Keluaran 8:25

8:25 Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “Go, sacrifice to your God within the land.” ¹ 

Keluaran 12:33

12:33 The Egyptians were urging ²  the people on, in order to send them out of the land quickly, ³  for they were saying, “We are all dead!”

Keluaran 32:7

32:7 The Lord spoke to Moses: “Go quickly, descend, ⁴  because your ⁵  people, whom you brought up from the land of Egypt, have acted corruptly.

[8:25]  ¹ sn After the plague is inflicted on the land, then Pharaoh makes an appeal. So there is the familiar confrontation (vv. 25-29). Pharaoh’s words to Moses are an advancement on his previous words. Now he uses imperatives: “Go, sacrifice to your God.” But he restricts it to “in the [this] land.” This is a subtle attempt to keep them as a subjugated people and prevent their absolute allegiance to their God. This offered compromise would destroy the point of the exodus – to leave Egypt and find a new allegiance under the Lord.

[12:33]  ² tn The verb used here (חָזַק, khazaq) is the same verb used for Pharaoh’s heart being hardened. It conveys the idea of their being resolved or insistent in this – they were not going to change.

[12:33]  ³ tn The phrase uses two construct infinitives in a hendiadys, the first infinitive becoming the modifier.

[32:7]  ⁴ tn The two imperatives could also express one idea: “get down there.” In other words, “Make haste to get down.”

[32:7]  ⁵ sn By giving the people to Moses in this way, God is saying that they have no longer any right to claim him as their God, since they have shared his honor with another. This is God’s talionic response to their “These are your gods who brought you up.” The use of these pronoun changes also would form an appeal to Moses to respond, since Moses knew that God had brought them up from Egypt.