another upon this occasion, which signifies the mourning of Egypt or of the Egyptians, they being the principal persons that used the outward and more affecting tokens of mourning; though the whole company might be taken for Egyptians by the Canaanites, because they came out of Egypt.





Genesis 50:12



Ver. 12. And his sons did unto him according as he commanded them. Not only Joseph, but all the sons of Jacob were concerned in the burial of him, being all charged by him with it, and who were obedient to his commands as follows; see Ge 49:29.





Genesis 50:13



Ver. 13. For his sons carried him into the land of Canaan,.... That is, they took care that he was carried there, as he desired to be; for it cannot be thought that they carried him on their shoulders thither, in like manner as the devout men carried Stephen to his burial, Ac 8:2



and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah, &c. the very place where he chose to be buried, Ge 47:29.





Genesis 50:14



Ver. 14. And Joseph returned into Egypt,.... As he promised he would,

Ge 50:5



he and his brethren; the eleven sons of Jacob; for though they had not made the same promise, nor Joseph for them, yet they returned, having left their little ones, flocks and herds, in Egypt:



and all that went up with him to bury his father; the elders and great men of the land of Egypt, with their attendants:



after he had buried his father; in the land of Canaan, which, though given to the seed of Jacob, the time was not come for them to possess it, nor the time of their departure out of Egypt thither, which was to be a good while hence, and after another manner.





Genesis 50:15



Ver. 15. And when Joseph's brethren saw that their father was dead,.... And buried; for this and what follows were after their return to Egypt, from the burial of their father; though some think it was before, and as soon as they saw their father was dead, when they thought it a proper time, while Joseph's heart was tender and affected with his father's death, to compromise matters with him: but there is no reason to invert the order of the narration, for this "seeing" is not to be understood of their bodily sight, but of the contemplation of their minds; they considered with themselves that their father was now dead and buried, they had lost an affectionate parent, who was concerned for the welfare and peace of all his family, but what a turn things would now take they knew not:



they said, Joseph will peradventure hate us, and will certainly requite us all the evil which we did unto him; their sin came fresh to their remembrance, guilt arose in their consciences and flew in their faces, and this caused fear and distrust where there was no reason for it, and led them to treat Joseph's character very ill; who was far from being of such a temper and disposition suggested by them, as if he retained hatred in his breast, and was of a revengeful spirit, only hid it during his father's life, because he would not grieve him.





Genesis 50:16



Ver. 16. And they sent a messenger unto Joseph,.... Not Bilhah, as the Targums of Jonathan and Jerusalem, nor her sons, Dan and Naphtali, as Jarchi, grounding it on Ge 37:1 though it is not improbable that some from among themselves were deputed, who were most interested in Joseph; since it is not very likely they would commit such an affair to a stranger or to a servant; and the most proper persons to be sent on such an errand seem to be Judah and Benjamin, the latter as having had no concern in the affair of selling him, and was his own brother by father and mother's side, and very dear to him; and the former, because he saved his life, when the rest, excepting Reuben, were for shedding his blood, and had endeared himself also to Joseph, by his tender concern both for his father and his brother Benjamin; however, they thought fit first to sound Joseph by a messenger, how he stood affected to them, before they appeared in a body in person, to whom they gave a charge, as the words may be rendered, "they commanded unto Joseph" {t}; that is, they commanded those that were deputed by them to him:



saying, thy father did command before he died; some think, this was no better than a lie, which their fear prompted them to; and that they framed the following story, the more to work upon the mind of Joseph, and dispose it in their favour; seeing it is a question whether Jacob ever knew anything of the affair of their ill usage to Joseph; since otherwise it would have been, in all likelihood, taken notice of in his last dying words, as well as the affair of Reuben, and that of Simeon and Levi; and besides, had he been apprised of it, he knew such was the clemency and generosity of Joseph, that he had nothing to fear from him, nor could he entertain any suspicion of a malevolent disposition in him towards his brethren, or that he would ever use them ill for former offences:



saying, as follows:



{t} Powy-la wwuyw "et mandaverunt ad Joseph", Montanus; "nuntio misso", Pagninus; "aliquos ad Josephum", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator.





Genesis 50:17



Ver. 17. So shall ye say unto Joseph, forgive, I pray thee now, the trespass of thy brethren, and their sin,.... Their very great sin, and therefore more words than one are used to express it: unless this repetition should be intended, and signifies that their crime was a trespass against God, and a sin against their brother; and however they are directed to ask forgiveness for it, and urge the relation they stood in to Joseph, in order to obtain it, which they were ready to acknowledge as a very great evil, and of which they repented:



and now, we pray thee, forgive the trespass of the servants of the God of thy father; they urge not only the common relation they stood in to Jacob, but what they stood in to the God of Jacob, being his servants, his worshippers, as Joseph also was; and therefore, being his brethren not only in nature but in religion and grace, they hoped he would forgive their trespass:



and Joseph wept when they spake unto him; by their messenger; being troubled that they should be in such anxiety and distress of mind, which he had a fellow feeling with, and that they should have no better opinion of him, but entertain such distrust of him, notwithstanding all the kindness he had shown them, as to imagine that he should ever deal hardly with them for their former ill usage of him, which was forgiven and forgotten by him long ago.





Genesis 50:18



Ver. 18. And his brethren also went,.... The messengers being returned to them, and acquainting them with what Joseph had said, they took courage and went from Goshen to Joseph's house or palace, be it where it may:



and fell down before his face; in an humble suppliant manner:



and they said, behold, we be thy servants; they were content to be so, would he but forgive their sin, and not resent their ill behaviour to him; thus they further fulfilled his dream of the eleven stars making obeisance to him, Ge 37:9.





Genesis 50:19



Ver. 19. And Joseph said unto them, fear not,.... That any hurt would be done by him to them, or that he would use them ill for their treatment of him:



for am I in the place of God? to receive such homage from you, that you should be my servants, as Saadiah Gaon gives the sense; or rather to take vengeance for injury done, which belongs to God alone: or, "am I not under God" {u}? subject to him, a servant of his, and why should you be mine? nor is it in my power, if I had a will to it, to change his purposes, to alter his providences, or contradict his will, and do hurt to those whom God hath blessed; and so may have regard to the late patriarchal benediction of his father, under the direction of the Holy Spirit: or, "am I in the place of God?" and under him a father of them, as he had been a provider for them, and a supporter of them, and still would be.



{u} yna Myhla txth "annon enim sub Deo sum?" Vatablus.





Genesis 50:20



Ver. 20. But as for you, ye thought evil against me,.... That must be said and owned, that their intentions were bad; they thought to have contradicted his dreams, and made them of none effect, to have token away his life, or however to have made him a slave all his days:



[but] God meant it unto good; he designed good should come by it, and he brought good out of it: this shows that this action, which was sinful in itself, fell under the decree of God, or was the object of it, and that there was a concourse of providence in it; not that God was the author of sin, which neither his decree about it, nor the concourse of providence with the action as such supposes; he leaving the sinner wholly to his own will in it, and having no concern in the ataxy or disorder of it, but in the issue, through his infinite wisdom, causes it to work for good, as follows:



to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive; the nation of the Egyptians and the neighbouring nations, as the Canaanites and others, and particularly his father's family: thus the sin of the Jews in crucifying Christ, which, notwithstanding the determinate counsel of God, they most freely performed, was what wrought about the greatest good, the salvation of men.





Genesis 50:21



Ver. 21. Now therefore, fear ye not,.... Which, is repeated to dispossess them of every fear they might entertain of him on any account whatever:



I will nourish you, and your little ones; provide food for them, and their families, not only for themselves and their sons, now grown up, but their grandchildren and even the youngest and latest of their families should share in his favours:



and he comforted them, and spake kindly to them; even "to their heart" {w}; such things as were quite pleasing and agreeable to them, served to banish their fears, revive their spirits, and afford comfort to them. Just so God and Christ do with backsliding sinners, and would have done with his own people by his servants; see Isa 40:1.



{w} Mbl le "ad cor eorum", Pagninus, Montanus, Drusius, &c.





Genesis 50:22



Ver. 22. And Joseph dwelt in Egypt, he, and his father's house,.... Comfortably, quietly, and in great prosperity, not only he, but his brethren and their families, as long as he lived:



and Joseph lived one hundred and ten years; and all but seventeen of them in Egypt, for at that age it was when he was brought thither: thirteen years he lived in Potiphar's house, and in prison, for he was thirty years of age when he was brought to Pharaoh, and stood before him, and fourscore years he lived in the greatest honour and prosperity that a man could well wish for.





Genesis 50:23



Ver. 23. And Joseph saw Ephraim's children of the third generation,.... His great grandchildren's children; and which shows, as most interpreters observe, that Jacob's prediction, that Ephraim should be the greatest and most numerous, very early began to take place:



and the children also of Machir, the son of Manasseh, were brought up upon Joseph's knees; Machir had but one son by his first wife, whose name was Gilead; but marrying a second wife, he had two sons, Peresh and Sheresh; see 1Ch 7:14 who might be born before the death of Joseph, and be said to be brought up upon his knees, being educated by him, and often took up in his lap, and dandled on his knees, as grandfathers, being fond of their grandchildren, are apt to do.





Genesis 50:24



Ver. 24. And Joseph said unto his brethren, I die,.... Some time before his death he called them together, and observed to them, that he expected to die in a little time, as all must:



and God will surely visit you; not in a way of wrath and vindictive justice, as he sometimes does, but in a way of love, grace, and mercy:



and bring you out of this land; the land of Egypt, in which they then dwelt:



unto the land which he sware to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob; meaning the land of Canaan, which he swore to those patriarchs that he would give to their posterity.





Genesis 50:25



Ver. 25. And Joseph took an oath of the children of Israel,.... Not of his brethren only, but of their posterity, as many of them as were now grown up, that so it might be communicated from one to another, and become well known to that generation which should depart out of Egypt:



saying, God will surely visit you; which he repeats for the certainty of it, and that it might be observed:



and ye shall carry up my bones from hence; when they should go from thence to Canaan's land; he did not desire them to carry him thither when he should die, which he knew would give umbrage to the Egyptians, and they would not be so able to obtain leave to do it as he had for his father. This was accordingly done; when Israel went out of Egypt, Moses took the bones of Joseph with him, and they were buried in Shechem; see

Ex 13:19.





Genesis 50:26



Ver. 26. So Joseph died, being an hundred and ten years old,.... The exact age assigned him by Polyhistor {x}, from Demetrius an Heathen. The Jewish writers {y} say, that he died the first of the twelve patriarchs, though he was the youngest of them; he died, according to Bishop Usher {z}, in the year of the world 2369, and before Christ 1635:



and they embalmed him; his servants, the physicians, according to the manner of the Egyptians, and as his father Jacob had been embalmed,

See Gill on "Ge 50:2",



and he was put into a coffin in Egypt; in an ark or chest, very probably into such an one in which the Egyptians had used to put dead bodies when embalmed; which Herodotus {a} calls a yhka, or chest, and which they set up against a wall: in what part of Egypt this coffin was put is not certain, it was most likely in Goshen, and in the care and custody of some of Joseph's posterity; so Leo Africanus says {b}, that he was buried in Fioum, the same with the Heracleotic nome, supposed to be Goshen; See Gill on "Ge 47:11", and was dug up by Moses, when the children of Israel departed. The Targum of Jonathan says, it was sunk in the midst of the Nile of Egypt; and an Arabic writer {c} says, the corpse of Joseph was put into a marble coffin, and cast into the Nile: the same thing is said in the Talmud {d}, from whence the story seems to be taken, and where the coffin is said to be a molten one, either of iron or brass; which might arise, as Bishop Patrick observes, from a mistake of the place where such bodies were laid; which were let down into deep wells or vaults, and put into a cave at the bottom of those wells, some of which were not far from the river Nile; and such places have been searched for mummies in late times, where they have been found, and the coffins and clothes sound and incorrupt. And so some of the Jewish writers say {e} he was buried on the banks of the river Sihor, that is, the Nile; but others {f} say he was buried in the sepulchre of the kings, which is much more likely.



{x} Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 21. p. 425. {y} Shalshalet Hakabala, fol. 4. 1. & T. Bab. Sotah, fol. 13. 2. {z} Annalea Vet. Test. A. M. 2369. {a} Euterpe, sive, l. 2. c. 86, 91. {b} Descriptio Africae, l. 8. p. 722. {c} Patricides, p. 24. apud Hottinger. Smegma Oriental. c. 8. p. 379. {d} T. Bab. Sotah, c. 1. fol. 13. 1. {e} Sepher Hajaschar, p. 118. apud Wagenseil Sotah, p. 300. {f} In T. Bab. Sotah, ut supra. (c. 1. fol. 13.1.)



 

John Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible.

Exodus 1:1



INTRODUCTION TO EXODUS



This book is called by the Jews Veelleh Shemoth, from the first words with which it begins, and sometimes Sepher Shemoth, and sometimes only Shemoth. It is by the Septuagint called Exodus, from whom we have the name of Exodus, which signifies "a going out"; see Lu 9:31, because it treats of the going of the children of Israel out of Egypt; and hence in the Alexandrian copy it is called the Exodus of Egypt; and so the Syriac version entitles it the second book of the law, called "the going out"; and to the same purpose the Arabic version. The Jews sometimes give it the name of Nezikin, as Buxtorf {a} observes out of the Masora on Ge 24:8 because in it some account is given of losses, and the restitution of them. That this book is of divine inspiration, and to be reckoned in the canon of the sacred writings, is sufficiently evident to all that believe the New Testament; since there are so many quotations out of it there by Christ, and his apostles; particularly see Mr 12:26 and that it was wrote by Moses is not to be doubted, but when is not certain; it must be after the setting up of the tabernacle in the wilderness; the greatest part of what is contained in it, he was an eye and ear witness of; it plainly points out the accomplishment of the promises and prophecies delivered to Abraham, that his posterity would be very numerous, that they would be afflicted in a land not theirs, and in the fourth generation come out of it with great substance. It treats of the afflictions of the Israelites in Egypt, after the death of Joseph, until their deliverance by Moses; of his birth, calling, and mission to Pharaoh, to demand of him to let the children of Israel go; of the ten plagues upon him and his people, for refusing to dismiss them; of the departure of Israel from Egypt, and the institution of the passover on that account; of their passage through the Red sea into the wilderness, and of the various exercises and afflictions, supplies and supports they met with there; of the giving of a body of laws unto them, moral, ceremonial, and judicial; and of the building of the tabernacle, and all things appertaining to it; and throughout the whole, as there is a figure and representation of the passage of the people of God out of spiritual Egypt, through the wilderness of this world, to the heavenly Canaan, and of various things they must meet with in their passage, so there are many types of Christ, his person, office, and grace, and of his church, his word, and ordinances, which are very edifying and instructing. The book contains a history of about one hundred and forty years, from the death of Joseph, to the erection of the tabernacle.



{a} Lexic. Talmud. col. 1325.



INTRODUCTION TO EXODUS 1



This chapter begins with an account of the names and number of the children of Israel that came into Egypt with Jacob, Ex 1:1 and relates that increase of them after the death of Joseph, and the generation that went down to Egypt, Ex 1:6 and what methods the Egyptians took to diminish them, but to no purpose, as by obliging to cruel bondage and hard service; and yet the more they were afflicted, the more they increased, Ex 1:9 by ordering the midwives of the Hebrew women to slay every son they laid them of; but they fearing God, did not obey the order of the king of Egypt, which when he expostulated with them about, they excused, and so the people multiplied, Ex 1:15 and lastly, by ordering every male child to be cast into the river, Ex 1:22 and which is the leading step to the account of the birth of Moses, which follows in the next chapter.



Ver. 1. Now these are the names of the children of Israel which came down into Egypt,.... Of the twelve patriarchs, the sons of Jacob, who were heads of the twelve tribes, whose names are here given; since the historian is about to give an account of their coming out of Egypt, and that it might be observed how greatly they increased in it, and how exactly the promise to Abraham, of the multiplication of his seed, was fulfilled: or, "and these are the names" {b}, &c. this book being connected with the former by the copulative "and"; and when this was wrote, it is highly probable there was no division of the books made, but the history proceeded in one continued account:



every man and his household came with Jacob; into Egypt, all excepting Joseph, and along with them their families, wives, children, and servants; though wives and servants are not reckoned into the number of the seventy, only such as came out of Jacob's loins: the Targum of Jonathan is,



"a man with the men of his house,''



as if only male children were meant, the sons of Jacob and his grandsons; and Aben Ezra observes, that women were never reckoned in Scripture as of the household or family; but certainly Dinah, and Serah, as they came into Egypt with Jacob, are reckoned among the seventy that came with him thither, Ge 46:15.



{b} hlaw "et haec", Pagninus, Montanus, Drusius.





Exodus 1:2



Ver. 2. Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah. The first sons of Jacob by Leah.





Exodus 1:3



Ver. 3. Issachar, Zebulun,.... The other two sons of Jacob, by Leah:



Benjamin; the youngest of all Jacob's sons is placed here, being his son by his beloved wife Rachel. Joseph is not put into the account, because he did not go into Egypt with Jacob.





Exodus 1:4



Ver. 4. Dan, and Naphtali, Gad, and Asher. Who are last mentioned, being sons of the concubine wives.





Exodus 1:5



Ver. 5. And all the souls that came out of the loins of Jacob were seventy souls,.... "Souls" are put for persons; of the number seventy, and how reckoned, See Gill on "Ge 46:27". This was but a small number that went down to Egypt, when compared with that which went out of it; and that it should be compared with it is the design of its being mentioned, see Ex 12:37:



for Joseph was in Egypt already; and is the reason why he is not reckoned among the sons of Jacob, that came thither with him; though rather it may be better rendered, "with Joseph who was in Egypt" {c}; for he must be reckoned, and indeed his two sons also, to make up the number seventy; therefore Jonathan rightly supplies it,



"with Joseph and his sons who were in Egypt,''



See Gill on "Ge 46:27".



{c} Poyw "cum Josepho qui erat in Aegypto", Junius & Tremellius, Ainsworth, Noldius, No. 1197. p. 273. so the Arabic version, Kimchi, and Ben Melech.





Exodus 1:6



Ver. 6. And Joseph died, and all his brethren,.... It is a notion of the Jews, that Joseph died before any of his brethren,

See Gill on "Ge 50:26" and they gather it from these words; but it does not necessarily follow from hence, they might die some before him and some after him; and as they were all born in about seven years' time, excepting Benjamin, they might all die within a little time of each other: according to the Jewish writers {d}, the dates of their death were these,



"Reuben lived one hundred and twenty four years, and died two years after Joseph; Simeon lived one hundred and twenty years, and died the year after Joseph; Levi lived one hundred and thirty seven years, and died twenty four years after Joseph; Judah lived one hundred and nineteen years, Issachar one hundred and twenty two, Zebulun one hundred and twenty four, and died two years after Joseph; Dan lived one hundred and twenty seven years, Asher one hundred and twenty three years, Benjamin one hundred and eleven years, and died twenty six years before Levi; Gad lived one hundred and twenty five years, and Naphtali one hundred and thirty three years;''



but though this account of the Jews, of their times, and of the times of their death, is not to be depended upon, yet it is certain they all died in Egypt, though they were not buried there; but as Stephen says, Ac 7:16 they were carried over to Shechem and interred there, either quickly after their decease, or, however, were taken along with the bones of Joseph by the children of Israel, when they departed out of Egypt: and it is also evident that they all died before the affliction and oppression of the children of Israel in Egypt began; and this account seems to be given on purpose to point this out unto us, being placed in the order it is. Levi lived the longest of them all, and the affliction did not begin till after his death; and the Jewish chronologers say {e} that from his death to the children of Israel's going out of Egypt were one hundred and sixteen years; and they further observe {f}, that it could not last more than one hundred and sixteen years, and not less than eighty seven, according to the years of Miriam:



and all that generation; in which Joseph and his brethren had lived. These also died, Egyptians as well as Israelites, before the oppression began.



{d} R. Bechai apud Shalshalet Hakabala, fol. 3. 2. & 4. 1. {e} R. Gedaliah in Shalshalet, fol. 5. 1. Ganz. Tzemach David: par. 1. fol. 6. 1. {f} Seder Olam Rabba, c. 3. p. 9.





Exodus 1:7



Ver. 7. And the children of Israel were fruitful,.... In their offspring; became like fruitful trees, as the word signifies:



and increased abundantly; like creeping things, or rather like fishes, which increase very much, see Ge 1:20



and multiplied; became very numerous, whereby the promises made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, were fulfilled:



and waxed exceeding mighty; were hale, and strong, of good constitutions, able bodied men, and so more dreaded by the Egyptians: a heap of words is here used to express the vast increase of the people of Israel in Egypt:



and the land was filled with them; not the whole land of Egypt, but the land of Goshen: at first they were seated in a village in that country, but now they were spread throughout the towns and cities in it.





Exodus 1:8



Ver. 8. Now there arose up a new king over Egypt,.... Stephen calls him another king, Ac 7:18 one of another family, according to Josephus {g}; who was not of the seed royal, as Aben Ezra; and Sir John Marsham {h} thinks this was Salatis, who, according to Manetho {i}, was the first of the Hycsi or pastor kings that ruled in lower Egypt; but these kings seem to have reigned before that time, See Gill on "Ge 46:34" and Bishop Usher {k} takes this king to be one of the ancient royal family, whose name was Ramesses Miamun; and gives us a succession of the Egyptian kings from the time of Joseph's going into Egypt to this king: the name of that Pharaoh that reigned when Joseph was had into Egypt, and whose dreams he interpreted, was Mephramuthosis; after him reigned Thmosis, Amenophis, and Orus; and in the reign of the last of these Joseph died, and after Orus reigned Acenehres a daughter of his, then Rathotis a brother of Acenchres, after him Acencheres a son of Rathotis, then another Acencheres, after him Armais, then Ramesses, who was succeeded by Ramesses Miamun, here called the new king, because, as the Jews {l} say, new decrees were made in his time; and this Pharaoh, under whom Moses was born, they call Talma {m}, and with Artapanus {n} his name is Palmanothes:



which knew not Joseph; which is not to be understood of ignorance of his person, whom he could not know; nor of the history of him, and of the benefits done by him to the Egyptian nation, though, no doubt, this was among their records, and which, one would think, he could not but know; or rather, he had no regard to the memory of Joseph; and so to his family and kindred, the whole people of Israel: he acknowledged not the favours of Joseph to his nation, ungratefully neglected them, and showed no respect to his posterity, and those in connection with him, on his account; though, if a stranger, it is not to be wondered at.



{g} Antiqu. l. 2. c. 9. sect. 1. {h} Canon. Chron. Sec. 8. p. 107. {i} Apud Joseph. Contr. Apion. l. 1. sect. 14. {k} Annal. Vet. Test. p. 17. 18. {l} T. Bab. Erubin. fol. 53. 1. {m} Juchasin, fol. 135. 2. {n} Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 27. p. 431.





Exodus 1:9



Ver. 9. And he said unto his people,.... His princes, nobles, and courtiers about him, his principal ministers of state:



behold, the people of the children of Israel are more and mightier than we: which could not be true in fact, but is said to stir up his nobles to attend to what he was about to say, and to work upon them to take some speedy measures for the crushing of this people; for that they were more in number, and mightier in power and wealth than the Egyptians, it was impossible; and indeed it may seem strange, that the king should tell such an untruth, which might be so easily contradicted by his courtiers; though the words will bear to be otherwise rendered, as that "the children of Israel are many" {o}; as they were very greatly multiplied, and became very numerous; and they might be "mightier", that is, more robust and strong, and fitter for war than the Egyptians, and therefore, were formidable, and a people to be guarded against; and it was high time to think of securing themselves from them, before they grew too mighty and powerful; or they might be more numerous and mighty in that part of the land in which they were, in Goshen, though not more and mightier than the Egyptians in general.



{o} br "multus", Pagninus, Montanus, Drusius, Rivet.





Exodus 1:10



Ver. 10. Come on,.... Which is a word of exhortation, stirring up to a quick dispatch of business, without delay, the case requiring haste, and some speedy and a matter of indifference:



let us deal wisely with them; form some wise schemes, take some crafty methods to weaken and diminish them gradually; not with open force of arms, but in a more private and secret manner, and less observed:



lest they multiply; yet more and more, so that in time it may be a very difficult thing to keep them under, and many disadvantages to the kingdom may arise from them, next observed:



and it come to pass, that when there falleth out any war, they join also unto our enemies; their neighbours the Arabians, and Phoenicians, and Ethiopians: with the latter the Egyptians had wars, as they had in the times of Moses, as Josephus {p} relates, and Artapanus {q}, an Heathen writer, also: Sir John Marsham {r} thinks these enemies were the old Egyptians, with whom the Israelites had lived long in a friendly manner, and so more likely to join with them, the Thebans who lived in upper Egypt, and between whom and the pastor kings that reigned in lower Egypt there were frequent wars; but these had been expelled from Egypt some time ago:



and fight against us, and so get them up out of the land; take the opportunity, by joining their enemies and fighting against them, to get away from them out of Egypt into the land of Canaan, from whence they came: this, it seems, the Egyptians had some notion of, that they were meditating something of this kind, often speaking of the land of Canaan being theirs, and that they should in a short time inherit it; and though they were dreaded by the Egyptians, they did not care to part with them, being an industrious laborious people, and from whom the kingdom reaped many advantages.



{p} Antiqu. l. 2. c. 10. {q} Ut supra. (Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 27. p. 431.) {r} Canon Chron. See 8. p. 107.





Exodus 1:11



Ver. 11. Therefore they did set taskmasters over them, to afflict them with their burdens,.... This was the first scheme proposed and agreed on, and was carried into execution, to appoint taskmasters over them; or "princes", or "masters of tribute" {r}, commissioners of taxes, who had power to lay heavy taxes upon them, and oblige them to pay them, which were very burdensome, and so afflictive to their minds, and tended to diminish their wealth and riches, and obliged them to harder labour in order to pay them, and so every way contributed to distress them:



and they built for Pharaoh treasure cities, Pithom and Raamses; these might be built with the money they collected from them by way of tribute, and so said to be built by them, since it was chiefly in husbandry, and in keeping flocks and herds, that the Israelites were employed; or they might be concerned in building these cities, some of them understanding architecture, or however the poorer or meaner sort might be made use of in the more laborious and servile part of the work; those two cities are, in the Targums of Jonathan and Jerusalem, called Tanis and Pelusium; but Tanis was the same with Zoan, and that was built but seven years after Hebron, an ancient city, in being long before this time, see Nu 13:22. Pelusium indeed may be one of them, but then it is not that which is here called Raamses, but Pithom, as Sir John Marsham {s} and others think: Pithom is by Junius thought to be the same with the Pathumus of Herodotus {t}, a town in Arabia Petraes, upon the borders of Egypt, where a ditch was dug from the Nile to the Red sea, and supposed to be the work of the Israelites: Raamses is a place different from Ramesses, Ge 47:11 and had its name from the then reigning Pharaoh, Ramesses Miamun, as Pithom is thought by some to be so called from his queen: Pliny {u} makes mention of some people called Ramisi and Patami, who probably were the inhabitants of these cities, whom he joins to the Arabians as bordering on Egypt: the Septuagint version adds a third city, "On", which is Hellopolls: and a learned writer {w} is of opinion that Raamses and Heliopolis are the same, and observes, that Raamses, in the Egyptian tongue, signifies the field of the sun, being consecrated to it, as Heliopolis is the city of the sun, the same with Bethshemesh, the house of the sun, Jer 43:13 and he thinks these cities were not properly built by the Israelites, but repaired, ornamented, and fortified, being by them banked up against the force of the Nile, that the granaries might be safe from it, as Strabo {x} writes, particularly of Heliopolis; and the Septuagint version here calls them fortified cities; and with this agrees what Benjamin of Tudela says {y}, that he came to the fountain of "Al-shemesh", or the sun, which is Raamses; and there are remains of the building of our fathers (the Jew says) even towers built of bricks, and Fium, he says {z}, (which was in Goshen, See Gill on "Ge 47:11") is the same with Pithom; and there, he says, are to be seen some of the buildings of our fathers. Here these cities are said to be built for treasure cities, either to lay up the riches of the kings of Egypt in, or as granaries and storehouses for corn, or magazines for warlike stores, or for all of these: some think the "pyramids" were built by the Israelites, and there is a passage in Herodotus {a} which seems to favour it; he says, the kings that built them, the Egyptians, through hatred, name them not, but call them the pyramids of the shepherd Philitis, who at that time kept sheep in those parts; which seems to point at the Israelites, the beloved people of God, who were shepherds.



{r} Myom yrv "principes tributorum", Pagninus, Montanus, Fagius, Drusius, Cartwright; so Tigurine version. {s} Ut supra. (Canon Chron. Sec. 8. p. 107.) {t} Euterpe, sive, l. 2. c. 158. {u} Nat. Hist. l. 6. c. 28. {w} Jablonski de Terra Goshen, dissert. 4. sect. 8. {x} Geograph. l. 17. p. 553. {y} Itinerar. p. 120. {z} Ib. p. 114. {a} Ut supra, ({t}) c. 128.





Exodus 1:12



Ver. 12. But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and grew,.... Became more numerous, "and broke out" {b}, as it may be rendered, like water which breaks out and spreads itself; so the Israelites, increasing in number, spread themselves still more in the land; the Egyptians thought, by putting them to hard labour in building cities, to have weakened their strength, and made them unfit for the procreation of children; but instead of that, the more hard labour they were put unto, the more healthful and the stronger they were, and begot more children, and multiplied exceedingly: and so it is that oftentimes afflictive dispensations are multiplying and growing times to the people of God, in a spiritual sense; who grow like the palm tree, which the more weight it has upon it the more it grows; when the church of God has been most violently persecuted, the number of converts have been greater, and saints under affliction grow in grace, in faith and love, in holiness, humility, patience, peace, and joy; see

Ac 12:1



and they were grieved because of the children of Israel; because of their multiplication and increase, and because their schemes for lessening them did not succeed; they were as thorns in their eyes, as some interpret the word, as Jarchi {c} observes.



{b} Uypy "erumpebat", Junius & Tremellius, Drusius, Tigurine version. {c} Krpb "in fractione", Cajetan. apud Rivet.





Exodus 1:13



Ver. 13. And the Egyptians made the children of Israel to serve with rigour. Or with breach {c}, with what might tend to break their strength; they laid heavier burdens upon them, obliged them to harder service, used them more cruelly and with greater fierceness, adding to their hard service ill words, and perhaps blows.



{c} Krpb "in fractione", Cajetan. apud Rivet.





Exodus 1:14



Ver. 14. And they made their lives bitter with hard bondage,.... So that they had no ease of body nor peace of mind; they had no comfort of life, their lives and mercies were embittered to them:



in mortar and in brick, and in all manner of service of the field; if Pelusium was one of the cities they built, that had its name from clay, the soil about it being clayish, and where the Israelites might be employed in making brick for the building of that and other cities: Josephus {d} says, they were ordered to part the river (Nile) into many canals, to build walls about cities, and raise up mounds, lest the water overflowing the banks should stagnate; and to build pyramids, obliging them to learn various arts, and inure themselves to labour: so Philo the Jew says {e}, some worked in the clay, forming it into bricks, and others in carrying straw: some were appointed to build private houses, others the walls of cities, and to cut ditches and canals in the river, and obliged day and night to carry burdens, so that they had no rest, nor were they suffered to refresh themselves with sleep; and some say that they were not only employed in the fields in ploughing and sowing and the like, but in carrying of dung thither, and all manner of uncleanness: of their being employed in building of pyramids and canals, See Gill on "Ge 47:11"



all their service wherein they made them serve was with rigour; they not only put them to hard work, but used them in a very churlish and barbarous manner, abusing them with their tongues, and beating them with their hands: Philo in the above place says, the king not only compelled them to servile works, but commanded them heavier things than they could bear, heaping labours one upon another; and if any, through weakness, withdrew himself, it was judged a capital crime, and the most merciless and cruel were set over them as taskmasters.



{d} Antiqu. l. 2. c. 9. sect. 1. {e} De Vita Mosis, l. 1. p. 608.





Exodus 1:15



Ver. 15. And the king of Egypt spake to the Hebrew midwives,.... It is difficult to say who these midwives were, whether Egyptian or Hebrew women. Josephus is of opinion that they were Egyptians, and indeed those the king was most likely to succeed with; and it may seem improbable that he should offer such a thing to Hebrew women, who he could never think would ever comply with it, through promises or threatenings; and the answer they afterwards gave him, that the Hebrew women were not as the Egyptian women, looks as if they were of the latter: and yet, after all, it is more likely that these midwives were Hebrew women, their names are Hebrew; and besides, they are not said to be the midwives of Hebrew women, but Hebrew midwives; nor does it seem probable that the Hebrew women should have Egyptian midwives, and not those of their own nation; and they were such as feared the Lord; and the Targums of Jonathan and Jerusalem are express for it, and they pretend to tell us who they were: "of which the name of the one was Shiphrah, and the name of the other Puah"; the one, they say, was Jochebed, the wife of Amram, and mother of Moses and Aaron, and the other Miriam their sister; and this is the sense of many of the Jewish writers {f}: but whatever may be said for Jochebed, it is not credible that Miriam should be a midwife, who was but a girl, or maid, at this time, about seven years of age, as the following chapter shows, and much less one of so much repute as to be spoke to by the king. It may seem strange, that only two should be spoke to on this account, when, as Aben Ezra supposes, there might be five hundred of them: to which it may be answered, that these were the most noted in their profession, and the king began with these, that if he could succeed with them, he would go on to prevail on others, or engage them to use their interest with others to do the like; or these might be the midwives of the principal ladies among the Israelites, in one of whose families, according as his magicians had told, as the Targum of Jonathan observes, should be born a son, by whom the land of Egypt would be destroyed; of which Josephus {g} also takes notice; and therefore he might be chiefly solicitous to destroy the male children of such families; but Aben Ezra thinks, that these two were the chief over the rest of the midwives, and who collected and paid to the king the tribute out of their salaries, which was laid upon them, and so he had an opportunity of conversing with them on this subject.



{f} T. Bab. Sotah, fol. 11. 2. Midrash Kohelet, fol. 74. 1. Jarchi in loc. {g} Ut supra. (Antiq. l. 2. c. 9. sect. 1.)





Exodus 1:16



Ver. 16. And he said, when ye do the office of a midwife to the Hebrew women,.... Deliver them of their children:



and see [them] upon the stools; seats for women in labour to sit upon, and so contrived, that the midwives might do their office the more readily; but while they sat there, and before the birth, they could not tell whether the child was a son or a daughter; wherefore Kimchi {h} thinks the word here used signifies the place to which the infant falls down from its mother's belly, at the time of labour, and is called the place of the breaking forth of children, and takes it to be the "uterus" itself; and says it is called "Abanim", because "Banim", the children, are there, and supposes "A" or "Aleph" to be an additional letter; and so the sense then is, not when ye see the women on the seats, but the children in the place of coming forth; but then he asks, if it be so, why does he say, "and see them" there? could they see them before they were entirely out of the womb? to which he answers, they know by this rule, if a son, its face was downwards, and if a daughter, its face was upwards; how true this is, must be left to those that know better; the Jewish masters {i} constantly and positively affirm it: he further observes, that the word is of the dual number, because of the two valves of the womb, through which the infant passes:



if it be a son, then ye shall kill him; give it a private pinch as it comes forth, while under their hands, that its death might seem to be owing to the difficulty of its birth, or to something that happened in it. This was ordered, because what the king had to fear from the Israelites was only from the males, and they only could multiply their people; and because of the above information of his magicians, if there is any truth in that:



but if it be a daughter, then she shall live, be kept alive, and preserved, and brought up to woman's estate; and this the king chose to have done, having nothing to fear from them, being of the feeble sex, and that they might serve to gratify the lust of the Egyptians, who might be fond of Hebrew women, being more beautiful than theirs; or that they might be married and incorporated into Egyptian families, there being no males of their own, if this scheme took place, to match with them, and so by degrees the whole Israelitish nation would be mixed with, and swallowed up in the Egyptian nation, which was what was aimed at.



{h} Sepher Shorash. rad. Nba. {i} T. Bab. Sotah, fol. 11. 1. Niddah, fol. 31. 2.





Exodus 1:17



Ver. 17. But the midwives feared God,.... And therefore durst not take away the life of an human creature, which was contrary to the express law of God, Ge 9:6:



and did not as the king of Egypt commanded them; knowing it was right to obey God rather than man, though ever so great, or in so exalted a station:



but saved the men children alive; did not use any violence with them, by stifling them in the birth. The scheme was so barbarous and shocking, especially to the tender sex, to whom it was proposed, and so devoid of humanity, that one would think it should never enter into the heart of man.





Exodus 1:18



Ver. 18. And the king called for the midwives,.... Perceiving, by the increase of the Israelites, that they did not obey his commands:



and said unto them, why have ye done this thing, and have saved the men children alive? not only did not kill them, but did everything for them that was necessary for their future preservation and health; see

Eze 16:4.





Exodus 1:19



Ver. 19. And the midwives said unto Pharaoh, because the Hebrew women are not as the Egyptian women,.... Not so tender, weak, and feeble, nor so ignorant of midwifery, and needed not the assistance of midwives, as the Egyptian women:



for they [are] lively; or midwives themselves, as Kimchi {k} says the word signifies; and so {l} Symmachus translates the words, "for they are midwives"; or are skilful in the art of midwifery, as Jarchi interprets it; and so the, Vulgate Latin version is, "for they have knowledge of midwifery"; and so could help themselves; or, "for they are as beasts" {m}, as animals which need not, nor have the assistance of any in bringing forth their young; and so Jarchi observes, that their Rabbins {n} explain it, they are like to the beasts of the field, who have no need of a midwife; or they were so lively, hale, and strong, as our version, and others, and their infants also, through a more than common blessing of God upon them at this time, that they brought forth children as soon as they were in travail, with scarce any pain or trouble, without the help of others: nor need this seem strange, if what is reported is true, of women in Illyria, Ireland, Italy {o}, and other places {p}, where it is said women will go aside from their work, or from the table, and bring forth their offspring, and return to their business or meal again; and especially in the eastern and hotter countries, women generally bring forth without much difficulty, and without the use of a midwife {q}:



and are delivered ere the midwives come in unto them; which doubtless was true in some cases, though not in all, because it is before said, they saved the men children alive; and had it been so at all times, there would have been no proof and evidence of their fearing God, and obeying his commands, rather than the king's; and in some cases not only the strength and liveliness of the Hebrew women, and their fears also, occasioned by the orders of the king, might hasten their births before the midwives could get to them; and they might not choose to send for them, but use their own judgment, and the help of their neighbours, and do without them, knowing what the midwives were charged to do.



{k} Sepher Shorash. hyx "sie alii", hnh twyx yk "quia obstetrices ipsae", Pagninus, Montanus; so the Syriac version. {l} maiai gar eisi, Symmachus apud Drusium. {m} In T. Bab. Sotah, fol. 11. 1. Chronicon Mosis, fol. 2. 1. {n} Vid Wagenseil. Sotah, p. 249. & Varro & Gataker in ib. {o} Posidonius apud Strabo. Geograph. l. 3. p. 114. {p} See Harte's History of the Life of Gustavus Adelphus, vol. 1. p. 233. {q} Ludolph. Ethiopic. l. 1. c. 14.





Exodus 1:20



Ver. 20. Wherefore God dealt well with the midwives,.... He approved of their conduct upon the whole, however difficult it may be to clear them from all blame in this matter; though some think that what they said was the truth, though they might not tell all the truth; yea, that they made a glorious confession of their faith in God, and plainly told the king, that it was nothing but the immediate hand of God that the Hebrew women were so lively and strong, and therefore were resolved not to oppose it, let him command what he would; so Dr. Lightfoot {r}, who takes the midwives to be Egyptians:



and the people multiplied, and waxed very mighty; became very numerous, and strong, and robust, being the offspring of such lively women.



{r} Works, vol. 1. p. 700.





Exodus 1:21



Ver. 21. And it came to pass, because the midwives feared God,.... And regarded his command, and not that of the king, though they risked his displeasure, and their lives:



that he made them houses; which some understand of the Israelites making houses for them, being moved to it by the Lord, to preserve them from the insults of the Egyptians; others of Pharaoh building houses for them, in which he kept them, until the Hebrew women came to their time of delivery, who were ordered to be brought to these houses, that it might be known by others, as well as the midwives, whether they brought forth sons or daughters, neither of which is likely: but rather the sense is, that God made them houses, and hid them from Pharaoh, as Kimchi interprets it, that he might not hurt them, just as he hid Jeremiah and Baruch: though it seems best of all to understand it of his building up the families of these midwives, increasing their number, especially their substance and wealth, making them and their households prosperous in all worldly good; but because the word is in the masculine gender, some choose to interpret it either of the infants themselves, the male children the midwives preserved, and of their being built up families in Israel, or by means of whom they were built up; or of the Israelites themselves, whose houses were built up by their means: and others are of opinion that material houses or buildings are meant, built for the Israelites, that the midwives might know where to find them and their wives, when ready to lie in, who before lived up and down in fields and tents: but the sense of God's building up the families of the midwives is to be preferred, there being an enallage or change of the gender, which is not unusual; see Ex 15:21.





Exodus 1:22



Ver. 22. And Pharaoh charged all his people,.... Finding he could not carry his point with the midwives, he gave a general order to all his people everywhere:



saying, every son that is born ye shall cast into the river; the river Nile; not every son born in his kingdom, for this would have ruined it in time; but that was born to the Jews, as the Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan; and it is added in the Septuagint version, to the Hebrews:



and every daughter ye shall save alive; for the reasons given

See Gill on "Ex 1:16".

 

John Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible.

Exodus 2:1



INTRODUCTION TO EXODUS 2



This chapter relates the birth of Moses, and his preservation in an ark of bulrushes, Ex 2:1. His being found by Pharaoh's daughter, took up, and put out to nurse by her, and adopted for her son, Ex 2:4, some exploits of his when grown up, taking the part of an Hebrew against an Egyptian whom he slew, and endeavouring to reconcile two Hebrews at variance, when one of them reproached him with slaying the Egyptian, Ex 2:11, which thing being known to Pharaoh, he sought to slay Moses, and this obliged him to flee to Midian, Ex 2:15 where he met with the daughters of Reuel, and defended them against the shepherds, and watered their flocks for them, Ex 2:16, which Reuel being informed of, sent for him, and he lived with him, and married his daughter Zipporah, by whom he had a son, Ex 2:18 and the chapter is concluded with the death of the king of Egypt, and the sore bondage of the Israelites, and their cries and groans, which God had a respect unto, Ex 2:23.



Ver. 1. And there went a man of the house of Levi,.... This man was Amram, the son of Kohath, and grandson of Levi, as appears from Ex 6:18



and took to wife a daughter of Levi; one of the same house, family, or tribe; which was proper, that the tribes might be kept distinct: this was Jochebed, said to be his father's sister, See Gill on "Ex 6:20": her name in Josephus {s} is Joachebel, which seems to be no other than a corruption of Jochebed, but in the Targum in 1Ch 4:18 she is called Jehuditha.



{s} Antiqu. l. 2. c. 9. sect. 4.





Exodus 2:2



Ver. 2. And the woman conceived, and bare a son,.... Which was not her first child, nor indeed her first son, for she had both Aaron and Miriam before this: this son, which was Moses, was born, as the Jews say {t}, in the thirty seventh year after the death of Levi, A. M. 2365, (or, as others, 2368,) on a Wednesday, the seventh of the month Adar, in the third hour of the day: some say it was on the twenty fourth of Nisan; but, according to Bishop Usher {u}, he was born forty one years after the death of Levi, A. M. 2433, and in the year before Christ 1571,



and when she saw him that he was a goodly child; exceeding fair and beautiful, as Stephen expresses it, Ac 7:20, the Jews say {w} his form was like an angel of God, and Trogus {x}, an Heathen writer, says his beautiful form recommended him: this engaged the affections of his parents to him, and who, from hence, might promise themselves that he would be a very eminent and useful person, could his life be preserved:



she hid him three months; in her bedchamber, some Jewish writers say {y}; others {z}, in a house under ground, that is, in the cellar; however, it was in his father's house, Ac 7:20.



{t} Shatshalet Hakabala, fol. 5. 2. Tzemach David, par. 1. fol. 7. 1. {u} Annal. Vet. Test. p. 18. {w} Pirke Eliezer, c. 48. fol. 57. 2. {x} Justin e Trogo, l. 36. c. 2. {y} Chronicon Mosis, fol. 3. 2. {z} Pirke Eliezer, ut supra. (c.48. fol. 57.2)





Exodus 2:3



Ver. 3. And when she could no longer hide him,.... Because of her neighbours, who might hear the crying of the child, or because of the diligent search made by Pharaoh's officers, which some think was made every three months: the Jews {a} have a notion that his mother was delivered of him at six months' end, and therefore when the other three months were up women usually go with child, she could hide him no longer, a birth of a child being then expected, and would be inquired about:



she took for him an ark of bulrushes; the word, according to Kimchi {b}, signifies a kind of wood exceeding light, so Gersom and Ben Melech; an Arabic writer {c} calls it an ark of wood; it is generally taken to be the "papyrus" or reed of Egypt, which grew upon the banks of the Nile, and of which, many writers say, small vessels or little ships were made, See Gill on "Isa 18:2"



and daubed it with slime and with pitch; with pitch without and slime within, as Jarchi observes; which being of a glutinous nature, made the rushes or reeds stick close together, and so kept out the water:



and put the child therein; committing it to the care and providence of God, hoping and believing that by some means or another it would be preserved; for this, no doubt, was done in faith, as was the hiding him three months, to which the apostle ascribes that, Heb 11:23



and she laid it in the flags by the river's brink; among the sedge, weeds, and rushes, that grew upon the banks of the river Nile; there she laid it, that it might not be carried away with the stream of the river, and that it might be seen and taken up by somebody that would have compassion on it, and take care of it: the Arabic writers {d} say, that Jochebed made an ark of the papyrus, though in the law it is said to be of cork, and pitched within and without, and put the child into it, and laid it on the bank of the Nile, where the water was not so deep, by the city Tzan (or Zoan, that is, Tanis), which was the metropolis of the Tanitic nome; but very wrongly adds, that it might be killed by the dashing of the waves, and she might not see its death.



{a} Targum Jon. & Jarchi in loc. {b} Sepher Shorash. rad. amg. {c} Elmacius apud Hottinger. p. 402. {d} Patricides, p. 25. Elmacinus, p. 46. apud Hottinger. Smegma, c. 8. p. 400.





Exodus 2:4



Ver. 4. And his sister stood afar off,.... This was Miriam, as the Targum of Jonathan expresses it; who is supposed to be about ten or twelve years of age, others say seven: she was placed {e}, as the word may be rendered, by her parents, or, "she placed herself" {f}, by their instruction, at some distance from the place where the ark was, that she might not be observed and be thought to belong to it, and yet so near as to observe what became of it, which was the intent of her standing there, as follows:



to wit what would be done to him; to know, take notice, and observe, what should happen to it, if anyone took it up, and what they did with it, and where they carried it, for, "to wit" is an old English word, which signifies "to know", and is the sense of the Hebrew word to which it answers, see 2Co 8:1.



{e} butt "collocata fuerat", Vatablus. {f} "Stiterat sese", Junius & Tremellius, "stitit sese", Piscator, Drusius.





Exodus 2:5



Ver. 5. And the daughter of Pharaoh came down to wash herself at the river,.... Her name, in Josephus {g}, is called Thermuthis, and by Artapanus {h}, an Heathen writer, Merrhis, perhaps from Miriam, and frequently by the Jewish writers {i}, Bithia, which is the name of a daughter of another Pharaoh, 1Ch 4:18 from whence they seem to have taken it: she came down from the palace of her father, the gardens of which might lead to the Nile; for Zoan or Tanis, near to which, the Arabiac writers say, as before observed, the ark was laid, was situated on the banks of the river Nile, and was the royal seat of the kings of Egypt; though perhaps the royal seat at this time was either Heliopolis, as Apion testifies {k}, that it was a tradition of the Egyptians that Moses was an Heliopolitan, or else Memphis, which was not far from it; for Artapanus, another Heathen writer, says {l}, that when he fled, after he had killed the Egyptian, from Memphis, he passed over the Nile to go into Arabia: however, no doubt a bath was there provided for the use of the royal family; for it can hardly be thought that she should go down and wash herself in the open river: here she came to wash either on a religious account, or for pleasure: the Jews {m} say it was an extraordinary hot season throughout Egypt, so that the flesh of men was burnt with the heat of the sun, and therefore to cool her she came to the river to bathe in it: others {n} of them say, that they were smitten with burning ulcers, and she also, that she could not wash in hot water, but came to the river:



and her maidens walked along by the river's side; while she washed herself; though it is highly probable she was not left alone: these seem to be the maids of honour, there might be others that might attend her of a meaner rank, and more fit to do for her what was necessary; yet these saw not the ark, it lying lower among the flags, and being nearer the bath where Pharaoh's daughter was, she spied it from thence as follows:



and when she saw the ark among the flags, she sent her maid to fetch it; the maid that waited on her while the rest were taking their walks; her she sent from the bath among the flags to take up the ark: the Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan, and R. Eliezer {o}, render it,



"she stretched out her arm and hand, and took it;''



the same word, being differently pointed, so signifying; but this is disapproved of, by the Jewish commentators.



{g} Antiqu. l. 2. c. 9. sect. 5. {h} Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 27. p. 432. {i} T. Bab. Megillah, fol. 13. 1. Derech Eretz, fol. 19. 1. Pirke Eliezer, c. 48. Shalshalet Hakabala, fol. 5. 2. {k} Apud Joseph. Contr. Apion, l. 2. sect. 2. {l} Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 27. p. 433. {m} Chronicon Mosis, fol. 3. 2. Ed. Gaulmin. {n} Targum Jon. in loc. Pirke Eliezer, ut supra. (c.48. fol. 57.2.) {o} Ibid. Vid. T. Bab. Sotah, fol. 12. 1.





Exodus 2:6



Ver. 6. And when she had opened it,.... The ark, for it was shut or covered over, though doubtless there were some apertures for respiration:



she saw the child [in it], and, behold, the babe wept; and which was a circumstance, it is highly probable, greatly affected the king's daughter, and moved her compassion to it; though an Arabic writer says {p}, she heard the crying of the child in the ark, and therefore sent for it:



and she had compassion on him, and said, this is one of the Hebrews' children; which she might conclude from its being thus exposed, knowing her father's edict, and partly from the form and beauty of it, Hebrew children not being swarthy and tawny as Egyptian ones: the Jewish writers {q} say, she knew it by its being circumcised, the Egyptians not yet using circumcision.



{p} Patricides apud Hottinger. p 401. {q} T. Bab. Sotah, fol. 12. 2. Aben Ezra in loc.





Exodus 2:7



Ver. 7. Then said his sister to Pharaoh's daughter,.... Miriam the sister of Moses, who observing the ark taken up, and the maidens that were walking upon the bank of the river, and other women perhaps, gathering about it to see it; she made one among them, and after hearing their discourse about it, proposed what follows to Pharaoh's daughter: Jarchi says, that Pharaoh's daughter tried several Egyptian women to suckle it, but it would not suck of them: Josephus {r} says the same, and it also is in the Talmud {s}; and that, if true, gave Miriam a fair opportunity to offer to do the following message for her:



shall I go and call for thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for thee? for she perceived that she was desirous of having the child brought up as her own.



{r} Antiqu. l. 2. c. 9. sect. 5. {s} T. Bab. Sotah, ut supra. (fol. 12.1)





Exodus 2:8



Ver. 8. And Pharaoh's daughter said unto her, go,.... She fell in at once with the proposal, being, no doubt, overruled, by the providence of God, to agree to have such a person called:



and the maid went and called the child's mother; and her own, whose name was Jochebed the wife of Amram, as observed in Ex 2:1.





Exodus 2:9



Ver. 9. And Pharaoh's daughter said unto her,.... Being come, having made all possible haste:



take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages; by which means she had not only the nursing of her own child, but was paid for it: according to a Jewish writer {t}, Pharaoh's daughter agreed with her for two pieces of silver a day.



{t} Dibre Hayamim; sive Chronicon Mosis, fol. 4. 1.





Exodus 2:10



Ver. 10. And the child grew,.... In stature and in strength, thriving under the care of its mother and nurse, through the blessing of God:



and she brought him unto Pharaoh's daughter; when grown up and weaned, and needed a nurse no longer: a Jewish chronologer {u} says, this was two years after his birth; and another says {w}, that when he was three years old, Pharaoh sitting at table, and his queen was at his right hand, and his daughter, with Moses, at his left, and his mother before him, when Moses in the sight of them all took the crown from Pharaoh's head:



and he became her son; by adoption, for though she was a married woman, as some say, yet had no children, though very desirous of them, which accounts the more for her readiness in taking notice and care of Moses; so Philo the Jew says {x}, that she had been married a long time, but never with child, though she was very desirous of children, and especially a son, that might succeed her father in the kingdom, or otherwise it must go into another family: yea, he further says, that she feigned herself with child, that Moses might be thought to be her own son: and Artapanus {y}, an Heathen writer, says that the daughter of Pharaoh was married to one Chenephres, who reigned over the country above Memphis, for at that time many reigned in Egypt; and she being barren, took a son of one of the Jews, whom she called Moyses, and being grown up to a man's estate, was, by the Greeks, called Musaeus:



and she called his name Moses, and she said, because I drew him out of the water; by which it appears, that this word is derived from the Hebrew word hvm, "Mashah", which signifies to draw out, and is only used of drawing out of water, 2Sa 22:17 which Pharaoh's daughter gave him, he being an Hebrew child, and which language she may very well be thought to understand; since there were such a large number of Hebrews dwelt in Egypt, and she was particularly conversant with Jochebed her Hebrew nurse; and besides, there was a great affinity between the Hebrew and the Egyptian language, and therefore there is no need to derive the word from the latter, as Philo {z} and Josephus {a} do; who observe that "Mo" in the Egyptian language signifies "water", and "Yses", "saved"; besides, the Egyptian name of Moses, according to Aben Ezra, who had it from a book of agriculture in that language, is Momos: the Jewish writers {b} give to Moses many names, which he had from different persons, no less than ten: and Artapanns {c} says, that by the Egyptian priests he was called Hermes or Mercury, and probably was the Hermes of that people; he is called by Orpheus {d} udogenhv, "born in water", because drawn out of it.



{u} Shalshalet Hakabala, fol. 5. 2. {w} Chronicon. ib. Shalshal. ib. {x} De Vita Mosis, c. 1. p. 604, 605. {y} Apud Euseb, Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 27. p. 432. {z} Ut supra. ({x}) {a} Ut supra, (Antiqu. l. 2. c. 9.) sect. 6. {b} Vajikra Rabba, sect. 1. fol. 146. 3. Shalshalet Hakabala, fol. 5. 2. Chronicon Mosis, fol. 4. 1. {c} Apud Euseb. ut supra. (praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 27. p. 432.) {d} De Deo, v. 23.





Exodus 2:11



Ver. 11. And it came to pass in those days, when Moses was grown,.... To man's estate; some of the Jewish writers say he was eighteen, others twenty years of age {e}, but Stephen, who is most to be credited, says he was full forty years of age, Ac 7:23,



that he went out unto his brethren the Hebrews: whom he knew to be his brethren, either by divine revelation, or by conversing with his nurse, who was his mother; who, doubtless, instructed him while he was with her, as far as he was capable of being informed of things, and who might frequently visit her afterwards, by which means he became apprised that he was an Hebrew and not an Egyptian, though he went for the son of Pharaoh's daughter, which he refused to be called when he knew his parentage, Heb 11:24 now he went out from Pharaoh's palace, which in a short time he entirely relinquished, to visit his brethren, and converse with them, and understood their case and circumstances:



and looked on their burdens; which they were obliged to carry, and were very heavy, and with which they were pressed; he looked at them with grief and concern, and considered in his mind how to relieve them, if possible:



and he spied an Egyptian smiting an Hebrew, one of his brethren; the Egyptian was, according to Jarchi, a principal of the taskmasters of Israel, who was beating the Hebrew for not doing his work as he required, and the Hebrew, according to him, was the husband of Shelomith, daughter of Dibri, Le 24:11, though others say it was Dathan {f}.



{e} Shalshalet Hakabala, fol. 5. 2. {f} lbid.





Exodus 2:12



Ver. 12. And he looked this way, and that way,.... All around, to observe if there were any within sight who could see what he did; which did not arise from any consciousness of any evil he was about to commit, but for his own preservation, lest if seen he should be accused to Pharaoh, and suffer for it:



and when he saw that there was no man; near at hand, that could see what he did, and be a witness against him:



he slew the Egyptian, and hid him in the sand; in a sandy desert place hard by, where having slain him with his sword, he dug a hole, and put him into it; See Gill on "Ac 7:24". Of the slaughter of the Egyptian, and the following controversy about it, Demetrius {g}, an Heathen writer, treats of in perfect agreement with the sacred Scriptures.



{g} Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 19. p. 439.





Exodus 2:13



Ver. 13. And when he went out the second day,.... The day following:



behold, two men of the Hebrews strove together; which the Jewish writers {h} take to be Dathan and Abiram:



and he said to him that did the wrong; who was the aggressor, and acted the wicked part in abusing his brother:



wherefore smitest thou thy fellow? friend and companion; signifying, that it was very unbecoming, unkind, and unnatural, and that brethren and friends ought to live together in love, and not strive with, and smite one another, and especially at such a time as this, when they were so oppressed by, and suffered so much from their enemies;

See Gill on "Ac 7:26".



{h} Targum Jon. & Jarchi in loc. Shemoth Rabba, sect. 1. fol. 91. 4. Shalshalet Hakabala, fol. 5. 2. Pirke Eliezer, c. 48.





Exodus 2:14



Ver. 14. And he said, who made thee a prince and a judge over us?.... God had designed him for one, and so he appeared to be afterwards; but this man's meaning is, that he was not appointed by Pharaoh's order then, and so had nothing to do to interfere in their differences and quarrels; though Moses did not take upon him to act in an authoritative way, but to exhort and persuade them to peace and love, as they were brethren:



intendest thou to kill me, as thou killedst the Egyptian? if this was Dathan, or however the same Hebrew that he had defended and rescued from the Egyptian, it was very ungenerous in him to upbraid him with it; or if that Hebrew had made him his confident, and acquainted him with that affair, as it was unfaithful to betray it, since it was in favour of one of his own people, it was ungrateful to reproach him with it:



and Moses feared; lest the thing should be discovered and be told to Pharaoh, and he should suffer for it: this fear that possessed Moses was before he fled from Egypt, and went to Midian, not when he forsook it, and never returned more, at the departure of the children of Israel, to which the apostle refers, Heb 11:27 and is no contradiction to this:



and said, surely this thing is known; he said this within himself, he concluded from this speech, that either somebody had seen him commit the fact he was not aware of, or the Hebrew, whose part he took, had through weakness told it to another, from whom this man had it, or to himself; for by this it seems that he was not the same Hebrew, on whose account Moses had slain the Egyptian, for then the thing would have been still a secret between them as before; only the other Hebrew this was now contending with must hereby come to the knowledge of it, and so Moses might fear, that getting into more hands it would come out, as it did; See Gill on "Ac 7:27".

See Gill on "Ac 7:28".

See Gill on "Ac 7:29".





Exodus 2:15



Ver. 15. Now when Pharaoh heard this thing, he sought to slay Moses,.... Both for his killing the Egyptian, which by the laws of Egypt {i} was death, whether bond or free; and for his taking part with the Hebrews against the Egyptians, and knowing him to be a wise and valiant man, might fear he would put himself at the head of the Hebrews, and cause a revolt of them; and if there was anything in his dream, or if he had such an one, and had the interpretation of it given by his magicians, that an Hebrew child should be born, by whom Egypt would be destroyed, See Gill on "Ex 1:15", he might call it to mind, and be affected with it, and fear the time was coming on, and Moses was the person by whom it should be done; and he might be stirred up by his courtiers to take this step, who doubtless envied the growing interest of Moses in his court:



but Moses fled from the face of Pharaoh; not through want of courage, but through prudence, to avoid danger, and preserve his life for future usefulness; and no doubt under a divine impulse, and by the direction of divine Providence, the time for him to be the deliverer of Israel not being yet come:



and dwelt in the land of Midian: a country so called from Midian, one of Abraham's sons by Keturah, Ge 25:2. Jerom {k} calls it a city, and says it was on the other side of Arabia, to the south, in the desert of the Saracens, to the east of the Red sea, from whence the country was called Midian; and Philo {l} says, that Moses went into neighbouring Arabia; and which is confirmed by Artapanus {m} the Heathen historian, who says, that from Memphis, crossing the river Nile, he went into Arabia; and this country was sometimes called Cush or Ethiopia; hence Moses's wife is called an Ethiopian woman,

Nu 12:1



and he sat down by a well; weary, thoughtful, and pensive. It may be observed, that it was usual with persons in such like circumstances, being strangers and not knowing well to whom to apply for assistance or direction, to place themselves at a well of water, to which there was frequent resort, both for the use of families and of flocks; see Ge 24:11. This well is now called, as some say, Eyoun el Kaseb, fourteen hours and a half from Magare Chouaib, or "the grot of Jethro" {n}; but if this was so far from Jethro's house, his daughters had a long way to go with their flock: but some other travellers {o} speak of a very neat and pleasant village, called Hattin, where they were shown the grave of Jethro, Moses's father-in-law; and in the neighbourhood of that place is a cistern, now called Omar, and is said to be the watering place where Moses met with the daughters of the priest of Midian. A late learned man {p} thinks, that Sharma, which is about a day and a half's journey southeast from Mount Sinai, is the place where Jethro lived. The Arabic geographer {q} says, at the shore of the Red sea lies the city Madian, greater than Tabuc, and in it is a well, out of which Moses watered the flocks of Scioaib, that is, Raguel.



{i} Diodor. Sicul. Bibliothec. l. 1. p. 70. {k} De locis Heb. fol. 93. A. B. {l} De Vita Mosis, l. 1. p. 609. {m} Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 27. p. 433. {n} See a Journey from Grand Cairo to Mecca, in Ray's Travels, vol. 2. p. 468. {o} Egmont and Heyman's Travels, vol. 2. p. 29. {p} See the Origin of Hieroglyphics, at the end of a Journal from Cairo, to Mount Sinai, p. 55. Ed. 2. {q} Climat. 3. par. 5.





Exodus 2:16



Ver. 16. Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters,.... Who being a descendant of Abraham might have retained the knowledge of the true God, and might be a priest of his, as Melchizedek was, or otherwise it may be thought improbable that Moses would have married his daughter, as he afterwards did; and so Aben Ezra says, he was a priest of God; though the word is sometimes used of a prince, ruler, and governor; and is so rendered here by the Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan; and Artapanus {r}, an Heathen writer, expressly calls him arcwn, a "prince" of those places, that is, of Arabia; he might be both prince and priest, as Melchizedek before mentioned was, and as has been the usage of many countries:



and they came and drew water, and filled the troughs to water their father's flock; which is no contradiction to their being daughters either of a priest or a prince, which were both high titles and characters; since it was usual in those early times, and in those countries, for the sons and daughters of considerable persons to be employed in such services; See Gill on "Ge 29:9".



{r} Ut supra, (Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 27.) p. 434.





Exodus 2:17



Ver. 17. And the shepherds came and drove them away,.... The daughters of the priest of Midian, and their flock likewise; these were shepherds of some neighbouring princes or great men, who were so rude and slothful, and to save themselves a little trouble of drawing water, brought up their flocks to drink of the water those virgins had drawn, and to do this forced them and their flocks away:



but Moses stood up and helped them, and watered their flock; moved to see such rude and uncivil treatment of the weaker sex, rose up from the ground on which he sat, and took their parts, and obliged the shepherds to give way, and brought up their flock to the troughs, and drew water for them, and gave them it; either he did this alone, or together with the servants that waited upon the priest's daughters, perhaps alone; and if it be considered that shepherds being usually not of a very martial spirit, and these also in a wrong cause, and Moses a man of an heroic disposition, and had doubtless the appearance of a man of some eminence and authority, they were the more easily intimidated and overcome.





Exodus 2:18



Ver. 18. And when they came to Reuel their father,.... Or Ragouel, as the Septuagint; and so Artapanus {s} calls him. The Targum of Jonathan has it, their father's father; and so Aben Ezra says he was; and is the sense of others, induced thereto by Nu 10:29, but it does not follow from thence: he said,



how is it that you are come so soon today? it being not only sooner than they were wont to come, but perhaps their business was done in so short a time; that it was marvellous to him that it could be done in it, so quick a dispatch had Moses made, and they through his assistance; and especially it might be more strange, if it was usual, as it seems it was, to be molested by the shepherds.



{s} Ut supra. (Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 27. p. 434.)





Exodus 2:19



Ver. 19. And they said, an Egyptian delivered us out of the hand of the shepherds,.... A man, who by his habit and by his speech appeared to them to be an Egyptian, and upon their inquiry he might tell them so, being born in Egypt, though of Hebrew parents:



and also drew water enough for us; or "in drawing drew" {t}; drew it readily, quickly and in abundance:



and watered the flock; by which means their business was done, and they returned home earlier than usual.



{t} hld hld "hauriendo bausit", Pagninus, Montanus, Piscator.





Exodus 2:20



Ver. 20. And he said unto his daughters, and where is he?.... By the account Reuel's daughters gave of Moses, of his courage and humanity, he was very desirous of seeing him:



why [is it] that ye have left the man? behind them at the well, and had not brought him along with them; he seemed to be displeased, and chides them, and tacitly suggests that they were rude and ungrateful not to ask a stranger, and one that had been so kind to them, to come with them and refresh himself:



call him, that he may eat bread; take meat with them, bread being put for all provisions.





Exodus 2:21



Ver. 21. And Moses was content to dwell with the man,.... After he had been called and brought into the house, and had had some refreshment, and after some conversation had passed between them, and perhaps after some days' stay in Reuel's house; Reuel having observed his disposition and behaviour, and being delighted therewith, proposed to him to take up his residence with him, with which motion Moses was well pleased, and accepted of it:



and he gave Moses Zipporah his daughter; to be his wife. It is not to be supposed that this was done directly; though both Philo {u} and Josephus {w} intimate as if it was done at first meeting together; but it is not likely that Reuel would dispose of his daughter so suddenly to a stranger, though he might at once entertain an high opinion of him; nor would Moses marry a woman directly he had so slender an acquaintance with, so little knowledge of her disposition, endowments of mind and religion. The Targum of Jonathan says it was at the end of ten years; and indeed forty years after this a son of his seems to have been young, having not till then been circumcised, Ex 4:22. The author of the Life of Moses says {x}, that he was seventy seven years of age when he married Zipporah, which was but three years before he returned to Egypt. This circumstance of Moses's marrying Reuel's daughter is confirmed by Artapanus {y} an Heathen historian; and also by Demetrius {z}, and expressly calls her Sapphora, who he says was a daughter of Jother or Jethro; and likewise by Ezekiel the tragedian {a}.



{u} De Vita Mosis, l. 1. p. 611. {w} Antiqu. l. 2. c. 11. sect. 2. {x} Chronicon Mosis, fol. 9. 1. {y} Apud Euseb. Evangel. Praepar. l. 9. c. 27. p. 434. {z} Ib. c. 29. p. 439. {a} lb. c. 28.





Exodus 2:22



Ver. 22. And she bare him a son, and he called his name Gershom,.... Which signifies a "desolate stranger"; partly on his own account, he being in a foreign country, a stranger and sojourner; but not by way of complaint, but rather of thankfulness to God for providing so well for him in it; and partly on his son's account, that when he came to years of maturity and knowledge, he might learn, and in which Moses no doubt instructed him, that he was not to look upon Midian as his proper country, but that he was to be heir of the land of Canaan, and which he might be reminded of by his name:



for he said, I have been a stranger in a strange land; so Midian was to him, who was born in Egypt, and being an Hebrew, was entitled to the land of Canaan; this looks as if he had been at this time some years in Midian.





Exodus 2:23



Ver. 23. And it came to pass in process of time that the king of Egypt died,.... According to Eusebius, Orus reigned in Egypt when Moses fled from thence, and that two more reigned after him, Acenchres and Achoris, who both died before the deliverance of the children of Israel; but according to Bishop Usher {b}, this was the same king of Egypt under whom Moses was born, and from whose face he fled, who died in the sixty seventh year of his reign, Moses being now sixty years of age, and having been in the land of Midian twenty years; and it was about twenty years after this that he was called from hence, to be the deliverer of his people; for things are often put close together in Scripture, which were done at a considerable distance. And the intention of this notice of the death of the king of Egypt is chiefly to show that it made no alteration in the afflictions of the children of Israel for the better, but rather the worse:



and the children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage; the severity of it, and its long duration, and seeing no way for their escape out of it:



and they cried, and their cry came up unto God; they not only sighed and groaned inwardly, but so great was their oppression, that they could not forbear crying out aloud; and such was the greatness and vehemency of their cry, that it reached up to heaven, and came into the ears of the Almighty, as vehement cries are said to do, whether sinful or religious; see Ge 18:20



by reason of the bondage; which may either be connected with their "cry", that that was because of their bondage; or with the "coming" of it unto God, he was pleased to admit and regard their cry, because their bondage was so very oppressive and intolerable.



{b} Annal Vet. Test. p. 19. A. M. 2494.





Exodus 2:24



Ver. 24. And God heard their groaning,.... The petitions they put up to him with groans and cries:



and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob; that he would bring their seed out of a land not theirs, in which they were strangers, and were afflicted, into the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession.





Exodus 2:25



Ver. 25. And God looked upon the children of Israel,.... With an eye of pity and compassion, and saw all the hardships they laboured under, and all the injuries that were done unto them:



and God had respect unto [them]; had a favourable regard to them; or "knew" {b} not only them, the Israelites, and loved them, and approved of them, and owned them as his own, all which words of knowledge sometimes signify; but he knew their sorrows and sufferings, and took notice of what was done to them secretly; see Ex 3:7.



{b} edyw "et eognovit", Pagninus, Montanus, Junius & Tremellius, Piscator.

 

John Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible.

Exodus 3:1



INTRODUCTION TO EXODUS 2



In this chapter we are informed how that the Lord appeared to Moses in a bush on fire, but not consumed, Ex 3:1, declared unto him that he had seen and observed the afflictions of the children of Israel, and was determined to deliver them, Ex 3:7, that he gave him a call to be the deliverer of them, answered his objections to it, and instructed him what he should say, both to the elders of Israel and to Pharaoh, Ex 3:10, and assured him, that though at first Pharaoh would refuse to let them go, yet after many miracles wrought, he would be willing to dismiss them, when they should depart with great substance, Ex 3:19.



Ver. 1. Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father in law, the priest of Midian,.... Who was either the same with Reuel or Raguel, spoken of in the preceding chapter; or, as others think, a son of his, the father being now dead; seeing it was now forty years since Moses came into Midian, Ac 7:30. Demetrius {c}, an Heathen writer, expressly says that Jothor a son of Raguel, and Zipporah or Sepphora, as he calls her, was his daughter, whom Moses married: now this was the business Moses was chiefly concerned in during his stay in Midian; keeping the sheep of his father-in-law, in which great personages have have employed, and who have afterwards been called to the kingly office, as David; and this was an emblem of his feeding and ruling the people of Israel, and in it he was an eminent type of Christ, the great shepherd and bishop of souls: no doubt there were other things besides this in which Moses exercised himself in this course of time, and improved himself in the knowledge of things, natural, civil, and religious, and which the more qualified him for the important work he was designed for: it is thought that in this interval he wrote the book of Genesis, and also the book of Job:



and he led the flock to the backside of the desert; of Sinai or Arabia, on the back part of which, it seems, were goodly pastures; and hither he led his flock to feed, which was about three days' journey from Egypt, Ex 5:3 or rather into the desert {d}, for Horeb or Sinai was not behind the desert, but in it:



and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb; so called either because of the appearance of God at this time, after related, or because of his giving the law and making the covenant with the people of Israel there; and it should be observed that that transaction was past when Moses wrote this book. Hither he led the sheep, they delighting in mountains, hence sometimes mountainous places are called

oiopola, {e}, because sheep delight to feed upon them {f}.



{c} Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 29. p. 439. {d} rbdmh rxa upo thn eremon, Sept. "in desertum", Syr. Samar, so Noldius, p. 11. No. 76. {e} Homer. Odyss. 11. prope finem. {f} En ouresi mala nomeuwn, Theocrit. Idyll. 3.





Exodus 3:2



Ver. 2. And the Angel of the Lord appeared unto him,.... Not a created angel, but the Angel of God's presence and covenant, the eternal Word and Son of God; since he is afterwards expressly called Jehovah, and calls himself the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, which a created angel would never do: the appearance was,



in a flame of fire, out of the midst of a bush; not in a tall, lofty, spreading oak or cedar, but in a low thorny bramble bush, which it might have been thought would have been consumed in an instant of time:



and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush [was] not consumed; this was not imaginary, but a real thing; there was



such a bush, and Jehovah appeared in it in this manner, and though it was all on fire yet was not consumed, but remained entire after it: reference is frequently had to it as a matter of fact, De 33:16. Artapanus {g}, an Heathen writer, had got some hint of it; his account is this, that while Moses was praying to God, and entreating the afflictions of his people might cease, he was propitious to him, and on a sudden fire broke out of the earth and burned, when there was no matter nor anything of a woody sort in the place: nor need this account Moses gives be thought incredible, when so many things similar to it are affirmed by Heathen writers, who speak of a whole forest in flames without fire, and of a spear that burned for two hours, and yet nothing of it consumed; and of a servant's coat all on fire, and yet after it was extinguished no trace or mark of the flames were to be seen on it; and several other things of the like kind are related by Huetius {h} out of various authors: as to the mystical signification of this bush, some make it to be a type of Christ, and of his manifestation in the flesh; of the union of the two natures in him, and of their distinction of the glory of the one, and of the meanness of the other; of his sustaining the wrath of God, and remaining fearless and unhurt by it; and of his delivering and preserving his people from it: the Jews commonly interpret it of the people of Israel, in the furnace of affliction in Egypt, and yet not consumed; nay, the more they were afflicted the more they grew; and it may be a symbol of the church and people of God, in all ages, under affliction and distress: they are like to a thorn bush both for their small quantity, being few, and for their quality, in themselves weak and strengthless, mean and low; have about them the thorns of corruptions and temptations, and who are often in the fire of afflictions and persecutions, yet are not consumed; which is owing to the person, presence, power, and grace of Christ being among them;

See Gill on "Ac 7:30".



{g} Apud Euseb. ib. c. 27. p. 434. {h} Alnetan. Quaest. l. 2. c. 12. sect. 10. p. 193, 194.





Exodus 3:3



Ver. 3. And Moses said, I will now turn aside,.... From the place where he was, and the flock he was feeding, and get nearer to the bush, which seems to have been on one side of him and not directly before him:



and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt; inquire into, and find out, if he could, the reason of this strange and amazing sight; how it could be that a bush should be on fire and yet not burnt up, which might have been expected would have been destroyed at once; for what is a thorn or bramble bush to devouring flames of fire, as these appeared to be?





Exodus 3:4



Ver. 4. And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see,.... Who is before called the Angel of the Lord, here Jehovah, the omniscient and omnipresent Being, who observing Moses turning aside and going onward to gratify his curiosity, by examining more narrowly this strange phenomenon:



God called unto him out of the midst of the bush; with an articulate voice, being the eternal Word:



and said, Moses, Moses; for the Lord knows his people distinctly, and can call them by name; and the repetition of his name not only shows familiarity and a strong vehement affection for him, but haste to stop him, that he might proceed no further; and this was done in order to stir him up to hearken to what would be said to him:



and he said, here am I; ready to hear what shall be said, and to obey whatever is commanded.





Exodus 3:5



Ver. 5. And he said, draw not nigh hither,.... Keep a proper distance:



put off thy shoes from off thy feet; dust and dirt cleaving to shoes, and these being ordered to be put off from the feet, the instrument of walking, show that those that draw nigh to God, and are worshippers of him, ought to be of pure and holy lives and conversations:



for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground; not that there was any inherent holiness in this spot of ground more than in any other, which ground is not capable of; but a relative holiness on account of the presence of God here at this time, and was not permanent, only while a pure and holy God was there: hence, in after times, the temple being the place of the divine residence, the priests there performed their services barefooted, nor might a common person enter into the temple with his shoes on {k}; and to this day the Jews go to their synagogues barefooted on the day of atonement {l}, to which Juvenal {m} seems to have respect; and from hence came the Nudipedalia among the Heathens, and that known symbol of Pythagoras {n}, "sacrifice and worship with naked feet": in this manner the priests of Diana sacrificed to her among the Cretians and other people {o}; and so the priests of Hercules did the same {p}; the Brahmans among the Indians never go into their temples without plucking off their shoes {q}; so the Ethiopian Christians, imitating Jews and Gentiles, never go into their places of public worship but with naked feet {r}, and the same superstition the Turks and Mahometans observe {s}.



{k} Misn. Beracot, c. 9. sect. 5. {l} Buxtorf. Jud Synagog. c. 30. p. 571. {m} "Observant ub. festa mero pede Sabbata reges." Satyr. 6. {n} Jamblichus de Vita Pythagor. Symbol. 3. {o} Solin. Polyhistor. c. 16. Strabo, l. 12. p. 370. {p} Silius de Bello Punic, l. 3. {q} Rogerius de Relig. Brachman. l. 2. c. 10. apud Braunium de vest. sacerdot. l. 1. c. 3. p. 66. {r} Damianus a Goes apud Rivet. in loc. {s} Pitts's Account of the Relig. and Manners of the Mahometans, c. 6. p. 38. 81. Georgieviz. de Turc. Moribus, c. 1. p. 11. Sionita de Urb. Oriental. & Relig. c. 7. p. 18. c. 10. p. 34.





Exodus 3:6



Ver. 6. Moreover he said, I am the God of thy fathers,.... Of every one of his fathers next mentioned:



the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob; with whom the covenant respecting the land of Canaan, and the promise of the blessed seed the Messiah, was made: this again shows that the Angel of the Lord that now appeared was God himself, Jehovah the Son of God. Our Lord makes use of this text to prove the resurrection of the dead against the Sadducees, God being not the God of the dead, but of the living; Mr 12:26



and Moses hid his face; wrapped it in his mantle or cloak, as Elijah did, 1Ki 19:13, because of the glory of the divine Majesty now present, and conscious of his own sinfulness and unworthiness:



for he was afraid to look upon God; even upon this outward appearance and representation of him in a flame of fire; otherwise the essence of God is not to be looked upon and seen at all, God is invisible; but even this external token and symbol of him was terrible to behold; the thought that God was there filled him with fear, considering the greatness and awfulness of his majesty, and what a poor, weak, and sinful creature he was.





Exodus 3:7



Ver. 7. And the Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt,.... Or, "in seeing I have seen", which not only denotes the certainty of it, as we express it; but the clear, distinct, and full sight he had of it, with sympathy towards them, an affectionate concern for them, and a fixed, settled, determination in his mind to deliver them; he had long took notice of, and had thoroughly observed their affliction, and was afflicted with them in it, and was bent upon their deliverance out of it:



and have heard their cry, by reason of their taskmasters; who were set over them to see that they did their work, and to lay heavy burdens on them, and afflict them by all manner of ways and methods they could devise; and who abused and beat them for not doing what was not to be done, which made them cry out because of their barbarous usage of them, and cry unto God for help and deliverance:



for I know their sorrows; the pains of body they were put unto, and the inward grief and trouble of their minds on account of them.





Exodus 3:8



Ver. 8. And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians,.... Which must be understood consistent with the omnipresence of God, who is everywhere, and strictly speaking cannot be said to remove from place to place, or to descend; but such a way of speaking is used, when he gives some eminent display of his power or goodness, as here in a wonderful manner he appeared in a burning bush, and manifested himself in a way of grace and kindness to his people, signifying that he would shortly save them: so Christ in our nature came down from heaven to earth, to save his spiritual Israel out of the hands of all their enemies:



and to bring them out of that land; the land of Egypt, where they were in bondage, and greatly oppressed:



unto a good land, and a large; the land of Canaan, which was not only a good land, but a large one in comparison of Goshen, where the Israelites were pent up and straitened for room through their great increase; and though it was but a small country in itself, and when compared with some others, being but one hundred and sixty miles from Dan to Beersheba, and but forty six from Joppa to Bethlehem, and but sixty from Joppa to Jordan, yet, for so small a country, it had a great deal of good land in it; for Hecataeus {t} an Heathen writer, says it had in it three hundred myriads of acres of the best and most fruitful land:



unto a land flowing with milk and honey; which is not to be restrained merely to the abundance of cattle fed here, and the plenty of milk they produced, or the number of bees that swarmed here, and the quantity of honey they made; for the land abounded with other good things, and excellent fruits, as corn, and wine, and oil, and with figs, pomegranates, palm trees, &c. but this is a proverbial and hyperbolical expression, setting forth the great affluence of all sorts of good things in it, for the necessity and delight of human life:



unto the place of the Canaanites; who are mentioned first, as being the general name for the inhabitants of the land, as Aben Ezra suggests, though they are often spoken of as a distinct nation or tribe from the rest, and a principal one, denominated from Canaan the son of Ham:



and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites: the Hittites and Amorites had their names from Heth and Emor, sons of Canaan; the Perizzites, Aben Ezra says, are the same with Sidon, who was the firstborn of Canaan: and the Hivites and Jebusites were the descendants also of sons of Canaan,

Ge 15:19, the Girgashites are not here mentioned, either because they were a lesser people than the rest, as Aben Ezra thinks; or their land was not a land flowing with milk and honey, as Abendana observes; or they were gone out of the land before Israel went into it, according to other Jewish writers, or immediately yielded to Joshua, without fighting against him.



{t} Apud Joseph. contr. Apion. l. 1. c. 22.





Exodus 3:9



Ver. 9. Now therefore, behold, the cry of the children of Israel is come unto me,.... See Ex 2:23:



and I have also seen the oppression wherewith the Egyptians oppress them; which is repeated to observe the great notice he took of it; and the reason of his descent and appearance in this wonderful manner, as well as of the urgent necessity of Moses's going to deliver the people from their oppression.





Exodus 3:10



Ver. 10. Come now therefore,..... Leave thy flock, thy family, and the land of Midian:



and I will send thee unto Pharaoh: this Pharaoh, according to Eusebius, was Cenchres, the successor of Achoris; but according to Bishop Usher {u}, his name was Amenophis, who immediately succeeded Ramesses Miamun, under whom Moses was born. Clemens of Alexandria {w} relates from Apion, and he, from Ptolemy Mendesius, that it was in the times of Amosis that Moses led the children of Israel out of Egypt; but Tacitus {x} says, the name of this king was Bocchoris, who obliged them to go out, being advised by an oracle to do so; and so says Lysimachus {y}:



that thou mayest bring forth my people the children of Israel out of Egypt; and conduct them through the wilderness to the land of Canaan, and so be their deliverer, guide, and governor under God, who now gave him a commission to act for him.



{u} Annal. Vet. Test. p. 19. {w} Stromat. l. 1. p. 320. {x} Hist. l. 5. c. 3. {y} Apud Joseph. contr. Apion, l. 1. c. 34.





Exodus 3:11



Ver. 11. And Moses said unto God, who am I, that I should go unto Pharaoh,.... A private person, an exile in a foreign country, a poor shepherd, unknown to Pharaoh, and had no interest in him; and he a great king, and possessed of numerous forces to defend his country, and prevent the Israelites' departure out of it: time was when he was known to a Pharaoh, dwelt in his court, and made a figure there, and had great interest and authority there, being the adopted son of the king's daughter; but now it was otherwise with him:



and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt: who though a people numerous, yet unarmed, and held in great bondage; and he might remember how he had been repulsed and rejected by some of them forty years ago, which might be discouraging to him.





Exodus 3:12



Ver. 12. And he said, certainly I will be with thee,.... To encourage and strengthen him; to protect, defend, and preserve him, and to succeed and prosper him; to give him credit and respect with the people of Israel, and influence over Pharaoh to prevail upon him at length to let Israel go:



and this shall be a token unto thee that I have sent thee; not the promise now made, nor the vision he had seen, but what follows:



when thou hast brought forth the people out of Egypt, ye shall serve God upon this mountain: Mount Horeb or Sinai, as they did at the time of the giving of the law on it, when an altar was built upon a hill, and they offered burnt offerings and peace offerings, Ex 24:4 and this was a sign, "a posteriori", confirming the divine mission of Moses; and besides the promise of this, on which Moses might depend, being made by the Lord, assured him of success, that he should bring the children of Israel out of Egypt, since he and they would serve the Lord together at this mountain, and from whence he might conclude he had a mission and commission from God. Of a like kind is the sign or token given of the deliverance of Jerusalem from the army of Sennacherib, Isa 37:30.





Exodus 3:13



Ver. 13. And Moses said unto God,.... Having received full satisfaction to his objection, taken from his own unfitness for such a service, and willing to have his way quite clear unto him, and his commission appear firm and valid to his people, he proceeds to observe another difficulty that might possibly arise:



when I come unto the children of Israel: out of Midian into Egypt;



and shall say unto them, the God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; with a message to them to receive him as his ambassador and their deliverer:



and they shall say unto me, what is his name? a question it was probable they would ask, not through ignorance, since in their distress they had called upon the name of the Lord, and cried unto him for help and deliverance; but either to try Moses, and what knowledge he had of God: or there being many names by which he had made himself known; and especially was wont to make use of a new name or title when he made a new appearance, or any eminent discovery of himself, they might be desirous of knowing what was the present name he took:



what shall I say unto them? what name shall I make mention of?





Exodus 3:14



Ver. 14. And God said unto Moses, I am that I am,.... This signifies the real being of God, his self-existence, and that he is the Being of beings; as also it denotes his eternity and immutability, and his constancy and faithfulness in fulfilling his promises, for it includes all time, past, present, and to come; and the sense is, not only I am what I am at present, but I am what I have been, and I am what I shall be, and shall be what I am. The Platonists and Pythagoreans seem to have borrowed their to on from hence, which expresses with them the eternal and invariable Being; and so the Septuagint version here is

o wn: it is said {z}, that the temple of Minerva at Sais, a city of Egypt, had this inscription on it,



"I am all that exists, is, and shall be.''



And on the temple of Apollo at Delphos was written ei, the contraction of eimi, "I am" {a}. Our Lord seems to refer to this name, Joh 8:58, and indeed is the person that now appeared; and the words may be rendered, "I shall be what I shall be" {b} the incarnate God, God manifest in the flesh:



thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you; or as the Targum of Jonathan has it,



"I am he that is, and that shall be.''



This is the name Ehjeh, or Jehovah, Moses is empowered to make use of, and to declare, as the name of the Great God by whom he was sent; and which might serve both to encourage him, and strengthen the faith of the Israelites, that they should be delivered by him.



{z} Phutarch. de Iside & Osir. {a} Plato in Timaeo. {b} hyha rva hyha "ero qui ero", Pagninus, Montanus, Fagius, Vatablus.





Exodus 3:15



Ver. 15. And God said moreover unto Moses,.... As a further explanation of the above name, and of the design and use of it:



thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel: for their further instruction in the said name, and for the confirmation of the mission of Moses, and the success of it:



the Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you; he who is Jehovah, and the covenant God of the ancestors of the people of Israel, and of them, so he is called, Ec 3:6



this [is] my name for ever: meaning either "Ehjeh, I am", in the preceding verse, or, which is the same, Jehovah in this, and so both of them, and including also the name of the God of Abraham, &c. which he was always to be known by:



and this is my memorial unto all generations; the name by which he should be made mention of both by himself and others, and by which he would be called to remembrance by his people, and what he had promised unto them, and done for them.





Exodus 3:16



Ver. 16. Go and gather the elders of Israel together,.... Not all the ancient men among them, nor the "judges" of the people of Israel; for it does not appear there were such among them in Egypt, until they came into the land of Canaan, but the heads of tribes or families:



and say unto them, the Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, appeared unto me; in a flame of fire in the midst of a bush at Horeb:



saying, I have surely visited you, and seen that which is done to you in Egypt; inspected into their state and circumstances, took notice of their afflictions and oppressions, and determined to deliver them out of them, as follows.





Exodus 3:17



Ver. 17. And I have said,.... Within himself, resolved in his own mind, and had declared it to Moses:



I will bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt: with which they were afflicted in Egypt, and by the Egyptians; this he both purposed and promised to bring them out of: unto the land of the Canaanites, &c. then in the possession of the Canaanites, and others after named;

See Gill on "Ex 3:8".





Exodus 3:18



Ver. 18. And they shall hearken to thy voice,.... The elders of Israel, who would give credit to his commission, attend to what he said, and obey his orders, and follow the directions that he should give them, and not slight and reject him, as some had done before:



and thou shall come, thou, and the elders of Israel, unto the king of Egypt: the elders of Israel in a body, and Moses at the head of them; though we do not read of their approaching to Pharaoh, and addressing him in such a manner, only of Moses and Aaron applying to him:



and you shall say unto him, the Lord God of the Hebrews hath met with us; with one of them, who had reported to the rest what he had said; the children of Israel are here called Hebrews, because that seems to be a name the Egyptians most commonly called them, and by which they were best known to them, see Ge 39:14



and now let us go, we beseech thee, three days' journey into the wilderness; the wilderness of Sinai and Arabia, and to Mount Horeb in it; which from the borders of Egypt was three days' journey going the direct road, but the Israelites going somewhat about, and stopping by the way, did not get to it until the third month of their going out of Egypt, Ex 19:1:



that we may sacrifice to the Lord God; in the place where he had appeared to a principal man among them, and where they would be in no danger of being insulted and molested by the Egyptians. Some think the reason of this request they were directed to make, to sacrifice out of the land of Egypt, was, because what they sacrificed the Egyptians worshipped as gods, and therefore would be enraged at such sacrifices; but for this there is no sufficient foundation; See Gill on "Ge 46:34", rather the design was under this pretence to get quite away from them, they being no subjects of the king of Egypt, nor had he a right to detain them; nor were they obliged to acquaint him with the whole of their intentions, and especially as they were directed of God himself to say this, and no more, and which being so reasonable, made Pharaoh's refusal the more inexcusable.





Exodus 3:19



Ver. 19. And I am sure that the king of Egypt will not let you go,.... Or "but" {c} "I am sure", &c. though so reasonable a request was made him, yet it would not be granted; this is observed to them, that they might not be discouraged when he should refuse to dismiss them, which the omniscient God knew beforehand, and acquaints them with it, that, when it came to pass, they might be induced to believe that the mission of Moses was of God, rather than the contrary:



no, not by a mighty hand; the mighty power of God displayed once and again, even in nine plagues inflicted on him, until the tenth and last came upon him; or "unless by a mighty hand" {d}, even the almighty hand of God; prayers, entreaties, persuasions, and arguments, will signify nothing, unless the mighty power of God is exerted upon him.



{c} yna "ego autem", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator; "sed ego", V. L. {d} alw ean mh Sept. "nisi", V. L. Pagninus, Vatablus; so Noldius, p. 344. No. 1246.





Exodus 3:20



Ver. 20. And I will stretch out my hand,.... Or "therefore" {e} he would stretch out his mighty hand, exert his almighty power; and for this purpose was Pharaoh raised up, and his heart hardened, that God might show his power in him, and on him:



and smite Egypt with all my wonders, which I will do in the midst thereof: with those wondrous plagues, the amazing effects of his almighty power, which were wrought by him in the midst of Egypt, by which their land, their rivers, their persons, and their cattle, were smitten:



and after that he will let you go; this is said for their encouragement, that their faith and patience might hold out, who otherwise seeing him so obstinate and inflexible, might be ready to despair of ever succeeding.



{e} w "ideo", "propterea", Noldius, p. 279.





Exodus 3:21



Ver. 21. And I will give this people favour in the sight of the Egyptians,.... That is, give the Israelites favour in their sight, a little before their departure, who should be ready to do anything for them, or bestow anything upon them; or however lend them what they would desire, being glad to be at peace with them, or get rid of them, for whose sakes they would perceive all those sore calamities came upon them, they were distressed with:



and it shall come to pass, that when ye go, ye shall not go empty; destitute of what was necessary for them, but even with great substance, as was foretold by Abraham they should, and which prophecy was now about to be fulfilled, Ge 15:14.





Exodus 3:22



Ver. 22. But every woman shall borrow of her neighbour, and of her that sojourneth in her house,.... Or "shall ask" {f}, desire them to give or lend, what follows; and by this it appears, that the Israelites by reason of their great increase were spread about, and mixed with the Egyptians; and hence it was that there was such a mixed multitude that went up with them out of Egypt, who either were in connection with them in civil things, or were proselyted by them:



jewels of silver, and jewels of gold; that is, jewels set in silver and in gold; or "vessels of silver, and vessels of gold" {g}, plate of both sorts, cups, dishes, &c:



and raiment; rich and goodly apparel, which they might borrow to appear in at their feast and sacrifices in the wilderness, whither they asked leave to go to:



and ye shall put [them] upon your sons, and upon your daughters; and so deck and ornament them with them at the time of their departure:



and ye shall spoil the Egyptians; and very justly, for the hard service they put them to; for which all this was but their wages due unto them, and which they would stand in need of in their travels to Canaan's land, and for the erection of the tabernacle, and providing things appertaining to it in the wilderness.



{f} hlav aithsei Sept. "postulabit", V. L. Pagninus, Montanus, Tigurine version, Drusius; "petet", Junius & Tremellius. {g} ylk "vasa", V. L. Pagninus, Montanus, Piscator, Tigurine version, Drusius.

 

John Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible.

Exodus 4:1



INTRODUCTION TO EXODUS 4



This chapter is a continuation of the discourse that passed between God and Moses; and here Moses makes other objections to his mission; one is taken from the unbelief of the people of Israel, which is removed by giving him power to work miracles, by turning the rod in his hand into a serpent, and then into a rod again; and by putting his hand into his bosom at one time, when it became leprous, and again into the same place, when it became sound and whole, and by turning the water of the river into blood, Ex 4:1, another objection is formed from his want of eloquence, which is answered with an assurance, that God, that made man's mouth, would be with his mouth, and teach him what to say; and besides, Aaron his brother, who was an eloquent man, should be his spokesman, Ex 4:10 upon which he returned to Midian, and having obtained leave of his father-in-law to depart from thence, he took his wife and his sons, and returned to Egypt, Ex 4:18 at which time he received some fresh instructions from the Lord what he should do before Pharaoh, and what he should say unto him, Ex 4:21 then follows an account of what befell him by the way, because of the circumcision of his son, Ex 4:24 and the chapter is closed with an account of the meeting of Moses and Aaron, and of their gathering the elders of Israel together, to whom the commission of Moses was opened, and signs done before them, to which they gave credit, and expressed their joy and thankfulness, Ex 4:27.



Ver. 1. And Moses answered and said,.... In reference to what Jehovah had declared to him in the latter end of the preceding chapter:



but, behold, they will not believe me, nor hearken to my voice; this seems to contradict what God had said to him, Ex 3:18 that they would hearken to his voice; but it can hardly be thought, that so good a man, and so great a prophet as Moses was, would directly fly in the face of God, and expressly contradict what he had said. To reconcile this it may be observed, that what the Lord says respects only the elders of Israel, this all the people; or Jehovah's meaning may be, and so this of Moses, that neither the one nor the other would regard his bare word, without some sign or miracle being wrought; for as his call was extraordinary, so it required something extraordinary to be done that it might be credited:



for they will say, the Lord hath not appeared unto me: in the bush, as he would affirm he did, and might do it with the greatest assurance; yet the thing being so marvellous, and they not eyewitnesses of it, might distrust the truth of it, or be backward to receive it on his bare word; and this Moses might rather fear would be the case, from the experience he had had of them forty years ago, when it was more likely for him to have been a deliverer of them.





Exodus 4:2



Ver. 2. And the Lord said unto him,.... Not reproving him for contradicting him, or showing any diffidence of what he had said; but rather as approving the hint he gave of having some sign or miracle wrought, to command from the Israelites an assent unto him, as commissioned of God to deliver them:



what [is] that in thine hand? which question is put, not as being ignorant of what it was, but to lead on to what he had further to say, and to the working of the miracle:



and he said, a rod; or staff, such as shepherds use in the management of their flocks, for Moses was now feeding the flock of his father-in-law; but Aben Ezra seems rather to think it was a walking staff, such as ancient men lean upon, since Moses did not go to Pharaoh after the manner of a shepherd; yea, it may be added, he went with the authority of a prince or ruler of Israel, and even with the authority of the ambassador of the King of kings.





Exodus 4:3



Ver. 3. And he said, cast it on the ground,.... That is, the rod or staff:



and he cast it on the ground, and it became a serpent; not in appearance only, but in reality, it was changed into a real living serpent; for God, who is the author of nature, can change the nature of things as he pleases; nor is it to be supposed that he would only make it look to the sight as if it was one, by working upon the fancy and imagination to think it was one, when it was not; no doubt but it was as really turned into a true serpent, as the water was turned really and truly into wine by our Lord; this was the first miracle that ever was wrought, that we know of. Dr. Lightfoot {h} observes, that as a serpent was the fittest emblem of the devil, Ge 3:1 so was it a sign that Moses did not these miracles by the power of the devil, but had a power over and beyond him, when he could thus deal with the serpent at his pleasure, as to make his rod a serpent, and the serpent a rod, as he saw good:



and Moses fled from before it; the Jews say {i} it was a fiery serpent, but for this they have no warrant: however, without supposing that it might be terrible and frightful, inasmuch as a common serpent is very disagreeable to men, and such an uncommon and extraordinary one must be very surprising, to see a staff become a serpent, a living one, crawling and leaping about, and perhaps turning itself towards Moses, whose staff it had been. Philo the Jew {k} says, it was a dragon, an exceeding large one.



{h} Works, vol. 1. p. 702. {i} Pirke Eliezer, c. 40. {k} De Vita Mosls, l. 1. 614.





Exodus 4:4



Ver. 4. And the Lord said to Moses, put forth thy hand, and take it by the tail,.... Which to do might seem most dangerous, since it might turn upon him and bite him; this was ordered, partly that Moses might be assured it was really a serpent, and not in appearance only; and partly to try his courage, and it suggested to him, that he need not be afraid of it, it would not hurt him: the above learned doctor observes {l}, that he is commanded to take it by the tail; for to meddle with the serpent's head belonged not to Moses, but to Christ that spake to him out of the bush:



and he put forth his hand, and caught it, and it became a rod in his hand; as it was before. Some think this refers to the threefold state of the Israelites, first to their flourishing estate under Joseph, when they were as a rod or staff, then to their dejected state, by this rod cast to the ground, and become a serpent, and lastly to their restoration and liberty, by its becoming a rod again: others refer it to Christ, who is the power of God, and the rod of his strength, and who in his state of humiliation was like this rod, cast to the ground and became a serpent, of which the brazen serpent was a type, and who by his resurrection from the dead regained his former power; but perhaps they may be most right who think it refers to the service and ministry of Moses, which seemed terrible to him at first, like a hurtful serpent, from which he fled; but after he was confirmed by the word of God, he readily undertook it.



{l} De Vita Mosis, l. 1. 614.





Exodus 4:5



Ver. 5. That they may believe,.... The elders and people of Israel; for this miracle was wrought not for the confirmation of Moses's faith; for, as Aben Ezra observes, the sign of the burning bush was given to him to confirm his faith, that it was God that appeared to him, and called him to this work; but this was wrought to confirm the faith of the Israelites in his divine mission:



that the Lord God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath appeared unto thee;

See Gill on "Ex 3:6".





Exodus 4:6



Ver. 6. And the Lord said furthermore unto him,.... Continued his discourse, and gave him another sign:



put now thine hand into thy bosom. And he put his hand into his bosom; within his coat, under that part of the garment next to his breast:



and when he took it out, behold, his hand [was] leprous as snow; that is, white as snow, as the Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan, through the leprosy that was upon it; it was a leprosy of the white sort, and which is reckoned the worst and most difficult to be cured, see

Le 13:3. It is highly probable that this gave rise to the story told by several Heathen writers, as Manetho {m}, Lysimachus {n}, Trogus {o}, and Tacitus {p}, that Moses and the Israelites were drove out of Egypt by the advice of an oracle, because they had the leprosy, itch, and other impure diseases upon them.



{m} Apud Joseph. contr. Apion. l. 1. c. 26. {n} Apud. ib. c. 34. {o} Justin e Trogo, l. 36. c. 2. {p} Hist. l. 5. c. 3.





Exodus 4:7



Ver. 7. And he said, put thine hand into thy bosom again,.... With the leprosy on it:



and he put his hand into his bosom again, and plucked it out of his bosom; quickly after he had put it in:



and, behold, it was turned again as his other flesh; it was cured of the leprosy, and recovered its colour, and was as sound as before, and as any other part of his body. This was a very astonishing miracle, that he should be at once smote with a leprosy; that this should be only in his hand, and not in any other part of his body; and that it should be cured immediately, without the use of any means; and by this miracle Moses, and the Israelites, might be instructed and confirmed in the power of God, that he that could so suddenly inflict such a disease, and so easily cure it, was able to deliver them out of captivity, which was as death; and that however until Moses might be in himself to be a deliverer of the people, signified by his weak and leprous hand, yet being quickened and strengthened by the Lord, would be able to answer to the character; though, after all, the deliverance must be imputed not to his hand and power, but to the mighty hand and power of God.





Exodus 4:8



Ver. 8. And it shall come to pass, if they will not believe thee,.... Will not give credit to the commission he had from God, but question the truth of it:



neither hearken to the voice of the first sign; which miracle wrought, spoke plain enough that he that wrought it, or for whose sake it was wrought, must be one come from God, or such a miracle would never be wrought by him or for him; but should any of the Israelites be still incredulous, it is supposed,



that they will believe the voice of the latter sign; which had a voice in it commanding belief that he was a messenger of God; the first sign respects his rod, the other his hand.





Exodus 4:9



Ver. 9. And it shall come to pass, if they will not believe also these two signs,.... Performed before their eyes; for these were done over again when Moses came into Egypt to the Israelites, and yet some of them might still remain unbelievers to his commission, and so to the voice of these signs, which loudly called for their faith:



neither hearken unto thy voice; affirming he came from God, and was sent to be the deliverer of them:



that thou shalt take of the water of the river; of the river Nile, when he should come into Egypt; wherefore Josephus {q} is mistaken when he intimates that this was done at the same time with the other signs; and was water he took near at hand and poured on the ground: but Philo {r} truly refers this to Egypt, where it was done, as it ought to be:



and pour [it] upon the dry land, and the water which thou takest out of the river shall become blood upon the dry land; by which it would appear how easily the Lord could destroy the land of Egypt, and make it a barren land, whose fertility was owing to the overflow of the river Nile as a means; and this would be a specimen also of what he would do hereafter, in turning the waters of the river into blood, thereby avenging the blood of innocent babes drowned there by the Egyptians.



{q} Antiqu. l. 2. c. 12. sect. 3. {r} De Vita Mosis, l. 1. p. 614.





Exodus 4:10



Ver. 10. And Moses said unto the Lord,.... Notwithstanding the above miracles, he seems unwilling to go on the Lord's errand to Pharaoh and to the Israelites, and therefore invents a new objection after all his other objections had been sufficiently answered:



I am not eloquent; or "a man of words" {s}, that has words at command, that can speak well readily, and gracefully; such an one, he intimates, was proper to be sent to a king's court, that was an orator, that could make fine speeches, and handsome addresses, for which he was not qualified:



neither heretofore, nor since thou hast spoken to thy servant; neither in his younger years had he ever been an eloquent man, nor was there any alteration in him in that respect, since God had given him this call:



but I [am] slow of speech, and of a slow tongue; had some impediment in his speech, could not freely and easily bring out his words, or rightly pronounce them; so Lucian {t} the Heathen calls Moses slow tongued, or one slow of speech, and uses the same word the Septuagint does here, which version perhaps he had seen, and from thence took it.



{s} Myrbd vya "vir verborum", Paguinus, Montanus, Piscator, Ainsworth. {t} In Philopatride.





Exodus 4:11



Ver. 11. And the Lord said unto him, who hath made man's mouth?.... Made that itself, and put in it the power and faculty of speech, even into the mouth of the first man, Adam, as the Targum of Jonathan; and so of every other man, did not the Lord do it? none else could, and therefore he that made it, and made it capable of speaking, could remove any impediments in it, and cause it to speak freely and fluently:



or who maketh the dumb, or deaf, or the seeing, or the blind? have not I, the Lord? as all the senses, and the perfection of them, are from him, so all the imperfections in them are according to his good pleasure; what he suffers to be, and can remedy when he thinks fit: it is he that gives the seeing eye and hearing ear, can and does make blind and deaf, that gives also the speaking mouth, and makes that dumb, and can open it again as he pleases! and what is it that he cannot do?





Exodus 4:12



Ver. 12. Now therefore go, and I will be with thy mouth,.... And put words into it, and cause it to speak readily and powerfully; and so it appears that he was mighty in words, as well as in deeds, Ac 7:22:



and teach thee what thou shalt say; to Pharaoh, to the Israelites, and to Aaron, that was to speak for him, as is hereafter observed.





Exodus 4:13



Ver. 13. And he said, O my Lord,.... Acknowledging his dominion, his sovereignty, his power to do the above things: or "on me, O Lord" {u}, be the blame for making such objections; or on me let this work be devolved, since it is thy pleasure:



send, I pray thee, by the hand [of him whom] thou wilt send. Many of the ancient Christian fathers understand it of the Messiah that was to be sent, and as if Moses thought this was a fit time for the sending of him: and so Cocceius is of opinion, that nothing better can be understood, than that Moses desired that God would rather send him, whom Israel expected to be sent, even the Angel that should go before them; of whose mission see Ex 23:20, but no particular person is intended, unless himself; and the common interpretation is, that God would send a more fit and proper person than he was; and that he would rather send anyone but him, and entreats to be excused; but I see not why this may not be understood of Moses assenting to his mission, and acquiescing in the will of God; as if he should say, since it must be so, the will of the Lord be done, let him send by whom he will, and since it is his pleasure to send by me, I submit; what may seem to contradict this is, the Lord's anger and resentment expressed in the following words; but that might be notwithstanding, since Moses had been so backward and reluctant, and made so many objections before he consented.



{u} ynda yb "in me", Oleaster.





Exodus 4:14



Ver. 14. And the anger of the Lord was kindled against Moses,.... For the objections, excuses, and delays he made with respect to his mission. In what way this anger was expressed is not easy to say, whether by not removing the impediment of his speech, or not giving him the priesthood, which Jarchi thinks he otherwise would have had, and Aaron been only a Levite, as he is called in the next clause; or whether it was by joining Aaron to him, and so lessening his honour in this embassy, though that seems to be done to encourage him; or by not suffering him to lead the children of Israel into the land of Canaan, which yet is ascribed to another cause. However, though the Lord was angry with Moses, yet without any change of affection to him, he still retained and expressed a great regard to him; did not reject him from his service as he might have done, but employed him, and preferred him to his elder brother. Moses shows himself to be a faithful historian in recording his own weaknesses, and the displeasure of God at them:



and he said, is not Aaron the Levite thy brother; he was, and his elder brother, he was born three years before him, Ex 7:7 though Justin {w}, an Heathen writer, says he was his son, and calls his name Aruas, and speaks of him as an Egyptian priest, and that he was made king after Moses's death; hence, he says, was the custom with the Jews for the same persons to be kings and priests; in all which he is mistaken. But Artapanus {x}, another Heathen writer, calls him the brother of Moses, and by his right name, Aaron; and says it was by his advice Moses fled into Arabia, and speaks of his meeting him afterwards, when he was sent to the king of Egypt. Aaron is called the Levite, because he was a descendant of Levi, and yet so was Moses; perhaps this is added here, to distinguish him from others of the same name in other families, as Aben Ezra thinks; for as for what Jarchi suggests, as before, is without any foundation; and it is much more likely that Moses added this title to him, in his account of this affair, because he was the first of the tribe of Levi that was employed in the priestly office:



I know that he can speak well; or "in speaking speak" {y}, speak very freely, fluently, in an eloquent manner; in which he was an eminent type of Christ, who is our advocate with the father, and has the tongue of the learned to speak a word in season; and does speak and plead for the conversion of his people, for the comfort of them, for the discoveries of pardoning grace and mercy to them; and for the carrying on the work of grace in them, and their perseverance to the end, and for their eternal glorification. The prayer in Joh 17:1 is a specimen of this:



and also, behold, he cometh forth to meet thee; having had an intimation from God of Moses's call to come into Egypt, and deliver his people from their bondage, he immediately set out to meet him, whereby he showed more faith, zeal, and courage, than Moses did; and this is said to animate him, and was a new sign, and would be a fresh confirmation of his faith, when he should see it accomplished, as he did:



and when he seeth thee, he will be glad in his heart: sincerely glad, and not only secretly so, but would express his cordial joy with his lips; not only because of his having a sight of his brother once more, whom he had not seen for forty years past, but because of his coming on such an errand from God, to deliver the people of Israel; and therefore, as he would express such gladness on this occasion, it became Moses to engage in this work with the utmost pleasure and cheerfulness.



{w} E Trogo, l. 36. c. 2. {x} Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 27. p. 433, 434. {y} rbdy rbd "loquendo loquetur", Pagninus, Montanus, Vatablus, Drusius.





Exodus 4:15



Ver. 15. And thou shalt speak unto him, and put words in his mouth,.... Or "things" {z}, the matter and substance of what he should say, who being a man of words, an eloquent man, and a good spokesman, would put them into proper language, and express them fluently:



and I will be with thy mouth, and with his mouth, and will teach you what ye shall do; or speak what Moses should say to Aaron, and what Aaron should say to Pharaoh, and to the people of Israel; so that as Aaron was under Moses, and at his direction, they were both dependent on the Lord, and under his direction; and the one, as well as the other, needed his assistance, even Aaron that could speak well. Moses furnished him with matter, he put it into words, and both were instructed and influenced by the Lord what they should say and do.



{z} Myrbdh ta.





Exodus 4:16



Ver. 16. And he shall be thy spokesman unto the people,.... And open to them Moses's commission from God, and the end of his mission into Egypt, and to them, and declare what signs had been, and would be done, in confirmation of it:



and he shall be, [even] he shall be to thee instead of a mouth; or an interpreter, as all the Targums explain it, and so Jarchi; as he was an orator and master of language, he should speak to the people for Moses, and explain his sense and meaning, and put it into plain, proper, easy language, to be understood by the people; and this may be done where a different language is not spoken, but the same in plainer words, in more pertinent expressions, and better pronounced, and this is repeated for the certainty of it:



and thou shall be to him instead of God; Aaron was to stand between Moses and the people, and speak for him; and Moses was to stand between God and Aaron, and in God's stead, and tell him what orders he had received from him, and which he should communicate; and so some Jewish writers {a} interpret it of his being to him instead of a master or teacher, one that received doctrine from the Lord, and instructed him in it, and taught him the mind and will of God: or, as Onkelos paraphrases it; "for a prince", and so Jarchi, a civil magistrate, one that had the power of life and death; the administration of civil affairs belonged to Moses, and Aaron, though the elder brother, was subject to him; and in this sense Moses was a god to him; and so in after times, the judges of Israel, they that sat in Moses's chair, were called gods, Ps 82:1.



{a} Targum Jon. Jerus. & Abendana in loc.





Exodus 4:17



Ver. 17. And thou shall take this rod in thine hand,.... Which he then had in his hand, and was no other than his shepherd's staff:



wherewith thou shall do signs: wondrous things, meaning the ten plagues inflicted on Egypt.





Exodus 4:18



Ver. 18. And Moses went and returned to Jethro his father in law,.... With his flock of sheep he kept, Ex 3:1: and said unto him,



let me go, I pray thee, and return to my brethren which are in Egypt; the Israelites, who were so by nation and religion; as Jethro had been kind and beneficent to him, he did not choose to leave him without his knowledge and consent, and especially to take away his wife and children without it:



and see whether they be yet alive; it seems by this that Moses had heard nothing of them during the forty years he lived in Midian, which may be thought strange, since it was not very far from Egypt; and besides the Midianites traded in Egypt, as we learn from Ge 37:28 but this must be ascribed to the providence of God, that so ordered it, that there should be no intercourse between him and his brethren, that so no step might be taken by them for their deliverance until the set time was come. Moses did not acquaint his father-in-law with the principal reason of his request, nor of his chief end in going into Egypt, which it might not be proper to acquaint him with, he being of another nation, though a good man; and lest he should use any arguments to dissuade Moses from going, who now having got clear of his diffidence and distrust, was determined upon it: though some ascribe this to his modesty in not telling Jethro of the glorious and wonderful appearance of God to him, and of the honour he had conferred on him to be the deliverer and governor of the people of Israel:



and Jethro said to Moses, go in peace; he judged his request reasonable, and gave his full consent to it, and wished him health and prosperity in his journey.





Exodus 4:19



Ver. 19. And the Lord said unto Moses in Midian,.... After he had obtained leave of his father-in-law to quit Midian, but before he left it;



go, return into Egypt: that is, directly, immediately; before he had only given him a commission at large to go thither, but had not fixed the time when he should go; but now he orders him to set forward at once:



for all the men are dead which sought thy life; to take it away, the king of Egypt, and his ministers, and the friends of the Egyptian Moses had slain; and this is said to encourage him to go; and though Moses had never expressed his fear on this account, or made it an objection, yet it might lie secretly in his heart, and be one reason of his backwardness to go into Egypt, and which was now removed.





Exodus 4:20



Ver. 20. And Moses took his wife, and his sons,.... Gershom and Eliezer; by which it appears that he intended to stay in Egypt, and that he believed that God would work deliverance by him:



and set them upon an ass: which though with us a mean creature, yet in those times and countries were rode upon by great personages; and these, as Aben Ezra says, were reckoned in Egypt more honourable than mules. It may be the singular is put for the plural, and that each of them was set upon an ass, with servants to take care of them:



and he returned to the land of Egypt; that is, he set forward to go thither; for before he got thither, various things are related which befell him:



and Moses took the rod of God in his hand: his shepherd's staff, so called, because God ordered him to take it; and besides, he had wrought signs and wonders by it already, and would do many more.





Exodus 4:21



Ver. 21. And the Lord said unto Moses,.... At the same time he appeared to him in Midian, and ordered him to go into Egypt, even before his departure thither:



when thou goest to return into Egypt; and when got thither; for before the thing directed to in the next clause could not be done:



see that thou do all these wonders before Pharaoh which I have put in thine hand; not the three signs or wonders, related in the preceding part of the chapter, for they were to be done not before Pharaoh, but before the children of Israel; but these are the wonders he was to do in the sight of Pharaoh, by inflicting the various plagues on him and his people, for refusing to let Israel go, and which God had put in the power of Moses to perform, and that by means of the rod in his hand he ordered him to take with him, Ex 4:17:



but I will harden his heart, that he shall not let the people go; that is, not directly, not for some time, not until all the wonders are wrought, and plagues inflicted to bring him to it: he first hardening his own heart against God, and all remonstrances made unto him, it was but a righteous thing in God to give him up to the hardness of his heart, to deny him his grace, which only could soften it, and to leave him to the corruptions of his nature, and the temptations of Satan; and by leaving him to strong delusions, to believe the lying miracles of his magicians: this the Lord thought fit to acquaint Moses with, lest he should be discouraged by his refusal to dismiss Israel.





Exodus 4:22



Ver. 22. And thou shall say unto Pharaoh,.... When arrived in Egypt, and in his presence:



thus saith the Lord; he was to declare to him that he came in his name, and by his orders, and, as an ambassador of his, required the dismission of the children of Israel out of Egypt:



Israel [is] my son, [even] my firstborn; as dear to him as a man's firstborn is, or as his only son: adoption is one of the privileges peculiar to Israel after the flesh, even national adoption, with all the external privileges appertaining to it, Ro 9:4.





Exodus 4:23



Ver. 23. And I say unto thee, let my son go, that he may serve me,.... Worship God according to his will in the place he had designed for him, and where he might be safe and free; and which service was due from him as a son, and to be performed not in a servile way, but in a filial manner, and therefore as a servant he could demand his dismission, and much more as his son; and this is required in an authoritative way, for saying is here commanding, insisting on it as a point of right to be done:



and if thou refuse to let him go, behold, I will slay thy son, even thy firstborn; meaning, not only in a strict and literal sense Pharaoh's firstborn son, and heir to his crown, but the firstborn of all his subjects, which in a civil sense were his. This was not to be said to Pharaoh at the first opening of his commission to him, but after all methods had been tried, and the several other plagues designed were inflicted on him to no purpose, he was to be told this, which was the last plague, and succeeded; but this is told to Moses before hand, that when other messages he should be sent with to him, and all that should be done by him would prove ineffectual, this, when sent with and performed, would have the desired effect.





Exodus 4:24



Ver. 24. And it came to pass by the way, in the inn,.... As Moses and his family were travelling in their way to Egypt, at an inn where they stopped for the refreshment of themselves and cattle, or in order to lodge all night: so it was, that the Lord met him, and sought to kill him; not the uncircumcised son of Moses, as some think, but Moses himself, who had neglected the circumcision of his son; that from the context, and the fact of Zipporah, after related, seems to be the reason of the divine displeasure, and not his bringing his family with him, supposed to be an hinderance of him in his work, nor of his staying too long at the inn, and not hastening his journey, which are the reasons given by some: and Moses's neglect of circumcision was not owing to the disuse of it among the Midianites, who being the descendants of Abraham, it is highly probable they retained this rite, and that it was used in Jethro's family, since Zipporah well understood the nature of it, and how to perform it; and it looks as if her eldest son had been circumcised before, seeing only one was now circumcised by her; but the Midianites perhaps followed the same practice as the Ishmaelites did, who were their neighbours, and the descendants of Abraham also, who deferred it till their children were thirteen years of age; or if this child was a very young one, it might have been put off, because of the journey they were just about to take, and purposing to do it when come into Egypt; but this was resented by the Lord in Moses, who had such knowledge of the law of God; and this displeasure of Jehovah might be signified either by inflicting some disease upon him, as Aben Ezra and Kimchi think, which threatened him with death, or by appearing in a terrible manner, as the angel of the Lord did to Balaam, with a drawn sword in his hand.





Exodus 4:25



Ver. 25. Then Zipporah took a sharp stone, and cut off the foreskin of her son,.... Perceiving that it was the neglect of circumcising her son was the cause of the divine displeasure against her husband; and he being either so ill through the disease upon him, or so terrified with the appearance of the Lord to him, in the manner it was, that he could not perform this rite himself, she undertook it; and, according to the Jewish canons {b}, a woman may circumcise; and having with her no instrument more proper to do it with, took a sharp stone, very probably a flint, of which there was great plenty in Arabia Petraea, where she was, and did it; and so the Jewish writers say {c}, they circumcise with a flint stone, with glass, or anything that will cut; and such like actions have been performed with sharp stones among the Heathens {d}: and cast it at his feet; not at the feet of the infant Eliezer, as R. Samuel in Aben Ezra; the blood of the circumcision running down to his feet, as Lyra interprets it; and so touched his feet {e}, as some render the words; not cast at the feet of the destroying angel, as the Targums of Jonathan and Jerusalem, in order to pacify him; but at the feet of Moses, as the Jerusalem Talmud {f}; and so Jarchi and Aben Ezra:



and said, surely a bloody husband art thou to me; those who think it was at the feet of the child the foreskin was cast, take these words to be spoken of that, and observe that it is usual for women, at the circumcision of a child, to call it a bridegroom or husband, because it is then espoused unto, and reckoned among the people of God; but this is not well supported; it is a custom of too late a date to give any countenance to such a sense of the words, which seem plain enough to be spoken to and of Moses; but not in an angry upbraiding way, as if he was a bloody cruel man to oblige her to do such an action, but rather in a congratulatory way, as being thankful and rejoicing, that by this means, through the blood of the circumcision, she had saved her husband's life; and as it were in that way had bought him, and afresh espoused him to herself as her husband; or otherwise it would have been all over with him, but now to her great joy he was delivered from the threatened destruction, and restored to her; and so the Targums of Jonathan and Jerusalem paraphrase the next verse,



"then Zipporah gave praise, and said, how amiable is the blood of circumcision, which hath delivered my husband from the hand of the destroying angel.''



{b} Maimon. Hilchot Milah, c. 2. sect. 1. Shulchan Aruch, par. 2. Yore Dea, Hilchot Milah, c. 264. sect. 1. {c} Maimon. ib. Shulchan ib. sect. 2. {d} "Mollia qui rupta secuit genitalia testa." Juvenal Satyr 6. "Devolvit ipse acuto sibi pondera silice." Catullus. {e} wylgrl egtw "tetigitque pedes ejus", V. L. {f} T. Hieros. Nedarim, fol. 38. 2.





Exodus 4:26



Ver. 26. So he let him go,.... That is, the Lord let Moses go; suffered him to go on his journey without any further interruption; as the Targums, "it", the angel, ceased from him, or left him; or the disease and trembling departed from him, as Aben Ezra, and he was quite well and easy; though Grotius, after Lyra, understands it of Zipporah, she departed from him, that is, from Moses, and returned to Midian again, as it seems she did; but this the grammatical construction of the words will not bear, being masculine, though sometimes the masculine is used of women, as in Ex 1:21:



then she said, a bloody husband thou art because of the circumcision; this is repeated, partly to give the reason of her calling him a bloody husband, because of the circumcision, and partly because of her great joy on occasion of her husband's restoration to her by this means.





Exodus 4:27



Ver. 27. And the Lord said unto Aaron,.... He appeared to him in a dream or vision, and to this reference is had in 1Sa 2:27



go into the wilderness to meet Moses; in the wilderness of Arabia, through which Moses was to pass into Egypt, and who was now set out on his journey thitherward:



and he went; immediately, being obedient to the heavenly vision: and met him in the mount of God; in Horeb, where the Lord had appeared to Moses, and therefore called the mount of God, and where afterwards the law was given, and the covenant made with the people of Israel; and so the Targum of Jonathan paraphrases it,



"in the mount on which the glory of God was revealed:''



and kissed him: as relations and intimate friends used to do at meeting or parting, to testify affection and respect; and Aaron must on all accounts be glad to meet Moses, both as he was his brother, whom he had not seen for many years, and as he was come to be a deliverer of the people of Israel. And it is observed, that it was but two days' journey from the land of Midian, where Jethro lived, from whence Moses set out; and that a common traveller cannot conveniently make the journey from Ramesses, or Grand Cairo (from whence it may be supposed Aaron set out), to Mount Horeb, in less than a fortnight, though he be carried on the back of a camel {g}; and yet Aaron reached this place by the time that Moses did, which shows that either he delayed setting out on his journey, or was detained long at the inn on the road, on account of what happened there.



{g} Clayton's Chronology of the Hebrew Bible, p 221.





Exodus 4:28



Ver. 28. And Moses told Aaron all the words of the Lord, who had sent him,.... He declared his mission and commission from God, and gave him the particulars of what was to be said both to the people of Israel and to the king of Egypt; and this he did, because Aaron was to be his spokesman unto them:



and all the signs which he had commanded him; to do, first before the children of Israel, and then before Pharaoh; before the one to obtain credit of them, as being sent of God, and before the other to get leave of him for the departure of Israel out of Egypt.





Exodus 4:29



Ver. 29. And Moses and Aaron went,.... Set forward for Egypt: and being come thither,



gathered together all the elders of the children of Israel; the heads of tribes and families, as many as they could conveniently get together in one place; probably in the metropolis of the kingdom, where Pharaoh's palace was, since we quickly hear of their going in to him.





Exodus 4:30



Ver. 30. And Aaron spake all the words which the Lord had spoken unto Moses,.... As Moses had related to him, being his mouth and spokesman:



and did the signs in the sight of the people; not Aaron, but Moses, and these were the turning of his rod into a serpent, and the serpent into a rod again; putting his hand into and out of his bosom, when it was leprous, and then doing the same when it was well again; and taking water out of the river, and changing it into blood, which he did for the confirmation of his mission.





Exodus 4:31



Ver. 31. And the people believed,.... That Moses was sent of God, and would be the deliverer of them:



and when they heard that the Lord had visited the children of Israel; in a way of grace and mercy, by raising such a redeemer and deliverer in the midst of them:



and that he had looked upon their affliction; with an eye of pity and compassion:



then they bowed their heads, and worshipped; adoring the goodness of God, and expressing their thankfulness for the notice he took of them, and signifying their readiness to obey all instructions and directions that should be given them.

 

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