Keluaran 4:12

4:12 So now go, and I will be with your mouth ¹  and will teach you ²  what you must say.” ³ 

Keluaran 18:6

18:6 He said ⁴  to Moses, “I, your father-in-law Jethro, am coming to you, along with your wife and her two sons with her.”

Keluaran 21:3

21:3 If he came ⁵  in by himself ⁶  he will go out by himself; if he had ⁷  a wife when he came in, then his wife will go out with him.

Keluaran 21:14

21:14 But if a man willfully attacks his neighbor to kill him cunningly, ⁸  you will take him even from my altar that he may die.

Keluaran 22:15

22:15 If its owner was with it, he will not have to pay; if it was hired, what was paid for the hire covers it. ⁹ 

Keluaran 23:1

Justice

23:1 ¹⁰ “You must not give ¹¹  a false report. ¹²  Do not make common cause ¹³  with the wicked ¹⁴  to be a malicious ¹⁵  witness.

Keluaran 24:2

24:2 Moses alone may come ¹⁶  near the Lord, but the others ¹⁷  must not come near, ¹⁸  nor may the people go up with him.”

Keluaran 34:5

34:5 The Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there and proclaimed the Lord by name. ¹⁹ 

[4:12]  ¹ sn The promise of divine presence always indicates intervention (for blessing or cursing). Here it means that God would be working through the organs of speech to help Moses speak. See Deut 18:18; Jer 1:9.

[4:12]  ² sn The verb is וְהוֹרֵיתִיךָ (vÿhoretikha), the Hiphil perfect with a vav (ו) consecutive. The form carries the instructional meaning because it follows the imperative “go.” In fact, there is a sequence at work here: “go…and/that I may teach you.” It is from יָרָה (yara), the same root behind תּוֹרָה (torah, “law”). This always referred to teaching either wisdom or revelation. Here Yahweh promises to teach Moses what to say.

[4:12]  ³ tn The form is the imperfect tense. While it could be taken as a future (“what you will say”), an obligatory imperfect captures the significance better (“what you must say” or “what you are to say”). Not even the content of the message will be left up to Moses.

[18:6]  ⁴ sn This verse may seem out of place, since the report has already been given that they came to the desert. It begins to provide details of the event that the previous verse summarizes. The announcement in verse 6 may have come in advance by means of a messenger or at the time of arrival, either of which would fit with the attention to formal greetings in verse 7. This would suit a meeting between two important men; the status of Moses has changed. The LXX solves the problem by taking the pronoun “I” as the particle “behold” and reads it this way: “one said to Moses, ‘Behold, your father-in-law has come….’”

[21:3]  ⁵ tn The tense is imperfect, but in the conditional clause it clearly refers to action that is anterior to the action in the next clause. Heb “if he comes in single, he goes out single,” that is, “if he came in single, he will go out single.”

[21:3]  ⁶ tn Heb “with his back” meaning “alone.”

[21:3]  ⁷ tn The phrase says, “if he was the possessor of a wife”; the noun בַּעַל (ba’al) can mean “possessor” or “husband.” If there was a wife, she shared his fortunes or his servitude; if he entered with her, she would accompany him when he left.

[21:14]  ⁸ tn The word עָרְמָה (’ormah) is problematic. It could mean with prior intent, which would be connected with the word in Prov 8:5, 12 which means “understanding” (or “prudence” – fully aware of the way things are). It could be connected also to an Arabic word for “enemy” which would indicate this was done with malice or evil intentions (U. Cassuto, Exodus, 270). The use here seems parallel to the one in Josh 9:4, an instance involving intentionality and clever deception.

[22:15]  ⁹ tn Literally “it came with/for its hire,” this expression implies that the owner who hired it out and was present was prepared to take the risk, so there would be no compensation.

[23:1]  ¹⁰ sn People who claim to worship and serve the righteous judge of the universe must preserve equity and justice in their dealings with others. These verses teach that God’s people must be honest witnesses (1-3); God’s people must be righteous even with enemies (4-5); and God’s people must be fair in dispensing justice (6-9).

[23:1]  ¹¹ tn Heb “take up, lift, carry” (נָשָׂא, nasa’). This verb was also used in the prohibition against taking “the name of Yahweh in vain.” Sometimes the object of this verb is physical, as in Jonah 1:12 and 15. Used in this prohibition involving speech, it covers both originating and repeating a lie.

[23:1]  ¹² tn Or “a groundless report” (see Exod 20:7 for the word שָׁוְא, shav’).

[23:1]  ¹³ tn Heb “do not put your hand” (cf. KJV, ASV); NASB “join your hand.”

[23:1]  ¹⁴ tn The word “wicked” (רָשָׁע, rasha’) refers to the guilty criminal, the person who is doing something wrong. In the religious setting it describes the person who is not a member of the covenant and may be involved in all kinds of sin, even though there is the appearance of moral and spiritual stability.

[23:1]  ¹⁵ tn The word חָמָס (khamas) often means “violence” in the sense of social injustices done to other people, usually the poor and needy. A “malicious” witness would do great harm to others. See J. W. McKay, “Exodus 23:1-43, 6-8: A Decalogue for Administration of Justice in the City Gate,” VT 21 (1971): 311-25.

[24:2]  ¹⁶ tn The verb is a perfect tense with a vav (ו) consecutive; it and the preceding perfect tense follow the imperative, and so have either a force of instruction, or, as taken here, are the equivalent of an imperfect tense (of permission).

[24:2]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “they.”

[24:2]  ¹⁸ tn Now the imperfect tense negated is used; here the prohibition would fit (“they will not come near”), or the obligatory (“they must not”) in which the subjects are obliged to act – or not act in this case.

[34:5]  ¹⁹ tn Some commentaries wish to make Moses the subject of the second and the third verbs, the first because he was told to stand there and this verb suggests he did it, and the last because it sounds like he was worshiping Yahweh (cf. NASB). But it is clear from v. 6 that Yahweh was the subject of the last clause of v. 5 – v. 6 tells how he did it. So if Yahweh is the subject of the first and last clauses of v. 5, it seems simpler that he also be the subject of the second. Moses took his stand there, but God stood by him (B. Jacob, Exodus, 981; U. Cassuto, Exodus, 439). There is no reason to make Moses the subject in any of the verbs of v. 5.