Keluaran 3:9

3:9 And now indeed ¹  the cry ²  of the Israelites has come to me, and I have also seen how severely the Egyptians oppress them. ³ 

Keluaran 6:1

6:1 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Now you will see what I will do to Pharaoh, ⁴  for compelled by my strong hand ⁵  he will release them, and by my strong hand he will drive them out of his land.” ⁶ 

Keluaran 9:15

9:15 For by now I could have stretched out ⁷  my hand and struck you and your people with plague, and you would have been destroyed ⁸  from the earth.

Keluaran 9:18

9:18 I am going to cause very severe hail to rain down ⁹  about this time tomorrow, such hail as has never occurred ¹⁰  in Egypt from the day it was founded ¹¹  until now.

Keluaran 10:17

10:17 So now, forgive my sin this time only, and pray to the Lord your God that he would only ¹²  take this death ¹³  away from me.”

Keluaran 18:19

18:19 Now listen to me, ¹⁴  I will give you advice, and may God be with you: You be a representative for the people to God, ¹⁵  and you bring ¹⁶  their disputes ¹⁷  to God;

Keluaran 19:5

19:5 And now, if you will diligently listen to me ¹⁸  and keep ¹⁹  my covenant, then you will be my ²⁰  special possession ²¹  out of all the nations, for all the earth is mine,

Keluaran 32:30

32:30 The next day Moses said to the people, ²²  “You have committed a very serious sin, ²³  but now I will go up to the Lord – perhaps I can make atonement ²⁴  on behalf of your sin.”

Keluaran 32:34

32:34 So now go, lead the people to the place I have spoken to you about. See, ²⁵  my angel will go before you. But on the day that I punish, I will indeed punish them for their sin.” ²⁶ 

[3:9]  ¹ tn The particle הִנֵּה (hinneh) focuses attention on what is being said as grounds for what follows.

[3:9]  ² tn The word is a technical term for the outcry one might make to a judge. God had seen the oppression and so knew that the complaints were accurate, and so he initiated the proceedings against the oppressors (B. Jacob, Exodus, 59).

[3:9]  ³ tn Heb “seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them.” The word for the oppression is now לַחַץ (lakhats), which has the idea of pressure with the oppression – squeezing, pressuring – which led to its later use in the Semitic languages for torture. The repetition in the Hebrew text of the root in the participle form after this noun serves to stress the idea. This emphasis has been represented in the translation by the expression “seen how severely the Egyptians oppress them.”

[6:1]  ⁴ sn The expression “I will do to Pharaoh” always refers to the plagues. God would first show his sovereignty over Pharaoh before defeating him.

[6:1]  ⁵ tn The expression “with a strong hand” (וּבְיָד חֲזָקָה, uvÿyad khazaqah) could refer (1) to God’s powerful intervention (“compelled by my strong hand”) or (2) to Pharaoh’s forceful pursuit (“he will forcefully drive them out”). In Exod 3:20 God has summarized what his hand would do in Egypt, and that is probably what is intended here, as he promises that Moses will see what God will do. All Egypt ultimately desired that Israel be released (12:33), and when they were released Pharaoh pursued them to the sea, and so in a sense drove them out – whether that was his intention or not. But ultimately it was God’s power that was the real force behind it all. U. Cassuto (Exodus, 74) considers that it is unlikely that the phrase would be used in the same verse twice with the same meaning. So he thinks that the first “strong hand” is God’s, and the second “strong hand” is Pharaoh’s. It is true that if Pharaoh acted forcefully in any way that contributed to Israel leaving Egypt it was because God was acting forcefully in his life. So in an understated way, God is saying that when forced by God’s strong hand, Pharaoh will indeed release God’s people.”

[6:1]  ⁶ tn Or “and he will forcefully drive them out of his land,” if the second occurrence of “strong hand” refers to Pharaoh’s rather than God’s (see the previous note).

[6:1]  sn In Exod 12:33 the Egyptians were eager to send (release) Israel away in haste, because they all thought they were going to die.

[9:15]  ⁷ tn The verb is the Qal perfect שָׁלַחְתִּי (shalakhti), but a past tense, or completed action translation does not fit the context at all. Gesenius lists this reference as an example of the use of the perfect to express actions and facts, whose accomplishment is to be represented not as actual but only as possible. He offers this for Exod 9:15: “I had almost put forth” (GKC 313 §106.p). Also possible is “I should have stretched out my hand.” Others read the potential nuance instead, and render it as “I could have…” as in the present translation.

[9:15]  ⁸ tn The verb כָּחַד (kakhad) means “to hide, efface,” and in the Niphal it has the idea of “be effaced, ruined, destroyed.” Here it will carry the nuance of the result of the preceding verbs: “I could have stretched out my hand…and struck you…and (as a result) you would have been destroyed.”

[9:18]  ⁹ tn הִנְנִי מַמְטִיר (hinÿni mamtir) is the futur instans construction, giving an imminent future translation: “Here – I am about to cause it to rain.”

[9:18]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “which not was like it in Egypt.” The pronoun suffix serves as the resumptive pronoun for the relative particle: “which…like it” becomes “the like of which has not been.” The word “hail” is added in the translation to make clear the referent of the relative particle.

[9:18]  ¹¹ tn The form הִוָּסְדָה (hivvasdah) is perhaps a rare Niphal perfect and not an infinitive (U. Cassuto, Exodus, 117).

[10:17]  ¹² sn Pharaoh’s double emphasis on “only” uses two different words and was meant to deceive. He was trying to give Moses the impression that he had finally come to his senses, and that he would let the people go. But he had no intention of letting them out.

[10:17]  ¹³ sn “Death” is a metonymy that names the effect for the cause. If the locusts are left in the land it will be death to everything that grows.

[18:19]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “hear my voice.”

[18:19]  ¹⁵ tn The line reads “Be you to the people before God.” He is to be their representative before God. This is introducing the aspect of the work that only Moses could do, what he has been doing. He is to be before God for the people, to pray for them, to appeal on their behalf. Jethro is essentially saying, I understand that you cannot delegate this to anyone else, so continue doing it (U. Cassuto, Exodus, 219-20).

[18:19]  ¹⁶ tn The form is the perfect tense with the vav (ו) consecutive; following the imperative it will be instruction as well. Since the imperative preceding this had the idea of “continue to be” as you are, this too has that force.

[18:19]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “words”; KJV, ASV “the causes”; NRSV “cases”; NLT “questions.”

[19:5]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “listen to my voice.” The construction uses the imperfect tense in the conditional clause, preceded by the infinitive absolute from the same verb. The idiom “listen to the voice of” implies obedience, not just mental awareness of sound.

[19:5]  ¹⁹ tn The verb is a perfect tense with vav (ו) consecutive; it continues the idea in the protasis of the sentence: “and [if you will] keep.”

[19:5]  ²⁰ tn The lamed preposition expresses possession here: “to me” means “my.”

[19:5]  ²¹ tn The noun is סְגֻלָּה (sÿgullah), which means a special possession. Israel was to be God’s special possession, but the prophets will later narrow it to the faithful remnant. All the nations belong to God, but Israel was to stand in a place of special privilege and enormous responsibility. See Deut 7:6; 14:2; 26:18; Ps 135:4; and Mal 3:17. See M. Greenburg, “Hebrew sÿgulla: Akkadian sikiltu,” JAOS 71 (1951): 172ff.

[32:30]  ²² tn Heb “and it was on the morrow and Moses said to the people.”

[32:30]  ²³ tn The text uses a cognate accusative: “you have sinned a great sin.”

[32:30]  ²⁴ tn The form אֲכַפְּרָה (’akhappÿrah) is a Piel cohortative/imperfect. Here with only a possibility of being successful, a potential imperfect nuance works best.

[32:34]  ²⁵ tn Heb “behold, look.” Moses should take this fact into consideration.

[32:34]  ²⁶ sn The Law said that God would not clear the guilty. But here the punishment is postponed to some future date when he would revisit this matter. Others have taken the line to mean that whenever a reckoning was considered necessary, then this sin would be included (see B. Jacob, Exodus, 957). The repetition of the verb traditionally rendered “visit” in both clauses puts emphasis on the certainty – so “indeed.”