Exodus 12:31

12:31 Pharaoh ¹  summoned Moses and Aaron in the night and said, “Get up, get out ²  from among my people, both you and the Israelites! Go, serve the Lord as you have requested! ³ 

Exodus 12:33

12:33 The Egyptians were urging ⁴  the people on, in order to send them out of the land quickly, ⁵  for they were saying, “We are all dead!”

Exodus 12:39

12:39 They baked cakes of bread without yeast using the dough they had brought from Egypt, for it was made without yeast – because they were thrust out ⁶  of Egypt and were not able to delay, they ⁷  could not prepare ⁸  food for themselves either.

¹ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Pharaoh) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

² tn The urgency in Pharaoh’s words is caught by the abrupt use of the imperatives – “get up, go” (קוּמוּ צְּאוּ, qumu tsÿ’u), and “go, serve” (וּלְכוּ עִבְדוּ, ulÿkhu ’ivdu) and “take” and “leave/go” (וָלֵכוּ…קְחוּ, qÿkhu...valekhu).

³ tn Heb “as you have said.” The same phrase also occurs in the following verse.

⁴ tn The verb used here (חָזַק, khazaq) is the same verb used for Pharaoh’s heart being hardened. It conveys the idea of their being resolved or insistent in this – they were not going to change.

⁵ tn The phrase uses two construct infinitives in a hendiadys, the first infinitive becoming the modifier.

⁷ sn For the use of this word in developing the motif, see Exod 2:17, 22; 6:1; and 11:1.

⁸ tn Heb “and also.”

⁹ tn The verb is עָשׂוּ (’asu, “they made”); here, with a potential nuance, it is rendered “they could [not] prepare.”