Exodus 4:6

6 Then the LORD said to Moses, “Now put your hand inside your cloak.” So Moses put his hand inside his cloak, and when he took it out again, his hand was white as snow with a severe skin disease.

Exodus 4:6 Meaning and Commentary

Exodus 4:6

And the Lord said furthermore unto him
Continued his discourse, and gave him another sign: put now thine hand into thy bosom. And he put his hand into his bosom;
within his coat, under that part of the garment next to his breast: and when he took it out, behold, his hand [was] leprous as snow;
that is, white as snow, as the Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan, through the leprosy that was upon it; it was a leprosy of the white sort, and which is reckoned the worst and most difficult to be cured, see ( Leviticus 13:3 Leviticus 13:4 ) ( Numbers 12:10 ) . It is highly probable that this gave rise to the story told by several Heathen writers, as Manetho ^F13, Lysimachus {n}, Trogus ^F15, and Tacitus ^F16, that Moses and the Israelites were drove out of Egypt by the advice of an oracle, because they had the leprosy, itch, and other impure diseases upon them.

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FOOTNOTES:

F13 Apud Joseph. contr. Apion. l. 1. c. 26.
F14 Apud. ib. c. 34.
F15 Justin e Trogo, l. 36. c. 2.
F16 Hist. l. 5. c. 3.

Exodus 4:6 In-Context

4 Then the LORD told him, “Reach out and grab its tail.” So Moses reached out and grabbed it, and it turned back into a shepherd’s staff in his hand.

5 “Perform this sign,” the LORD told him. “Then they will believe that the LORD, the God of their ancestors—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob—really has appeared to you.”

6 Then the LORD said to Moses, “Now put your hand inside your cloak.” So Moses put his hand inside his cloak, and when he took it out again, his hand was white as snow with a severe skin disease.

7 “Now put your hand back into your cloak,” the LORD said. So Moses put his hand back in, and when he took it out again, it was as healthy as the rest of his body.

8 The LORD said to Moses, “If they do not believe you and are not convinced by the first miraculous sign, they will be convinced by the second sign.

Footnotes

• [a]. Or with leprosy. The Hebrew word used here can describe various skin diseases.