Exodus 5:4

4 And the king of Egypt said, "Why, Moses and Aaron, do you take the people from their work? Go to your {forced labor}!"

Exodus 5:4 Meaning and Commentary

Exodus 5:4

And the king of Egypt said to them
For he was not struck dumb, as Artapanus ^F7, afore cited writer, says:

wherefore do ye, Moses and Aaron, let the people from their works?
as they did when they gathered them together, and wrought signs before them; which Pharaoh it seems had heard of, and had got their names very readily:

get you unto your burdens;
meaning not Moses and Aaron, ordering them to go about their private and family business, but the people they represented, and on whose account they came; and it is highly probable the elders of the people, at least some of them, were with them, to whom these words might be more particularly directed. See ( Exodus 3:18 ) .

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FOOTNOTES:

F7 Ut supra. (Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 27. p. 434.)

Exodus 5:4 In-Context

2 And Pharaoh said, "Who is Yahweh that I should listen to his voice to release Israel? I do not know Yahweh, and also I will not release Israel."

3 And they said, "The God of the Hebrews has met with us. Please let us go [on] a three-day journey into the desert, and let us sacrifice to Yahweh our God, lest he strike us with plague or with sword."

4 And the king of Egypt said, "Why, Moses and Aaron, do you take the people from their work? Go to your {forced labor}!"

5 And Pharaoh said, "Look, the people of the land [are] now many, and you want to stop them from their {forced labor}."

6 And on that day Pharaoh commanded the slave drivers over the people and his foremen, saying,

Footnotes

• [a]. Or "let loose," "let run wild" (compare 32:25)
• [b]. Literally "burdens" or "burdensome labor"