Exodus 4:10-13

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 

4:11 The Lord said to him, “Who gave ⁷  a mouth to man, or who makes a person mute or deaf or seeing or blind? Is it not I, the Lord? ⁸  4:12 So now go, and I will be with your mouth ⁹  and will teach you ¹⁰  what you must say.” ¹¹ 

4:13 But Moses said, ¹²  “O ¹³  my Lord, please send anyone else whom you wish to send!” ¹⁴ 

Exodus 6:12

6:12 But Moses replied to ¹⁵  the Lord, “If the Israelites did not listen to me, then ¹⁶  how will Pharaoh listen to me, since ¹⁷  I speak with difficulty?” ¹⁸ 

Exodus 6:1

6:1 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Now you will see what I will do to Pharaoh, ¹⁹  for compelled by my strong hand ²⁰  he will release them, and by my strong hand he will drive them out of his land.” ²¹ 

Exodus 18:18

18:18 You will surely wear out, ²²  both you and these people who are with you, for this is too ²³  heavy a burden ²⁴  for you; you are not able to do it by yourself.

Exodus 18:2

18:2 Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, took Moses’ wife Zipporah after he had sent her back,

Exodus 7:18

7:18 Fish ²⁵  in the Nile will die, the Nile will stink, and the Egyptians will be unable ²⁶  to drink water from the Nile.”’”

Exodus 7:1

7:1 So the Lord said to Moses, “See, I have made you like God ²⁷  to Pharaoh, and your brother Aaron will be your prophet. ²⁸ 

Exodus 3:7

3:7 The Lord said, “I have surely seen ²⁹  the affliction of my people who are in Egypt. I have heard their cry because of their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows. ³⁰ 

Exodus 3:9

3:9 And now indeed ³¹  the cry ³²  of the Israelites has come to me, and I have also seen how severely the Egyptians oppress them. ³³ 

Isaiah 6:5-8

6:5 I said, “Too bad for me! I am destroyed, ³⁴  for my lips are contaminated by sin, ³⁵  and I live among people whose lips are contaminated by sin. ³⁶  My eyes have seen the king, the Lord who commands armies.” ³⁷  6:6 But then one of the seraphs flew toward me. In his hand was a hot coal he had taken from the altar with tongs. 6:7 He touched my mouth with it and said, “Look, this coal has touched your lips. Your evil is removed; your sin is forgiven.” ³⁸  6:8 I heard the voice of the sovereign master say, “Whom will I send? Who will go on our behalf?” ³⁹  I answered, “Here I am, send me!”

Jeremiah 1:6

1:6 I answered, “Oh, Lord God, ⁴⁰  I really ⁴¹  do not know how to speak well enough for that, ⁴²  for I am too young.” ⁴³ 

Acts 7:23-25

7:23 But when he was about forty years old, it entered his mind ⁴⁴  to visit his fellow countrymen ⁴⁵  the Israelites. ⁴⁶  7:24 When ⁴⁷  he saw one of them being hurt unfairly, ⁴⁸  Moses ⁴⁹  came to his defense ⁵⁰  and avenged the person who was mistreated by striking down the Egyptian. 7:25 He thought his own people ⁵¹  would understand that God was delivering them ⁵²  through him, ⁵³  but they did not understand. ⁵⁴ 

Acts 7:2

7:2 So he replied, ⁵⁵  “Brothers and fathers, listen to me. The God of glory appeared to our forefather ⁵⁶  Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he settled in Haran,

Colossians 2:16

2:16 Therefore do not let anyone judge you with respect to food or drink, or in the matter of a feast, new moon, or Sabbath days –

Colossians 3:5

3:5 So put to death whatever in your nature belongs to the earth: ⁵⁷  sexual immorality, impurity, shameful passion, ⁵⁸  evil desire, and greed which is idolatry.

[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.

[4:11]  ⁷ tn The verb שִׂים (sim) means “to place, put, set”; the sentence here more precisely says, “Who put a mouth into a man?”

[4:11]  ⁸ sn The final question obviously demands a positive answer. But the clause is worded in such a way as to return to the theme of “I AM.” Isaiah 45:5-7 developed this same idea of God’s control over life. Moses protests that he is not an eloquent speaker, and the Lord replies with reminders about himself and promises, “I will be with your mouth,” an assertion that repeats the verb he used four times in 3:12 and 14 and in promises to Isaac and Jacob (Gen 26:3; 31:3).

[4:12]  ⁹ sn The promise of divine presence always indicates intervention (for blessing or cursing). Here it means that God would be working through the organs of speech to help Moses speak. See Deut 18:18; Jer 1:9.

[4:12]  ¹⁰ sn The verb is וְהוֹרֵיתִיךָ (vÿhoretikha), the Hiphil perfect with a vav (ו) consecutive. The form carries the instructional meaning because it follows the imperative “go.” In fact, there is a sequence at work here: “go…and/that I may teach you.” It is from יָרָה (yara), the same root behind תּוֹרָה (torah, “law”). This always referred to teaching either wisdom or revelation. Here Yahweh promises to teach Moses what to say.

[4:12]  ¹¹ tn The form is the imperfect tense. While it could be taken as a future (“what you will say”), an obligatory imperfect captures the significance better (“what you must say” or “what you are to say”). Not even the content of the message will be left up to Moses.

[4:13]  ¹² tn Heb “And he said”; the referent (Moses) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[4:13]  ¹³ tn The word בִּי (bi) is a particle of entreaty; it seeks permission to speak and is always followed by “Lord” or “my Lord.”

[4:13]  ¹⁴ tn The text has simply שְׁלַח־נָא בְּיַד־תִּשְׁלָח (shÿlakh-na’ bÿyad tishlakh, “send by the hand you will send”). This is not Moses’ resignation to doing God’s will – it is his final attempt to avoid the call. It carries the force of asking God to send someone else. This is an example of an independent relative clause governed by the genitive: “by the hand of – whomever you will send” (see GKC 488-89 §155.n).

[6:12]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “And Moses spoke before.”

[6:12]  ¹⁶ sn This analogy is an example of a qal wahomer comparison. It is an argument by inference from the light (qal) to the heavy (homer), from the simple to the more difficult. If the Israelites, who are Yahwists, would not listen to him, it is highly unlikely Pharaoh would.

[6:12]  ¹⁷ tn The final clause begins with a disjunctive vav (ו), a vav on a nonverb form – here a pronoun. It introduces a circumstantial causal clause.

[6:12]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “and [since] I am of uncircumcised lips.” The “lips” represent his speech (metonymy of cause). The term “uncircumcised” makes a comparison between his speech and that which Israel perceived as unacceptable, unprepared, foreign, and of no use to God. The heart is described this way when it is impervious to good impressions (Lev 26:41; Jer 9:26) and the ear when it hears imperfectly (Jer 6:10). Moses has here returned to his earlier claim – he does not speak well enough to be doing this.

[6:1]  ¹⁹ 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]  ²⁰ 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]  ²¹ 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).

[18:18]  ²² tn The verb means “to fall and fade” as a leaf (Ps 1:3). In Ps 18:45 it is used figuratively of foes fading away, failing in strength and courage (S. R. Driver, Exodus, 166). Here the infinitive absolute construction heightens the meaning.

[18:18]  ²³ tn Gesenius lists the specialized use of the comparative min (מ) where with an adjective the thought expressed is that the quality is too difficult for the attainment of a particular aim (GKC 430 §133.c).

[18:18]  ²⁴ tn Here “a burden” has been supplied.

[7:18]  ²⁵ tn The definite article here has the generic use, indicating the class – “fish” (R. J. Williams, Hebrew Syntax, 19, §92).

[7:18]  ²⁶ tn The verb לָאָה (la’a), here in the Niphal perfect with a vav consecutive, means “be weary, impatient.” The Niphal meaning is “make oneself weary” in doing something, or “weary (strenuously exert) oneself.” It seems always to indicate exhausted patience (see BDB 521 s.v.). The term seems to imply that the Egyptians were not able to drink the red, contaminated water, and so would expend all their energy looking for water to drink – in frustration of course.

[7:1]  ²⁷ tn The word “like” is added for clarity, making explicit the implied comparison in the statement “I have made you God to Pharaoh.” The word אֱלֹהִים (’elohim) is used a few times in the Bible for humans (e.g., Pss 45:6; 82:1), and always clearly in the sense of a subordinate to GOD – they are his representatives on earth. The explanation here goes back to 4:16. If Moses is like God in that Aaron is his prophet, then Moses is certainly like God to Pharaoh. Only Moses, then, is able to speak to Pharaoh with such authority, giving him commands.

[7:1]  ²⁸ tn The word נְבִיאֶךָ (nÿvi’ekha, “your prophet”) recalls 4:16. Moses was to be like God to Aaron, and Aaron was to speak for him. This indicates that the idea of a “prophet” was of one who spoke for God, an idea with which Moses and Aaron and the readers of Exodus are assumed to be familiar.

[3:7]  ²⁹ tn The use of the infinitive absolute with the perfect tense intensifies the statement: I have surely seen – there is no doubt that I have seen and will do something about it.

[3:7]  ³⁰ sn Two new words are introduced now to the report of suffering: “affliction” and “pain/suffering.” These add to the dimension of the oppression of God’s people.

[3:9]  ³¹ tn The particle הִנֵּה (hinneh) focuses attention on what is being said as grounds for what follows.

[3:9]  ³² 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]  ³³ 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.”

[6:5]  ³⁴ 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]  ³⁵ 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]  ³⁶ tn Heb “and among a nation unclean of lips I live.”

[6:5]  ³⁷ 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.

[6:7]  ³⁸ tn Or “ritually cleansed,” or “atoned for” (NIV).

[6:8]  ³⁹ tn Heb “for us.” The plural pronoun refers to the Lord, the seraphs, and the rest of the heavenly assembly.

[1:6]  ⁴⁰ tn Heb “Lord Yahweh.”

[1:6]  ⁴¹ 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]  ⁴² 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]  ⁴³ 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.

[7:23]  ⁴⁴ tn Grk “heart.”

[7:23]  ⁴⁵ tn Grk “brothers.” The translation “compatriot” is given by BDAG 18-19 s.v. ἀδελφός 2.b.

[7:23]  ⁴⁶ tn Grk “the sons of Israel.”

[7:24]  ⁴⁷ tn Grk “And when.” Because of the difference between Greek style, which often begins sentences or clauses with “and,” and English style, which generally does not, καί (kai) has not been translated here.

[7:24]  ⁴⁸ tn “Hurt unfairly” conveys a better sense of the seriousness of the offense against the Israelite than “treated unfairly,” which can sometimes refer to slight offenses, or “wronged,” which can refer to offenses that do not involve personal violence, as this one probably did.

[7:24]  ⁴⁹ tn Grk “he”; the referent (Moses) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[7:24]  ⁵⁰ tn Or “he defended,” “he retaliated” (BDAG 55 s.v. ἀμύνομαι).

[7:25]  ⁵¹ tn Grk “his brothers.”

[7:25]  ⁵² tn Grk “was granting them deliverance.” The narrator explains that this act pictured what Moses could do for his people.

[7:25]  ⁵³ tn Grk “by his hand,” where the hand is a metaphor for the entire person.

[7:25]  ⁵⁴ sn They did not understand. Here is the theme of the speech. The people did not understand what God was doing through those he chose. They made the same mistake with Joseph at first. See Acts 3:17; 13:27. There is good precedent for this kind of challenging review of history in the ancient scriptures: Ps 106:6-46; Ezek 20; and Neh 9:6-38.

[7:2]  ⁵⁵ tn Grk “said.”

[7:2]  ⁵⁶ tn Or “ancestor”; Grk “father.”

[3:5]  ⁵⁷ tn Grk “the members which are on the earth.” See BDAG 628 s.v. μέλος 1, “put to death whatever in you is worldly.”

[3:5]  ⁵⁸ tn Or “lust.”