Keluaran 2:15

2:15 When Pharaoh heard ¹  about this event, ²  he sought to kill Moses. So Moses fled ³  from Pharaoh and settled in the land of Midian, ⁴  and he settled ⁵  by a certain well. ⁶ 

Keluaran 32:27

32:27 and he said to them, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘Each man fasten ⁷  his sword on his side, and go back and forth ⁸  from entrance to entrance throughout the camp, and each one kill his brother, his friend, and his neighbor.’” ⁹ 

Keluaran 33:12

33:12 Moses said to the Lord, “See, you have been saying to me, ‘Bring this people up,’ ¹⁰  but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. But you said, ‘I know you by name, ¹¹  and also you have found favor in my sight.’

[2:15]  ¹ tn The form with the vav consecutive is here subordinated to the main idea that Pharaoh sought to punish Moses.

[2:15]  ² tn Heb הַדָּבָר (haddavar, “the word [thing, matter, incident]”) functions here like a pronoun to refer in brief to what Moses had done.

[2:15]  ³ tn The vav (ו) consecutive with the preterite shows result – as a result of Pharaoh’s search for him, he fled.

[2:15]  ⁴ sn The location of Midyan or Midian is uncertain, but it had to have been beyond the Egyptian borders on the east, either in the Sinai or beyond in the Arabah (south of the Dead Sea) or even on the east side of the Gulf of Aqaba. The Midianites seem to have traveled extensively in the desert regions. R. A. Cole (Exodus [TOTC], 60) reasons that since they later were enemies of Israel, it is unlikely that these traditions would have been made up about Israel’s great lawgiver; further, he explains that “Ishmaelite” and “Kenite” might have been clan names within the region of Midian. But see, from a different point of view, G. W. Coats, “Moses and Midian,” JBL 92 (1973): 3-10.

[2:15]  ⁵ tn The verb reads “and he sat” or “and he lived.” To translate it “he sat by a well” would seem anticlimactic and unconnected. It probably has the same sense as in the last clause, namely, that he lived in Midian, and he lived near a well, which detail prepares for what follows.

[2:15]  ⁶ tn The word has the definite article, “the well.” Gesenius lists this use of the article as that which denotes a thing that is yet unknown to the reader but present in the mind under the circumstances (GKC 407-8 §126.q-r). Where there was a well, people would settle, and as R. A. Cole says it, for people who settled there it was “the well” (Exodus [TOTC], 60).

[32:27]  ⁷ tn Heb “put.”

[32:27]  ⁸ tn The two imperatives form a verbal hendiadys: “pass over and return,” meaning, “go back and forth” throughout the camp.

[32:27]  ⁹ tn The phrases have “and kill a man his brother, and a man his companion, and a man his neighbor.” The instructions were probably intended to mean that they should kill leaders they knew to be guilty because they had been seen or because they failed the water test – whoever they were.

[33:12]  ¹⁰ tn The Hiphil imperative is from the same verb that has been used before for bringing the people up from Egypt and leading them to Canaan.

[33:12]  ¹¹ tn That is, “chosen you.”