Keluaran 8:1

8:1 (7:26) ¹  Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh and tell him, ‘Thus says the Lord: “Release my people in order that they may serve me!

Keluaran 8:5

8:5 The Lord spoke to Moses, “Tell Aaron, ‘Extend your hand with your staff ²  over the rivers, over the canals, and over the ponds, and bring the frogs up over the land of Egypt.’”

Keluaran 8:7

8:7 The magicians did the same ³  with their secret arts and brought up frogs on the land of Egypt too. ⁴ 

Keluaran 8:10-12

8:10 He said, “Tomorrow.” And Moses said, ⁵  “It will be ⁶  as you say, ⁷  so that you may know that there is no one like the Lord our God. 8:11 The frogs will depart from you, your houses, your servants, and your people; they will be left only in the Nile.”

8:12 Then Moses and Aaron went out from Pharaoh, and Moses cried ⁸  to the Lord because of ⁹  the frogs that he had brought on ¹⁰  Pharaoh.

Keluaran 8:15-16

8:15 But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, ¹¹  he hardened ¹²  his heart and did not listen to them, just as the Lord had predicted. ¹³ 

The Third Blow: Gnats

8:16 ¹⁴ The Lord said to Moses, “Tell Aaron, ‘Extend your staff and strike the dust of the ground, and it will become ¹⁵  gnats ¹⁶  throughout all the land of Egypt.’”

Keluaran 8:18

8:18 When ¹⁷  the magicians attempted ¹⁸  to bring forth gnats by their secret arts, they could not. So there were gnats on people and on animals.

Keluaran 8:27

8:27 We must go ¹⁹  on a three-day journey ²⁰  into the desert and sacrifice ²¹  to the Lord our God, just as he is telling us.” ²² 

Keluaran 22:4

22:4 If the stolen item should in fact be found ²³  alive in his possession, ²⁴  whether it be an ox or a donkey or a sheep, he must pay back double. ²⁵ 

Keluaran 22:8

22:8 If the thief is not caught, ²⁶  then the owner of the house will be brought before the judges ²⁷  to see ²⁸  whether he has laid ²⁹  his hand on his neighbor’s goods.

Keluaran 22:13

22:13 If it is torn in pieces, then he will bring it for evidence, ³⁰  and he will not have to pay for what was torn.

Keluaran 22:15-16

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. ³¹ 

Moral and Ceremonial Laws

22:16 ³² “If a man seduces a virgin ³³  who is not engaged ³⁴  and has sexual relations with her, he must surely endow ³⁵  her to be his wife.

Keluaran 22:30

22:30 You must also do this for your oxen and for your sheep; seven days they may remain with their mothers, but give them to me on the eighth day.

[8:1]  ¹ sn Beginning with 8:1, the verse numbers through 8:32 in English Bibles differ from the verse numbers in the Hebrew text (BHS), with 8:1 ET = 7:26 HT, 8:2 ET = 7:27 HT, 8:3 ET = 7:28 HT, 8:4 ET = 7:29 HT, 8:5 ET = 8:1 HT, etc., through 8:32 ET = 8:28 HT. Thus in English Bibles chapter 8 has 32 verses, while in the Hebrew Bible it has 28 verses, with the four extra verses attached to chapter 7.

[8:5]  ² sn After the instructions for Pharaoh (7:25-8:4), the plague now is brought on by the staff in Aaron’s hand (8:5-7). This will lead to the confrontation (vv. 8-11) and the hardening (vv. 12-15).

[8:7]  ³ tn Heb “thus, so.”

[8:7]  ⁴ sn In these first two plagues the fact that the Egyptians could and did duplicate them is ironic. By duplicating the experience, they added to the misery of Egypt. One wonders why they did not use their skills to rid the land of the pests instead, and the implication of course is that they could not.

[8:10]  ⁵ tn Heb “And he said”; the referent (Moses) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[8:10]  ⁶ tn “It will be” has been supplied.

[8:10]  ⁷ tn Heb “according to your word” (so NASB).

[8:12]  ⁸ 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).

[8:12]  ⁹ tn Heb “over the matter of.”

[8:12]  ¹⁰ 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.

[8:15]  ¹¹ tn The word רְוָחָה (rÿvakhah) means “respite, relief.” BDB 926 relates it to the verb רָוַח (ravakh, “to be wide, spacious”). There would be relief when there was freedom to move about.

[8:15]  ¹² tn וְהַכְבֵּד (vÿhakhbed) is a Hiphil infinitive absolute, functioning as a finite verb. The meaning of the word is “to make heavy,” and so stubborn, sluggish, indifferent. It summarizes his attitude and the outcome, that he refused to keep his promises.

[8:15]  ¹³ sn The end of the plague revealed clearly God’s absolute control over Egypt’s life and deities – all at the power of the man who prayed to God. Yahweh had made life unpleasant for the people by sending the plague, but he was also the one who could remove it. The only recourse anyone has in such trouble is to pray to the sovereign Lord God. Everyone should know that there is no one like Yahweh.

[8:16]  ¹⁴ sn The third plague is brief and unannounced. Moses and Aaron were simply to strike the dust so that it would become gnats. Not only was this plague unannounced, but also it was not duplicated by the Egyptians.

[8:16]  ¹⁵ tn The verb is the perfect tense with vav (ו) consecutive, meaning “and it will be.” When הָיָה (hayah) is followed by the lamed (ל) proposition, it means “become.”

[8:16]  ¹⁶ tn The noun is כִּנִּים (kinnim). The insect has been variously identified as lice, gnats, ticks, flies, fleas, or mosquitoes. “Lice” follows the reading in the Peshitta and Targum (and so Josephus, Ant. 2.14.3 [2.300]). Greek and Latin had “gnats.” By “gnats” many commentators mean “mosquitoes,” which in and around the water of Egypt were abundant (and the translators of the Greek text were familiar with Egypt). Whatever they were they came from the dust and were troublesome to people and animals.

[8:18]  ¹⁷ tn The preterite with vav (ו) consecutive is here subordinated to the main clause as a temporal clause.

[8:18]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “and the magicians did so.”

[8:18]  sn The report of what the magicians did (or as it turns out, tried to do) begins with the same words as the report about the actions of Moses and Aaron – “and they did so” (vv. 17 and 18). The magicians copy the actions of Moses and Aaron, leading readers to think momentarily that the magicians are again successful, but at the end of the verse comes the news that “they could not.” Compared with the first two plagues, this third plague has an important new feature, the failure of the magicians and their recognition of the source of the plague.

[8:27]  ¹⁹ tn The verb נֵלֵךְ (nelekh) is a Qal imperfect of the verb הָלַךְ (halakh). Here it should be given the modal nuance of obligation: “we must go.”

[8:27]  ²⁰ tn This clause is placed first in the sentence to stress the distance required. דֶּרֶךְ (derekh) is an adverbial accusative specifying how far they must go. It is in construct, so “three days” modifies it. It is a “journey of three days,” or, “a three day journey.”

[8:27]  ²¹ tn The form is the perfect tense with a vav (ו) consecutive; it follows in the sequence: we must go…and then [must] sacrifice.”

[8:27]  ²² tn The form is the imperfect tense. It could be future: “as he will tell us,” but it also could be the progressive imperfect if this is now what God is telling them to do: “as he is telling us.”

[22:4]  ²³ tn The construction uses a Niphal infinitive absolute and a Niphal imperfect: if it should indeed be found. Gesenius says that in such conditional clauses the infinitive absolute has less emphasis, but instead emphasizes the condition on which some consequence depends (see GKC 342-43 §113.o).

[22:4]  ²⁴ tn Heb “in his hand.”

[22:4]  ²⁵ sn He must pay back one for what he took, and then one for the penalty – his loss as he was inflicting a loss on someone else.

[22:8]  ²⁶ tn Heb “found.”

[22:8]  ²⁷ tn Here again the word used is “the gods,” meaning the judges who made the assessments and decisions. In addition to other works, see J. R. Vannoy, “The Use of the Word ha’elohim in Exodus 21:6 and 22:7,8,” The Law and the Prophets, 225-41.

[22:8]  ²⁸ tn The phrase “to see” has been supplied.

[22:8]  ²⁹ tn The line says “if he has not stretched out his hand.” This could be the oath formula, but the construction here would be unusual, or it could be taken as “whether” (see W. C. Kaiser, Jr., “Exodus,” EBC 2:438). U. Cassuto (Exodus, 286) does not think the wording can possibly fit an oath; nevertheless, an oath would be involved before God (as he takes it instead of “judges”) – if the man swore, his word would be accepted, but if he would not swear, he would be guilty.

[22:13]  ³⁰ tn The word עֵד (’ed) actually means “witness,” but the dead animal that is returned is a silent witness, i.e., evidence. The word is an adverbial accusative.

[22:15]  ³¹ 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.

[22:16]  ³² sn The second half of the chapter records various laws of purity and justice. Any of them could be treated in an expository way, but in the present array they offer a survey of God’s righteous standards: Maintain the sanctity of marriage (16-17); maintain the purity of religious institutions (18-20), maintain the rights of human beings (21-28), maintain the rights of Yahweh (29-31).

[22:16]  ³³ tn This is the word בְּתוּלָה (bÿtulah); it describes a young woman who is not married or a young woman engaged to be married; in any case, she is presumed to be a virgin.

[22:16]  ³⁴ tn Or “pledged” for marriage.

[22:16]  ³⁵ tn The verb מָהַר (mahar) means “pay the marriage price,” and the related noun is the bride price. B. Jacob says this was a proposal gift and not a purchase price (Exodus, 700). This is the price paid to her parents, which allowed for provision should there be a divorce. The amount was usually agreed on by the two families, but the price was higher for a pure bride from a noble family. Here, the one who seduces her must pay it, regardless of whether he marries her or not.