Keil and Delitzsch Commentary - Exodus 10:7 - 10:7

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Keil and Delitzsch Commentary - Exodus 10:7 - 10:7


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The announcement of such a plague of locusts, as their forefathers had never seen before since their existence upon earth, i.e., since the creation of man (Exo 10:6), put the servants of Pharaoh in such fear, that they tried to persuade the king to let the Israelites go. “How long shall this (Moses) be a snare to us?...Seest thou not yet, that Egypt is destroyed?” מֹוקֵשׁ, a snare or trap for catching animals, is a figurative expression for destruction. הָאֲנָשִׁים (Exo 10:7) does not mean the men, but the people. The servants wished all the people to be allowed to go as Moses had desired; but Pharaoh would only consent to the departure of the men (הַגְּבָרִים, Exo 10:11).

Exo 10:8-11

As Moses had left Pharaoh after announcing the plague, he was fetched back again along with Aaron, in consequence of the appeal made to the king by his servants, and asked by the king, how many wanted to go to the feast. וָמִי מִי, “who and who still further are the going ones;” i.e., those who wish to go? Moses required the whole nation to depart, without regard to age or sex, along with all their flocks and herds. He mentioned “young and old, sons and daughters;” the wives as belonging to the men being included in the “we.” Although he assigned a reason for this demand, viz., that they were to hold a feast to Jehovah, Pharaoh was so indignant, that he answered scornfully at first: “Be it so; Jehovah be with you when I let you and your little ones go;” i.e., may Jehovah help you in the same way in which I let you and your little ones go. This indicated contempt not only for Moses and Aaron, but also for Jehovah, who had nevertheless proved Himself, by His manifestations of mighty power, to be a God who would not suffer Himself to be trifled with. After this utterance of his ill-will, Pharaoh told the messengers of God that he could see through their intention. “Evil is before your face;” i.e., you have evil in view. He called their purpose an evil one, because they wanted to withdraw the people from his service. “Not so,” i.e., let it not be as you desire. “Go then, you men, and serve Jehovah.” But even this concession was not seriously meant. This is evident from the expression, “Go then,” in which the irony is unmistakeable; and still more so from the fact, that with these words he broke off all negotiation with Moses and Aaron, and drove them from his presence. וַיְגָרֶשׁ: “one drove them forth;” the subject is not expressed, because it is clear enough that the royal servants who were present were the persons who drove them away. “For this are ye seeking:” אֹתָהּ relates simply to the words “serve Jehovah,” by which the king understood the sacrificial festival, for which in his opinion only the men could be wanted; not that “he supposed the people for whom Moses had asked permission to go, to mean only the men” (Knobel). The restriction of the permission to depart to the men alone was pure caprice; for even the Egyptians, according to Herodotus (2, 60), held religious festivals at which the women were in the habit of accompanying the men.