Exodus 5:11

5:11 You ¹  go get straw for yourselves wherever you can ²  find it, because there will be no reduction at all in your workload.’”

Exodus 21:10

21:10 If he takes another wife, ³  he must not diminish the first one’s food, ⁴  her clothing, or her marital rights. ⁵ 

[5:11]  ¹ tn The independent personal pronoun emphasizes that the people were to get their own straw, and it heightens the contrast with the king. “You – go get.”

[5:11]  ² tn The tense in this section could be translated as having the nuance of possibility: “wherever you may find it,” or the nuance of potential imperfect: “wherever you are able to find any.”

[21:10]  ³ tn “wife” has been supplied.

[21:10]  ⁴ tn The translation of “food” does not quite do justice to the Hebrew word. It is “flesh.” The issue here is that the family she was to marry into is wealthy, they ate meat. She was not just to be given the basic food the ordinary people ate, but the fine foods that this family ate.

[21:10]  ⁵ sn See S. Paul, “Exodus 21:10, A Threefold Maintenance Clause,” JNES 28 (1969): 48-53. Paul suggests that the third element listed is not marital rights but ointments since Sumerian and Akkadian texts list food, clothing, and oil as the necessities of life. The translation of “marital rights” is far from certain, since the word occurs only here. The point is that the woman was to be cared for with all that was required for a woman in that situation.