23:4 “If you encounter 4 your enemy’s ox or donkey wandering off, you must by all means return 5 it to him.
1 tn Heb “and Pharaoh will say.”
2 sn The word translated “wandering around confused” indicates that Pharaoh thought the Israelites would be so perplexed and confused that they would not know which way to turn in order to escape – and they would never dream of crossing the sea (S. R. Driver, Exodus, 115).
3 tn The expression has also been translated “the desert has shut [the way] for them,” and more freely “[the Israelites are] hemmed in by the desert.”
4 tn Heb “meet” (so KJV, ASV, NASB).
5 tn The construction uses the imperfect tense (taken here as an obligatory imperfect) and the infinitive absolute for emphasis.