Exodus 5:23

5:23 From the time I went to speak to Pharaoh in your name, he has caused trouble ¹  for this people, and you have certainly not rescued ²  them!” ³ 

Exodus 29:42

29:42 “This will be a regular ⁴  burnt offering throughout your generations at the entrance of the tent of meeting before the Lord, where I will meet ⁵  with you to speak to you there.

Exodus 31:18

31:18 He gave Moses two tablets of testimony when he had finished speaking with him on Mount Sinai, tablets of stone written by the finger of God. ⁶ 

Exodus 34:34-35

34:34 But when Moses went in ⁷  before the Lord to speak with him, he would remove the veil until he came out. ⁸  Then he would come out and tell the Israelites what he had been commanded. ⁹  34:35 When the Israelites would see ¹⁰  the face of Moses, that ¹¹  the skin of Moses’ face shone, Moses would put the veil on his face again, until he went in to speak with the Lord. ¹² 

[5:23]  ¹ sn Now the verb (הֵרַע, hera’) has a different subject – Pharaoh. The ultimate cause of the trouble was God, but the immediate cause was Pharaoh and the way he increased the work. Meanwhile, the Israelite foremen have pinned most of the blame on Moses and Aaron. Moses knows all about the sovereignty of God, and as he speaks in God’s name, he sees the effect it has on pagans like Pharaoh. So the rhetorical questions are designed to prod God to act differently.

[5:23]  ² tn The Hebrew construction is emphatic: וְהַצֵּל לֹא־הִצַּלְתָּ (vÿhatsel lo’-hitsalta). The verb נָצַל (natsal) means “to deliver, rescue” in the sense of plucking out, even plundering. The infinitive absolute strengthens both the idea of the verb and the negative. God had not delivered this people at all.

[5:23]  ³ tn Heb “your people.” The pronoun (“them”) has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons here, to avoid redundancy.

[29:42]  ⁴ tn The translation has “regular” instead of “continually,” because they will be preparing this twice a day.

[29:42]  ⁵ tn The relative clause identifies the place in front of the Tent as the place that Yahweh would meet Moses. The main verb of the clause is אִוָּעֵד (’ivva’ed), a Niphal imperfect of the verb יָעַד (ya’ad), the verb that is cognate to the name “tent of meeting” – hence the name. This clause leads into the next four verses.

[31:18]  ⁷ sn The expression “the finger of God” has come up before in the book, in the plagues (Exod 8:15) to express that it was a demonstration of the power and authority of God. So here too the commandments given to Moses on stone tablets came from God. It too is a bold anthropomorphism; to attribute such a material action to Yahweh would have been thought provoking to say the least. But by using “God” and by stating it in an obviously figurative way, balance is maintained. Since no one writes with one finger, the expression simply says that the Law came directly from God.

[34:34]  ¹⁰ tn The construction uses a infinitive construct for the temporal clause; it is prefixed with the temporal preposition: “and in the going in of Moses.”

[34:34]  ¹¹ tn The temporal clause begins with the temporal preposition “until,” followed by an infinitive construct with the suffixed subjective genitive.

[34:34]  ¹² tn The form is the Pual imperfect, but since the context demands a past tense here, in fact a past perfect tense, this is probably an old preterite form without a vav consecutive.

[34:35]  ¹³ tn Now the perfect tense with vav consecutive is subordinated to the next clause, “Moses returned the veil….”

[34:35]  ¹⁴ tn Verbs of seeing often take two accusatives. Here, the second is the noun clause explaining what it was about the face that they saw.

[34:35]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “with him”; the referent (the Lord) has been specified in the translation for clarity.