Exodus 4–5

Miraculous Signs for Moses

4Then Moses answered, “What if they won’t believe me and will not obey me but say, ‘The Lord did not appear ^oto you’?”

²The Lord asked him, “What is that in your hand?”

“A staff,” he replied.

³Then He said, “Throw it on the ground.” He threw it on the ground, and it became a snake. Moses ran from it, ⁴but the Lord told him, “Stretch out your hand and grab it by the tail.” So he stretched out his hand and caught it, and it became a staff in his hand. ⁵“This will take place,” He continued, “so they will believe that Yahweh, the God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has appeared to you.” ^p

⁶In addition the Lord said to him, “Put your hand inside your cloak.” So he put his hand inside his cloak, and when he took it out, his hand was diseased, white as snow. ^qr7Then He said, “Put your hand back inside your cloak.” He put his hand back inside his cloak, and when he took it out, ^sit had again become like the rest of his skin. ^t8“If they will not believe you and will not respond to the evidence of the first sign, they may believe the evidence of the second sign. ⁹And if they don’t believe even these two signs or listen to what you say, take some water from the Nile and pour it on the dry ground. The water you take from the Nile will become blood on the ground.” ^u

¹⁰But Moses replied to the Lord, “Please, Lord, I have never been eloquent—either in the past or recently or since You have been speaking to Your servant ^v—because I am slow and hesitant in speech.” ^wx

¹¹Yahweh said to him, “Who made the human mouth? Who makes him mute or deaf, seeing or blind? Is it not I, Yahweh? ^y12Now go! I will help ^zyou speak and I will teach you what to say.” ^a

¹³Moses said, “Please, Lord, send someone else.” ^b

¹⁴Then the Lord’s anger burned against Moses, and He said, “Isn’t Aaron the Levite your brother? I know that he can speak well. And also, he is on his way now to meet you. He will rejoice when he sees you. ¹⁵You will speak with him and tell him what to say. ^cI will help ^dboth you and him to speak and will teach you both what to do. ¹⁶He will speak to the people for you. He will be your spokesman, and you will serve as God to him. ¹⁷And take this staff in your hand that you will perform the signs with.” ^e

Moses’ Return to Egypt

¹⁸Then Moses went back to his father-in-law Jethro and said to him, “Please let me return to my relatives in Egypt and see if they are still living.”

Jethro said to Moses, “Go in peace.”

¹⁹Now in Midian the Lord told Moses, “Return to Egypt, for all the men who wanted to kill you are dead.” ^f20So Moses took his wife and sons, put them on a donkey, and returned to the land of Egypt. And Moses took God’s staff ^gin his hand.

²¹The Lord instructed Moses, “When you go back to Egypt, make sure you do all the wonders before Pharaoh that I have put within your power. But I will harden his heart ^hiso that he won’t let the people go. ²²Then you will say to Pharaoh: This is what Yahweh says: Israel is My firstborn son. ^j23I told you: Let My son go so that he may worship Me, but you refused to let him go. Now I will kill your firstborn son!” ^k

²⁴On the trip, at an overnight campsite, it happened that the Lord confronted him and sought to put him to death. ²⁵So Zipporah took a flint, cut off her son’s foreskin, and threw it at Moses’ feet. ^lThen she said, “You are a bridegroom of blood to me!” ^m26So He let him alone. At that time she said, “You are a bridegroom of blood,” referring to the circumcision. ⁿ

Reunion of Moses and Aaron

²⁷Now the Lord had said to Aaron, “Go and meet Moses in the wilderness.” So he went and met him at the mountain of God and kissed him. ^o28Moses told Aaron everything the Lord had sent him to say, and about all the signs He had commanded him to do. ²⁹Then Moses and Aaron went and assembled all the elders of the Israelites. ³⁰Aaron repeated everything the Lord had said to Moses and performed the signs before the people. ³¹The people believed, and when they heard that the Lord had paid attention ^pto them and that He had seen their misery, ^qthey bowed down and worshiped.

Moses Confronts Pharaoh

5Later, Moses and Aaron went in and said to Pharaoh, “This is what Yahweh, the God of Israel, says: Let My people go, so that they may hold a festival for Me in the wilderness.” ^r

²But Pharaoh responded, “Who is Yahweh that I should obey Him by letting Israel go? I do not know anything about Yahweh, and besides, I will not let Israel go.” ^s

³Then they answered, “The God of the Hebrews has met with us. Please let us go on a three-day trip into the wilderness so that we may sacrifice to Yahweh our God, or else He may strike us with plague or sword.”

⁴The king of Egypt said to them, “Moses and Aaron, why are you causing the people to neglect their work? Get to your work!” ⁵Pharaoh also said, “Look, the people of the land are so numerous, and you would stop them from working.” ^t

Further Oppression of Israel

⁶That day Pharaoh commanded the overseers ^uof the people as well as their foremen: ⁷“Don’t continue to supply the people with straw for making bricks, as before. They must go and gather straw for themselves. ⁸But require the same quota of bricks from them as they were making before; do not reduce it. For they are slackers—that is why they are crying out, ^v‘Let us go and sacrifice to our God.’ ⁹Impose heavier work on the men. Then they will be occupied with it and not pay attention to deceptive words.”

¹⁰So the overseers and foremen of the people went out and said to them, “This is what Pharaoh says: ^w‘I am not giving you straw. ¹¹Go get straw yourselves wherever you can find it, but there will be no reduction at all in your workload.’ ” ¹²So the people scattered throughout the land of Egypt to gather stubble for straw. ¹³The overseers insisted, “Finish your assigned work each day, just as you did when straw was provided.” ¹⁴Then the Israelite foremen, whom Pharaoh’s slave drivers had set over the people, were beaten ^xand asked, “Why haven’t you finished making your prescribed number of bricks yesterday or today, as you did before?”

¹⁵So the Israelite foremen went in and cried for help to Pharaoh: “Why are you treating your servants this way? ¹⁶No straw has been given to your servants, yet they say to us, ‘Make bricks!’ Look, your servants are being beaten, but it is your own people who are at fault.”

¹⁷But he said, “You are slackers. Slackers! That is why you are saying, ‘Let us go sacrifice to the Lord.’ ¹⁸Now get to work. No straw will be given to you, but you must produce the same quantity of bricks.”

¹⁹The Israelite foremen saw that they were in trouble when they were told, “You cannot reduce your daily quota of bricks.” ²⁰When they left Pharaoh, they confronted Moses and Aaron, who stood waiting to meet them.

²¹“May the Lord take note of you and judge,” they said to them, “because you have made us reek in front of Pharaoh and his officials—putting a sword in their hand to kill us!” ^y

²²So Moses went back to the Lord and asked, “Lord, why have You caused trouble for this people? And why did You ever send me? ^z23Ever since I went in to Pharaoh to speak in Your name he has caused trouble for this people, and You haven’t delivered Your people at all.”