Genesis 41:43

41:43 Pharaoh ¹  had him ride in the chariot used by his second-in-command, ²  and they cried out before him, “Kneel down!” ³  So he placed him over all the land of Egypt.

Genesis 46:29

46:29 Joseph harnessed his chariot and went up to meet his father Israel in Goshen. When he met him, ⁴  he hugged his neck and wept on his neck for quite some time.

Exodus 14:7

14:7 He took six hundred select ⁵  chariots, and all the rest of the chariots of Egypt, ⁶  and officers ⁷  on all of them.

Exodus 14:17

14:17 And as for me, I am going to harden ⁸  the hearts of the Egyptians so that ⁹  they will come after them, that I may be honored ¹⁰  because ¹¹  of Pharaoh and his army and his chariots and his horsemen.

Exodus 14:28

14:28 The water returned and covered the chariots and the horsemen and all the army of Pharaoh that was coming after the Israelites into the sea ¹²  – not so much as one of them survived! ¹³ 

Exodus 14:2

14:2 “Tell the Israelites that they must turn and camp ¹⁴  before Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea; you are to camp by the sea before Baal Zephon opposite it. ¹⁵ 

Exodus 18:24

18:24 Moses listened to ¹⁶  his father-in-law and did everything he had said.

The Song of Songs 1:9

The Beautiful Mare and the Fragrant Myrrh

The Lover to His Beloved:

1:9 O my beloved, you are like ¹⁷  a ¹⁸  mare ¹⁹ 

among Pharaoh’s stallions. ²⁰ 

Acts 8:2

8:2 Some ²¹  devout men buried Stephen and made loud lamentation ²²  over him. ²³ 

[41:43]  ¹ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Pharaoh) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[41:43]  ² tn Heb “and he caused him to ride in the second chariot which was his.”

[41:43]  ³ tn The verb form appears to be a causative imperative from a verbal root meaning “to kneel.” It is a homonym of the word “bless” (identical in root letters but not related etymologically).

[46:29]  ⁴ tn Heb “and he appeared to him.”

[14:7]  ⁵ tn The passive participle of the verb “to choose” means that these were “choice” or superb chariots.

[14:7]  ⁶ tn Heb “every chariot of Egypt.” After the mention of the best chariots, the meaning of this description is “all the other chariots.”

[14:7]  ⁷ tn The word שָׁלִשִׁם (shalishim) means “officers” or some special kind of military personnel. At one time it was taken to mean a “three man chariot,” but the pictures of Egyptian chariots only show two in a chariot. It may mean officers near the king, “men of the third rank” (B. Jacob, Exodus, 394). So the chariots and the crew represented the elite. See the old view by A. E. Cowley that linked it to a Hittite word (“A Hittite Word in Hebrew,” JTS 21 [1920]: 326), and the more recent work by P. C. Craigie connecting it to Egyptian “commander” (“An Egyptian Expression in the Song of the Sea: Exodus XV.4,” VT 20 [1970]: 85).

[14:17]  ⁸ tn הִנְנִי (hinni) before the participle gives it the force of a futur instans participle, meaning “I am about to harden” or “I am going to harden” their heart.

[14:17]  ⁹ tn The form again is the imperfect tense with vav (ו) to express the purpose or the result of the hardening. The repetition of the verb translated “come” is interesting: Moses is to divide the sea in order that the people may cross, but God will harden the Egyptians’ hearts in order that they may follow.

[14:17]  ¹⁰ tn For the comments on this verb see the discussion in v. 4. God would get glory by defeating Egypt.

[14:17]  ¹¹ tn Or “I will get glory over.”

[14:28]  ¹² tn Heb “that was coming after them into the sea.” The referent of “them” (the Israelites) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[14:28]  ¹³ tn Heb “not was left among them as much as one.”

[14:2]  ¹⁴ tn The two imperfects follow the imperative and therefore express purpose. The point in the verses is that Yahweh was giving the orders for the direction of the march and the encampment by the sea.

[14:2]  ¹⁵ sn The places have been tentatively identified. W. C. Kaiser summarizes the suggestions that Pi-Hahiroth as an Egyptian word may mean “temple of the [Syrian god] Hrt” or “The Hir waters of the canal” or “The Dwelling of Hator” (“Exodus,” EBC 2:387; see the literature on these names, including C. DeWit, The Date and Route of the Exodus, 17).

[18:24]  ¹⁶ tn The idiom “listen to the voice of” means “obey, comply with, heed.”

[1:9]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “I compare you to.”

[1:9]  ¹⁸ tn The hireq-yod ending on סֻסָתִי (susati) is a remnant of the old genitive ending (e.g., nominative: malku, genitive: malki, accusative: malka), the so-called hireq compaginis ending. Thus, סֻסָתִי בְּרִכְבֵי פַרְעֹה (susati berikve par’oh) is a double genitive-construct: “a mare among the chariot-horses of Pharaoh” (M. H. Pope, Song of Songs [AB], 338) or “a mare among the chariots of Pharaoh” (R. E. Murphy, Song of Songs [Hermeneia], 131). The hireq-yod ending was mistakenly treated as 1st person common singular possessive suffix “my mare” by LXX, Vulgate, Syriac. This approach is mistakenly adopted by several translations: “my mare” (NASB, NJB), “my filly” (NKJV) and “my company of horsemen” (DRA).

[1:9]  ¹⁹ sn It was common in ancient love literature to compare a beautiful woman to a sleek filly. For example, Horace likened Lyde to a three year old filly: “She gambols over the spreading plains and shrinks from touch, to wedlock still a stranger, not yet ripe for eager mate” (Horace, Odes iii. xi. 9). Theocritus compared Helen of Troy to a graceful steed harnessed to a chariot: “As towers the cypress mid the garden’s bloom, as in the chariot proud Thessalian steed, thus graceful rose-complexion’d Helen moves” (Theocritus, Idyll xviii. 30-31).

[1:9]  ²⁰ tn Heb “among the chariot-horses” or “among the chariots.” The noun רֶכֶב (rekhev) has a wide range of meanings: “chariots, war-chariots” (Exod 14:17-18, 23; 15:19; Deut 11:4; 20:1; Josh 11:4) “chariot crews, chariot troops” (1 Kgs 9:22; 16:9; 22:31; 2 Kg 8:21), “column of chariots, troop of warriors” (Isa 21:7, 9), “charioteer” (Ps 76:7), and “chariot-horses” (Exod 14:9; 2 Sam 8:4; 1 Chr 18:4; Ezek 39:20) (HALOT 1233-35 s.v. רֶכֶב). Scholars have struggled with the meaning of בְּרִכְבֵי פַרְעֹה (bÿrikhbe par’oh, “[harnessed to (?)] Pharaoh’s chariot”; HALOT 1234 s.v. 6.b). M. H. Pope (Song of Songs [AB], 338) suggests that רִכְבֵי (rikhbe) be nuanced “chariot-horses” and the phrase rendered “among the chariot-horses of Pharaoh.” Pope offers the best explanation of this enigmatic picture: “A crucial consideration overlooked by commentators is the well-attested fact that Pharaoh’s chariots, like other chariotry in antiquity, were not drawn by a mare or mares but by stallions hitched in pairs. This bit of intelligence radically alters the usual understanding of the verse and dispels the notion that there is a grammatical incongruity, which needs harmonizing. The juxtaposition is between a single mare and a plurality of stallions and it requires only a modicum of what is called ‘horse sense’ to appreciate the thrust of the comparison. The situation envisaged is illustrated by the famous incident in one of the campaigns of Thutmose III against Qadesh. On his tomb at Thebes, the Egyptian soldier Amenemheb relates how the Prince of Qadesh sent forth a swift mare, which entered among the army. But Amenemheb ran after her on foot and with his dagger ripped open her belly, cut off her tail, and presented it to the king, thus preventing a debacle before the excited stallions could take out after the mare.”

[8:2]  ²¹ tn “Some” is not in the Greek text, but is implied.

[8:2]  ²² sn Made loud lamentation. For someone who was stoned to death, lamentation was normally not allowed (m. Sanhedrin 6:6). The remark points to an unjust death.

[8:2]  ²³ tn Or “mourned greatly for him.”