Keluaran 4:10

4:10 Then Moses said to the Lord, ¹  “O ²  my Lord, ³  I am not an eloquent man, ⁴  neither in the past ⁵  nor since you have spoken to your servant, for I am slow of speech and slow of tongue.” ⁶ 

Keluaran 6:11

6:11 “Go, tell Pharaoh king of Egypt that he must release ⁷  the Israelites from his land.”

Keluaran 6:29

6:29 he said to him, ⁸  “I am the Lord. Tell ⁹  Pharaoh king of Egypt all that ¹⁰  I am telling ¹¹  you.”

Hakim-hakim 6:15

6:15 Gideon ¹²  said to him, “But Lord, ¹³  how ¹⁴  can I deliver Israel? Just look! My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the youngest in my family.” ¹⁵ 

Hakim-hakim 6:1

Oppression and Confrontation

6:1 The Israelites did evil in the Lord’s sight, ¹⁶  so the Lord turned them over to ¹⁷  Midian for seven years.

1 Samuel 9:21

9:21 Saul replied, “Am I not a Benjaminite, from the smallest of Israel’s tribes, and is not my family clan the smallest of all the tribes of Benjamin? Why do you speak to me in this way?”

1 Samuel 15:17

15:17 Samuel said, “Is it not true that when you were insignificant in your own eyes, you became head of the tribes of Israel? The Lord chose ¹⁸  you as king over Israel.

1 Samuel 18:18

18:18 David said to Saul, “Who am I? Who are my relatives or the clan of my father ¹⁹  in Israel that I should become the king’s son-in-law?”

1 Samuel 18:2

18:2 Saul retained David ²⁰  on that day and did not allow him to return to his father’s house.

1 Samuel 7:1-2

7:1 Then the people ²¹  of Kiriath Jearim came and took the ark of the Lord; they brought it to the house of Abinadab located on the hill. They consecrated Eleazar his son to guard the ark of the Lord.

Further Conflict with the Philistines

7:2 It was quite a long time – some twenty years in all – that the ark stayed at Kiriath Jearim. All the people ²²  of Israel longed for ²³  the Lord.

1 Tawarikh 2:6

2:6 The sons of Zerah:

Zimri, Ethan, Heman, Kalkol, Dara ²⁴  – five in all.

Yesaya 6:5

6:5 I said, “Too bad for me! I am destroyed, ²⁵  for my lips are contaminated by sin, ²⁶  and I live among people whose lips are contaminated by sin. ²⁷  My eyes have seen the king, the Lord who commands armies.” ²⁸ 

Yeremia 1:6

1:6 I answered, “Oh, Lord God, ²⁹  I really ³⁰  do not know how to speak well enough for that, ³¹  for I am too young.” ³² 

[4:10]  ¹ sn Now Moses took up another line of argumentation, the issue of his inability to speak fluently (vv. 10-17). The point here is that God’s servants must yield themselves as instruments to God, the Creator. It makes no difference what character traits they have or what weaknesses they think they have (Moses manages to speak very well) if God is present. If the sovereign God has chosen them, then they have everything that God intended them to have.

[4:10]  ² tn The word בִּי (bi) is a particle of entreaty; it seeks permission to speak and is always followed by “my lord” or “my Lord.” Often rendered “please,” it is “employed in petitions, complaints and excuses” (W. H. C. Propp, Exodus 1–18 [AB], 213).

[4:10]  ³ tn The designation in Moses’ address is אֲדֹנָי (’adonay), a term of respect and deference such as “lord, master, sir” but pointed as it would be when it represents the tetragrammaton. B. Jacob says since this is the first time Moses spoke directly to Yahweh, he did so hesitatingly (Exodus, 87).

[4:10]  ⁴ tn When a noun clause is negated with לֹא (lo’), rather than אֵין (’en), there is a special emphasis, since the force of the negative falls on a specific word (GKC 479 §152.d). The expression “eloquent man” is אִישׁ דְּבָרִים (’ish dÿvarim, “a man of words”). The genitive may indicate a man characterized by words or a man who is able to command or control words. Moses apparently is resigned to the fact that he can do the signs, but he knows the signs have to be explained.

[4:10]  ⁵ tn Heb “also from yesterday also from three days ago” or “neither since yesterday nor since before that” is idiomatic for “previously” or “in the past.”

[4:10]  ⁶ tn The two expressions are כְבַד־פֶּה (khÿvad peh, “heavy of mouth”), and then כְבַד לָשׁוֹן (khÿvad lashon, “heavy of tongue”). Both use genitives of specification, the mouth and the tongue being what are heavy – slow. “Mouth” and “tongue” are metonymies of cause. Moses is saying that he has a problem speaking well. Perhaps he had been too long at the other side of the desert, or perhaps he was being a little dishonest. At any rate, he has still not captured the meaning of God’s presence. See among other works, J. H. Tigay, “‘Heavy of Mouth’ and ‘Heavy of Tongue’: On Moses’ Speech Difficulty,” BASOR 231 (1978): 57-67.

[6:11]  ⁷ tn The form וִישַׁלַּח (vishallakh) is the Piel imperfect or jussive with a sequential vav; following an imperative it gives the imperative’s purpose and intended result. They are to speak to Pharaoh, and (so that as a result) he will release Israel. After the command to speak, however, the second clause also indirectly states the content of the speech (cf. Exod 11:2; 14:2, 15; 25:2; Lev 16:2; 22:2). As the next verse shows, Moses doubts that what he says will have the intended effect.

[6:29]  ⁸ tn Heb “and Yahweh spoke to Moses saying.” This has been simplified in the translation as “he said to him” for stylistic reasons.

[6:29]  ⁹ tn The verb is דַּבֵּר (dabber), the Piel imperative. It would normally be translated “speak,” but in English that verb does not sound as natural with a direct object as “tell.”

[6:29]  ¹⁰ tn The clause begins with אֵת כָּל־אֲשֶׁר (’et kol-’asher) indicating that this is a noun clause functioning as the direct object of the imperative and providing the content of the commanded speech.

[6:29]  ¹¹ tn דֹּבֵר (dover) is the Qal active participle; it functions here as the predicate in the noun clause: “that I [am] telling you.” This one could be rendered, “that I am speaking to you.”

[6:15]  ¹² tn Heb “he”; the referent (Gideon) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[6:15]  ¹³ tn Note the switch to אֲדֹנָי (’adonay, “Lord”). Gideon seems aware that he is speaking to someone other than, and superior to, the messenger, whom he addressed as אֲדֹנִי (’adoniy, “my lord”) in v. 13.

[6:15]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “with what.”

[6:15]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “in my father’s house.”

[6:1]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “in the eyes of.”

[6:1]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “gave them into the hand of.”

[15:17]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “anointed.”

[18:18]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “Who are my relatives, the clan of my father?” The term חַי (khay), traditionally understood as “my life,” is here a rare word meaning “family, kinfolk” (see HALOT 309 s.v. III חַי). The phrase “clan of my father” may be a scribal gloss explaining the referent of this rare word.

[18:2]  ²⁰ tn Heb “him”; the referent (David) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[7:1]  ²¹ tn Heb “men.”

[7:2]  ²² tn Heb “house” (also in the following verse).

[7:2]  ²³ tn Heb “mourned after”; NIV “mourned and sought after”; KJV, NRSV “lamented after”; NAB “turned to”; NCV “began to follow…again.”

[2:6]  ²⁴ tc Many medieval Hebrew mss, some LXX mss, and Syriac read “Darda” (see 1 Kgs 4:31 ET = 1 Kgs 5:11 HT).

[6:5]  ²⁵ tn Isaiah uses the suffixed (perfect) form of the verb for rhetorical purposes. In this way his destruction is described as occurring or as already completed. Rather than understanding the verb as derived from דָּמַה (damah, “be destroyed”), some take it from a proposed homonymic root דמה, which would mean “be silent.” In this case, one might translate, “I must be silent.”

[6:5]  ²⁶ tn Heb “a man unclean of lips am I.” Isaiah is not qualified to praise the king. His lips (the instruments of praise) are “unclean” because he has been contaminated by sin.

[6:5]  ²⁷ tn Heb “and among a nation unclean of lips I live.”

[6:5]  ²⁸ tn Perhaps in this context, the title has a less militaristic connotation and pictures the Lord as the ruler of the heavenly assembly. See the note at 1:9.

[1:6]  ²⁹ tn Heb “Lord Yahweh.”

[1:6]  sn The translation follows the ancient Jewish tradition of substituting the Hebrew word for “God” for the proper name Yahweh in this compound name. See the study note on v. 2 for the substitution of “Lord” in a similar kind of situation.

[1:6]  ³⁰ tn Heb “Behold, I do not know how to speak.” The particle הִנֵּה (hinneh, commonly rendered “behold”) often introduces a speech and calls special attention to a specific word or the statement as a whole (see IBHS 675-78 §40.2.1).

[1:6]  ³¹ tn The words “well enough for that” are implicit and are supplied in the translation for clarity. Jeremiah is not claiming an absolute inability to speak.

[1:6]  ³² tn Heb “I am a boy/youth.” The Hebrew word can refer to an infant (Exod 2:6), a young boy (1 Sam 2:11), a teenager (Gen 21:12), or a young man (2 Sam 18:5). The translation is deliberately ambiguous since it is unclear how old Jeremiah was when he was called to begin prophesying.