Keluaran 4:20

4:20 Then Moses took ¹  his wife and sons ²  and put them on a donkey and headed back ³  to the land of Egypt, and Moses took the staff of God in his hand.

Keluaran 17:9

17:9 So Moses said to Joshua, “Choose some of our ⁴  men and go out, fight against Amalek. Tomorrow I will stand on top of the hill with the staff of God in my hand.”

[4:20]  ¹ tn Heb “And Moses took.”

[4:20]  ² sn Only Gershom has been mentioned so far. The other son’s name will be explained in chapter 18. The explanation of Gershom’s name was important to Moses’ sojourn in Midian. The explanation of the name Eliezer fits better in the later chapter (18:2-4).

[4:20]  ³ tn The verb would literally be rendered “and returned”; however, the narrative will record other happenings before he arrived in Egypt, so an ingressive nuance fits here – he began to return, or started back.

[17:9]  ⁴ tn This could be rendered literally “choose men for us.” But the lamed (ל) preposition probably indicates possession, “our men,” and the fact that Joshua was to choose from Israel, as well as the fact that there is no article on “men,” indicates he was to select some to fight.