8:12 Then Moses and Aaron went out from Pharaoh, and Moses cried 1 to the Lord because of 2 the frogs that he had brought on 3 Pharaoh.
10:8 So Moses and Aaron were brought back to Pharaoh, and he said to them, “Go, serve the Lord your God. Exactly who is going with you?” 4
16:6 Moses and Aaron said to all the Israelites, “In the evening 7 you will know that the Lord has brought you out of the land of Egypt,
32:7 The Lord spoke to Moses: “Go quickly, descend, 11 because your 12 people, whom you brought up from the land of Egypt, have acted corruptly.
32:21 Moses said to Aaron, “What did this people do to you, that you have brought on them so great a sin?”
35:23 Everyone who had 13 blue, purple, or 14 scarlet yarn, fine linen, goats’ hair, ram skins dyed red, or fine leather 15 brought them. 16
1 tn The verb צָעַק (tsa’aq) is used for prayers in which people cry out of trouble or from danger. U. Cassuto observes that Moses would have been in real danger if God had not answered this prayer (Exodus, 103).
2 tn Heb “over the matter of.”
3 tn The verb is an unusual choice if it were just to mean “brought on.” It is the verb שִׂים (sim, “place, put”). S. R. Driver thinks the thought is “appointed for Pharaoh” as a sign (Exodus, 64). The idea of the sign might be too much, but certainly the frogs were positioned for the instruction of the stubborn king.
4 tn The question is literally “who and who are the ones going?” (מִי וָמִי הַהֹלְכִים, mi vami haholÿkhim). Pharaoh’s answer to Moses includes this rude question, which was intended to say that Pharaoh would control who went. The participle in this clause, then, refers to the future journey.
5 tn The word is טוֹטָפֹת (totafot, “frontlets”). The etymology is uncertain, but the word denotes a sign or an object placed on the forehead (see m. Shabbat 6:1). The Gemara interprets it as a band that goes from ear to ear. In the Targum to 2 Sam 1:10 it is an armlet worn by Saul (see S. R. Driver, Exodus, 110). These bands may have resembled the Egyptian practice of wearing as amulets “forms of words written on folds of papyrus tightly rolled up and sewn in linen” (W. C. Kaiser, Jr., “Exodus,” EBC 2:384).
6 sn The pattern of the passage now emerges more clearly; it concerns the grateful debt of the redeemed. In the first part eating the unleavened bread recalls the night of deliverance in Egypt, and it calls for purity. In the second part the dedication of the firstborn was an acknowledgment of the deliverance of the firstborn from bondage. They were to remember the deliverance and choose purity; they were to remember the deliverance and choose dedication. The NT will also say, “You are not your own, for you were bought with a price, therefore, glorify God” (1 Cor 6:20). Here too the truths of God’s great redemption must be learned well and retained well from generation to generation.
7 tn The text simply has “evening, and you will know.” Gesenius notes that the perfect tense with the vav consecutive occurs as the apodosis to temporal clauses or their equivalents. Here the first word implies the idea “[when it becomes] evening” or simply “[in the] evening” (GKC 337-38 §112.oo).
sn Moses is very careful to make sure that they know it is Yahweh who has brought them out, and it will be Yahweh who will feed them. They are going to be convinced of this now.
8 tn The figure compares the way a bird would teach its young to fly and leave the nest with the way Yahweh brought Israel out of Egypt. The bird referred to could be one of several species of eagles, but more likely is the griffin-vulture. The image is that of power and love.
9 sn The language here is the language of a bridegroom bringing the bride to the chamber. This may be a deliberate allusion to another metaphor for the covenant relationship.
10 tn The verb is an imperfect. The people are not being presumptuous in stating their compliance – there are several options open for the interpretation of this tense. It may be classified as having a desiderative nuance: “we are willing to do” or, “we will do.”
11 tn The two imperatives could also express one idea: “get down there.” In other words, “Make haste to get down.”
12 sn By giving the people to Moses in this way, God is saying that they have no longer any right to claim him as their God, since they have shared his honor with another. This is God’s talionic response to their “These are your gods who brought you up.” The use of these pronoun changes also would form an appeal to Moses to respond, since Moses knew that God had brought them up from Egypt.
13 tn The text uses a relative clause with a resumptive pronoun for this: “who was found with him,” meaning “with whom was found.”
14 tn The conjunction in this verse is translated “or” because the sentence does not intend to say that each person had all these things. They brought what they had.
15 tn See the note on this phrase in Exod 25:5.
16 tn Here “them” has been supplied.
17 tn Heb “wisdom of heart,” which means that they were skilled and could make all the right choices about the work.
18 tn Heb “set up,” if it includes more than the curtain.
19 tn Or “shielding” (NIV); Heb “the veil of the covering” (cf. KJV).