Exodus 32:11-13

32:11 But Moses sought the favor ¹  of the Lord his God and said, “O Lord, why does your anger burn against your people, whom you have brought out from the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? 32:12 Why ²  should the Egyptians say, ³  ‘For evil ⁴  he led them out to kill them in the mountains and to destroy ⁵  them from the face of the earth’? Turn from your burning anger, and relent ⁶  of this evil against your people. 32:13 Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel your servants, to whom you swore by yourself and told them, ‘I will multiply your descendants ⁷  like the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have spoken about ⁸  I will give to your descendants, ⁹  and they will inherit it forever.’”

Exodus 34:9

34:9 and said, “If now I have found favor in your sight, O Lord, let my Lord ¹⁰  go among us, for we ¹¹  are a stiff-necked people; pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for your inheritance.”

Numbers 14:13-19

14:13 Moses said to the Lord, “When the Egyptians hear ¹²  it – for you brought up this people by your power from among them – 14:14 then they will tell it to the inhabitants ¹³  of this land. They have heard that you, Lord, are among this people, that you, Lord, are seen face to face, ¹⁴  that your cloud stands over them, and that you go before them by day in a pillar of cloud and in a pillar of fire by night. 14:15 If you kill ¹⁵  this entire people at once, ¹⁶  then the nations that have heard of your fame will say, 14:16 ‘Because the Lord was not able to bring this people into the land that he swore to them, he killed them in the wilderness.’ 14:17 So now, let the power of my Lord ¹⁷  be great, just as you have said, 14:18 ‘The Lord is slow to anger and abounding in loyal love, ¹⁸  forgiving iniquity and transgression, ¹⁹  but by no means clearing ²⁰  the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children until the third and fourth generations.’ ²¹  14:19 Please forgive ²²  the iniquity of this people according to your great loyal love, ²³  just as you have forgiven this people from Egypt even until now.”

Psalms 99:6

99:6 Moses and Aaron were among his priests;

Samuel was one of those who prayed to him. ²⁴ 

They ²⁵  prayed to the Lord and he answered them.

Psalms 106:23

106:23 He threatened ²⁶  to destroy them,

but ²⁷  Moses, his chosen one, interceded with him ²⁸ 

and turned back his destructive anger. ²⁹ 

Jeremiah 14:21

14:21 For the honor of your name, ³⁰  do not treat Jerusalem ³¹  with contempt.

Do not treat with disdain the place where your glorious throne sits. ³² 

Be mindful of your covenant with us. Do not break it! ³³ 

[32:11]  ¹ tn S. R. Driver (Exodus, 351) draws on Arabic to show that the meaning of this verb (חָלָה, khalah) was properly “make sweet the face” or “stroke the face”; so here “to entreat, seek to conciliate.” In this prayer, Driver adds, Moses urges four motives for mercy: 1) Israel is Yahweh’s people, 2) Israel’s deliverance has demanded great power, 3) the Egyptians would mock if the people now perished, and 4) the oath God made to the fathers.

[32:12]  ² tn The question is rhetorical; it really forms an affirmation that is used here as a reason for the request (see GKC 474 §150.e).

[32:12]  ³ tn Heb “speak, saying.” This is redundant in English and has been simplified in the translation.

[32:12]  ⁴ tn The word “evil” means any kind of life-threatening or fatal calamity. “Evil” is that which hinders life, interrupts life, causes pain to life, or destroys it. The Egyptians would conclude that such a God would have no good intent in taking his people to the desert if now he destroyed them.

[32:12]  ⁵ tn The form is a Piel infinitive construct from כָּלָה (kalah, “to complete, finish”) but in this stem, “bring to an end, destroy.” As a purpose infinitive this expresses what the Egyptians would have thought of God’s motive.

[32:12]  ⁶ tn The verb “repent, relent” when used of God is certainly an anthropomorphism. It expresses the deep pain that one would have over a situation. Earlier God repented that he had made humans (Gen 6:6). Here Moses is asking God to repent/relent over the judgment he was about to bring, meaning that he should be moved by such compassion that there would be no judgment like that. J. P. Hyatt observes that the Bible uses so many anthropomorphisms because the Israelites conceived of God as a dynamic and living person in a vital relationship with people, responding to their needs and attitudes and actions (Exodus [NCBC], 307). See H. V. D. Parunak, “A Semantic Survey of NHM,” Bib 56 (1975): 512-32.

[32:13]  ⁷ tn Heb “your seed.”

[32:13]  ⁸ tn “about” has been supplied.

[32:13]  ⁹ tn Heb “seed.”

[34:9]  ¹⁰ tn The Hebrew term translated “Lord” two times here is אֲדֹנָי (’adonay).

[34:9]  ¹¹ tn Heb “it is.” Hebrew uses the third person masculine singular pronoun here in agreement with the noun “people.”

[14:13]  ¹² tn The construction is unusual in that we have here a perfect tense with a vav (ו) consecutive with no verb before it to establish the time sequence. The context requires that this be taken as a vav (ו) consecutive. It actually forms the protasis for the next verse, and would best be rendered “when…then they will say.”

[14:14]  ¹³ tn The singular participle is to be taken here as a collective, representing all the inhabitants of the land.

[14:14]  ¹⁴ tn “Face to face” is literally “eye to eye.” It only occurs elsewhere in Isa 52:8. This expresses the closest communication possible.

[14:15]  ¹⁵ tn The verb is the Hiphil perfect of מוּת (mut), וְהֵמַתָּה (vÿhemattah). The vav (ו) consecutive makes this also a future time sequence verb, but again in a conditional clause.

[14:15]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “as one man.”

[14:17]  ¹⁷ tc The form in the text is אֲדֹנָי (’adonay), the word that is usually used in place of the tetragrammaton. It is the plural form with the pronominal suffix, and so must refer to God.

[14:18]  ¹⁸ tn The expression is רַב־חֶסֶד (rav khesed) means “much of loyal love,” or “faithful love.” Some have it “totally faithful,” but that omits the aspect of his love.

[14:18]  ¹⁹ tn Or “rebellion.”

[14:18]  ²⁰ tn The infinitive absolute emphasizes the verbal activity of the imperfect tense, which here serves as a habitual imperfect. Negated it states what God does not do; and the infinitive makes that certain.

[14:18]  ²¹ sn The Decalogue adds “to those who hate me.” The point of the line is that the effects of sin, if not the sinful traits themselves, are passed on to the next generation.

[14:19]  ²² tn The verb סְלַח־נָא (selakh-na’), the imperative form, means “forgive” (see Ps 130:4), “pardon,” “excuse.” The imperative is of course a prayer, a desire, and not a command.

[14:19]  ²³ tn The construct unit is “the greatness of your loyal love.” This is the genitive of specification, the first word being the modifier.

[99:6]  ²⁴ tn Heb “among those who called on his name.”

[99:6]  ²⁵ tn Heb “those who.” The participle is in apposition to the phrase “those who called on his name” in the preceding line.

[106:23]  ²⁶ tn Heb “and he said.”

[106:23]  ²⁷ tn Heb “if not,” that is, “[and would have] if [Moses] had not.”

[106:23]  ²⁸ tn Heb “stood in the gap before him.”

[106:23]  ²⁹ tn Heb “to turn back his anger from destroying.”

[14:21]  ³⁰ tn Heb “For the sake of your name.”

[14:21]  ³¹ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[14:21]  ³² tn English versions quite commonly supply “us” as an object for the verb in the first line. This is probably wrong. The Hebrew text reads: “Do not treat with contempt for the sake of your name; do not treat with disdain your glorious throne.” This is case of poetic parallelism where the object is left hanging until the second line. For an example of this see Prov 13:1 in the original and consult E. W. Bullinger, Figures of Speech, 103-4. There has also been some disagreement whether “your glorious throne” refers to the temple (as in 17:12) or Jerusalem (as in 3:17). From the beginning of the prayer in v. 19 where a similar kind of verb has been used with respect to Zion/Jerusalem it would appear that the contextual referent is Jerusalem. The absence of an object from the first line makes it possible to retain part of the metaphor in the translation and still convey some meaning.

[14:21]  ³³ tn Heb “Remember, do not break your covenant with us.”