Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Exodus 5:15
Then the officers of the children of Israel came and cried unto Pharaoh, saying, Wherefore dealest thou thus with thy servants?
15 19. The officers of the Israelites expostulate with the Pharaoh, but to no effect. Cf. Erman, 177 (a complaint of the absence of straw).
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Exo 5:15-16
Wherefore dealest thou thus.
Lessons
1. Oppressed souls cannot but complain of cruel and unjust smitings; blows make cries.
2. Addresses for relief are fittest from the afflicted to the highest power oppressing.
3. Access and cries and sad speeches are forced from oppressed to oppressors.
4. The execution by instruments is justly charged upon their lords.
5. True servants may justly expostulate about hard dealings from their rulers.
6. Unreasonable exactions will force afflicted ones to expostulate with powers oppressing them (Exo 5:15).
7. To give no straw and to command bricks is a most unreasonable exaction.
8. To punish innocent servants when others sin is a most unjust oppression.
9. Such sad dealings make Gods servants sometimes to complain to earthly powers (Exo 5:16). (G. Hughes, B. D.)
Reasons required for moral conduct
I. There are times when men are required to give reasons for their method of moral conduct. Public opinion often calls a man to its tribunal. Sometimes men are the questioners. Sometimes God is the Questioner.
II. It is highly important that every man should be able to allege heavenly principles and motives as the basis of his conduct. Love to God and man is the only true and loyal principle and motive of human action, and only will sustain the scrutiny of infinite rectitude.
III. That a man who can allege heavenly principles as the basis of his conduct will be safe at any tribunal to which he may be called.
1. He will be safe at the tribunal of his own conscience.
2. He will be safe at the tribunal of Gods Book.
3. He will be safe at the tribunal of public opinion.
4. He will be safe at the final tribunal of the universe. (J. S. Exell, M. A.)
The expostulations of the slave
I. They expostulate that the means necessary to the accomplishment of their daily work were withheld. There is no straw given to thy servants.
II. They expostulate that they were brutally treated. Thy servants are beaten.
III. They expostulate that they were not morally culpable in their neglect of work. The fault is in thine own people. (J. S. Exell, M. A.)
The tyrant
1. Unreasonable in his demands.
2. Cruel in his resentment.
3. Mistaken in his judgment of guilt. (J. S. Exell, M. A.)
The true object of blame
Gotthold had a little dog, which, when placed before a mirror, became instantly enraged, and barked at its own linage. He remarked on the occasion: In general, a mirror serves as an excitement to self-love, whereas it stimulates this dog to anger against itself. The animal cannot conceive that the figure it sees is only its own reflection, but fancies that it is a strange dog, and therefore will not suffer it to approach its master. This may remind us of an infirmity of our depraved hearts. We often complain of others, and take offence at the things they do against us, without reflecting that, for the most part, the blame lies with ourselves.
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Then the officers of the children of Israel came and cried unto Pharaoh,…. Made their complaints to him, perhaps with tears in their eyes, being used so very ill. They little thought it was by Pharaoh’s orders; they supposed he knew nothing of it, and therefore hoped to have their grievances redressed by him, but were mistaken:
saying, wherefore dealest thou thus with thy servants? so they call themselves, they living in his country, and being under his jurisdiction, though not properly his subjects; however, he had made them his slaves, and so indeed even bondservants.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
15 Then the officers of the children of Israel came and cried unto Pharaoh, saying, Wherefore dealest thou thus with thy servants? 16 There is no straw given unto thy servants, and they say to us, Make brick: and, behold, thy servants are beaten; but the fault is in thine own people. 17 But he said, Ye are idle, ye are idle: therefore ye say, Let us go and do sacrifice to the LORD. 18 Go therefore now, and work; for there shall no straw be given you, yet shall ye deliver the tale of bricks. 19 And the officers of the children of Israel did see that they were in evil case, after it was said, Ye shall not minish ought from your bricks of your daily task. 20 And they met Moses and Aaron, who stood in the way, as they came forth from Pharaoh: 21 And they said unto them, The LORD look upon you, and judge; because ye have made our savour to be abhorred in the eyes of Pharaoh, and in the eyes of his servants, to put a sword in their hand to slay us. 22 And Moses returned unto the LORD, and said, Lord, wherefore hast thou so evil entreated this people? why is it that thou hast sent me? 23 For since I came to Pharaoh to speak in thy name, he hath done evil to this people; neither hast thou delivered thy people at all.
It was a great strait that the head-workmen were in, when they must either abuse those that were under them or be abused by those that were over them; yet, it should seem, rather than they would tyrannize, they would be tyrannized over; and they were so. In this evil case (v. 19), observe,
I. How justly they complained to Pharaoh: They came and cried unto Pharaoh, v. 15. Whither should they go with a remonstrance of their grievances but to the supreme power, which is ordained for the protection of the injured? As bad as Pharaoh was his oppressed subjects had liberty to complain to him; there was no law against petitioning: it was a very modest, but moving, representation that they made of their condition (v. 16): Thy servants are beaten (severely enough, no doubt, when things were in such a ferment), and yet the fault is in thy own people, the task-masters, who deny us what is necessary for carrying on our work. Note, It is common for those to be most rigorous in blaming others who are most blameworthy themselves. But what did they get by this complaint? It did but make bad worse. 1. Pharaoh taunted them (v. 17); when they were almost killed with working, he told them they were idle: they underwent the fatigue of industry, and yet lay under the imputation of slothfulness, while nothing appeared to ground the charge upon but this, that they said, Let us go and do sacrifice. Note, It is common for the best actions to be mentioned under the worst names; holy diligence in the best business is censured by many as a culpable carelessness in the business of the world. It is well for us that men are not to be our judges, but a God who knows what the principles are on which we act. Those that are diligent in doing sacrifice to the Lord will, with God, escape the doom of the slothful servant, though, with men, they do not. 2. He bound on their burdens: Go now and work. v. 18. Note, Wickedness proceedeth from the wicked; what can be expected from unrighteous men but more unrighteousness?
II. How unjustly they complained of Moses and Aaron: The Lord look upon you, and judge, v. 21. This was not fair. Moses and Aaron had given sufficient evidence of their hearty good-will to the liberties of Israel; and yet, because things succeed not immediately as they hoped, they are reproached as accessaries to their slavery. They should have humbled themselves before God, and taken to themselves the shame of their sin, which turned away good things from them; but, instead of this, they fly in the face of their best friends, and quarrel with the instruments of their deliverance, because of some little difficulties and obstructions they met with in effecting it. Note, Those that are called out to public service for God and their generation must expect to be tried, not only by the malicious threats of proud enemies, but by the unjust and unkind censures of unthinking friends, who judge only by outward appearance and look but a little way before them. Now what did Moses do in this strait? It grieved him to the heart that the event did not answer, but rather contradict, his expectation; and their upbraidings were very cutting, and like a sword in his bones; but, 1. He returned to the Lord (v. 22), to acquaint him with it, and to represent the case to him: he knew that what he had said and done was by divine direction; and therefore what blame is laid upon him for it he considers as reflecting upon God, and, like Hezekiah, spreads it before him as interested in the cause, and appeals to him. Compare this with Jer. xx. 7-9. Note, When we find ourselves, at any time, perplexed and embarrassed in the way of our duty, we ought to have recourse to God, and lay open our case before him by faithful and fervent prayer. If we retreat, let us retreat to him, and no further. 2. He expostulated with him, Exo 5:22; Exo 5:23. He knew not how to reconcile the providence with the promise and the commission which he had received. “Is this God’s coming down to deliver Israel? Must I, who hoped to be a blessing to them, become a scourge to them? By this attempt to get them out of the pit, they are but sunk the deeper into it.” Now he asks, (1.) Wherefore hast thou so evil entreated this people? Note, Even when God is coming towards his people in ways of mercy, he sometimes takes such methods as that they may think themselves but ill treated. The instruments of deliverance, when they aim to help, are found to hinder, and that becomes a trap which, it was hoped, would have been for their welfare, God suffering it to be so that we may learn to cease from man, and may come off from a dependence upon second causes. Note, further, When the people of God think themselves ill treated, they should go to God by prayer, and plead with him, and that is the way to have better treatment in God’s good time. (2.) Why is it thou hast sent me? Thus, [1.] He complains of his ill success: “Pharaoh has done evil to this people, and not one step seems to be taken towards their deliverance.” Note, It cannot but sit very heavily upon the spirits of those whom God employs for him to see that their labour does no good, and much more to see that it does hurt eventually, though not designedly. It is uncomfortable to a good minister to perceive that his endeavours for men’s conviction and conversion do but exasperate their corruptions, confirm their prejudices, harden their hearts, and seal them up under unbelief. This makes them go in the bitterness of their souls, as the prophet, Ezek. iii. 14. Or, [2.] He enquires what was further to be done: Why hast thou sent me? that is, “What other method shall I take in pursuance of my commission?” Note, Disappointments in our work must not drive us from our God, but still we must consider why we are sent.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
Verses 15-19:
The Hebrew officers came to Pharaoh with a complaint of their cruel and unjust treatment. They likely thought that the king was unaware of the unreasonable and unjust demands made upon them. They had done their best, but were unable to meet the new quotas. They charged that the fault was not theirs, but that of the Egyptian officers.
Pharaoh rejected the complaints. He charged them with insincerity; they did not really want to worship, but they wanted a holiday. Then he sent them away “at once,” rejecting outright their request for justice, without even so much as inquiring of the validity of their charges.
Pharaoh’s spiritual blindness is further revealed by this conduct.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.Exo. 5:15-19
REQUIRING THE IMPOSSIBLE
I. That there are some people in society who strive to make those under them do the impossible. Pharaoh tried to make the Israelites do the impossible, when he commanded them to make bricks without providing them with straw. This demand of tyranny is heard to-day in our large factories and amongst our agricultural population.
1. All require men to do the impossible who wish them to work beyond their capabilities. Every man has a degree of capability for work peculiar to himself, and can only execute that kind of work in a given time, according to his own ability. To require more at his hands is to require the impossible. To require men to work beyond their physical strength is to require the impossible. Some employers have no regard for the physical manhood of those engaged in their service. They give the same amount of work alike to the strong and the weak, and expect it accomplished. The thin, pale countenances of many who are daily seen wending their way to our busy hives of industry are indices to sad tales of heart and home. They are overworked. They are sinking into the grave. How often is the buoyant life and energy of youth quenched, and almost extinguished, by toil in an overcrowded and illventilated office. All who require young men to prosecute their daily business under such conditions are, in effect, seeking the impossible. To require men to work beyond their intellectual ability is to require the impossible. There are hundreds of men in our country who occupy positions beyond the power of their mental ability to sustain happily, and with comfort to themselves. This is the case with many who indulge in large financial speculations; with many in the daily haunts of life who occupy a higher position than they are qualified for; and with many popular ministers. Those in authority over them, and an exacting public, are ever urging them to make bricks without straw. Hence their work becomes a burden and a sorrow. To require men to work beyond their moral energy is to require the impossible. There are some men of little souls and small sympathies who have great churches, and who have in their congregation men of large hearts. These large-hearted hearers get but little help in their sorrows and conflicts from their minister and his sermons; they ought not to expect otherwise, for even a minister cannot make brick without straw. How can a preacher give to his congregation the sympathies of an overflowing heart of love, when his soul is hardly large enough to contain even himself, when he is of cold temperament, logical in thought rather than deep in emotion. Never require your minister to do the impossible; to visit all the parish in a day, to know that people are ill when he has never been told, to attend half a dozen committees at the same hour, to lead a prayer-meeting when he is preaching elsewhere, or expect sympathy from him when he has none to give. If you have chosen him as your pastor, do not expect him to make bricks without straw.
2. All require men to do the impossible who wish them to work beyond their opportunity. Every man must have time, and a proper time, to do his work. He must not be expected to do two things at once. He must not be expected to work when nature requires that he should be in bed asleep. But men must not only have the opportunity of time in which to accomplish their work, but also the opportunity of place and means. Every workman should have a place adapted to his employment, and should be readily supplied with means whereby to carry it on. He should have a shed to make his bricks in, as well as straw to make them with.
3. Contemplate the method employed to get men to do the impossible. These methods are various. Some will condescend to flattery and cant to get men to do that for which they are totally unadapted. Others will use force and persecution.
(1.) They set taskmasters over us. To watch our conduct. To inspect our work. To insure our diligence. To augment our burden. To darken our sorrow. How many managers in our large factories, inspired by the tyrant spirit of their masters, act the part of these Egyptian officers. How many deacons in small churches are more like them than they are like Christ, who gave rest to the heavy ladened.
(2.) They abuse us. They say we are idle, and that even after we have made the best attempt within our power, to fall in with their unjust demands.
(3.) They mock our religious sentiment. Therefore, ye say, let us go and do sacrifice unto the Lord. They impeach our religious motives. They insinuate that we are hypocrites. These, then, are the ways and methods in which we are treated, when tyrants endeavour to compel us to do the impossible.
(4.) Some people will attempt to accomplish the impossible. It would seem that these Israelites did. They were scattered abroad, and went seeking stubble wherewith to make bricks. Never attempt to do what you cannot, either in response to the order of the tyrant or the smile of the flatterer. It will involve you in utter failure and distress at last, when you will get no sympathy from those who urged you to it. The world is full of men who are trying to do the impossible. They are trying to make wealth too fast, they are giving out energy they will never be able to repair.
II. That the people who strive to make those under them do the impossible are throwing society into an attitude of pain and complaint. Then the officers of the Children of Israel came and cried unto Pharaoh, saying, wherefore dealest thou thus with thy servants?
1. The requirement of the impossible tends to throw society into an attitude of pain. When men are required to do the impossible, their physical and moral energies are exhausted by what they know must be fruitless labour. Hence they become weary. They despair. Most of the social pain of our country is occasioned by tyrannic and covetous spirits, who are in haste to get rich out of the cheap and stern labour of those who are unfortunately in their service. National happiness is to a very large extent the outcome of a free and sympathetic employment of the working classes.
2. The requirement of the impossible tends to throw society into an attitude of complaint. When society is in pain, it is almost sure to render vocal its anguish in the language of complaint. Men feel, when they are required to do the impossible, that they are unjustly treated. And nothing will sooner give rise to complaint than a sense of injury and wrong. When society is complaining, it cannot be happy or prosperous. A tyrant king can destroy the very life of a nation. Wherefore dealest thou thus with thy servants.
1. Is it from the sheer motive of tyranny?
(2.) Is it as an additional assertion of authority since the demand of Moses and Aaron?
(3.) Is it with a cruel delight in our woe?
(4.) It certainly cannot be justified.
III. That the people who strive to make those under them do the impossible, and who throw society into an attitude of pain, are but little affected by the woe they occasion, and generally resent any mention of it to them. Go therefore now, and work; for there shall no straw be given you, yet shall ye deliver the tale of bricks.
1. Not withstanding the outcry of the oppressed the tyrant demands renewed work. Go therefore now, and work.
2. Notwithstanding the outcry of the oppressed, the tyrant adheres to his cruel measures. There shall no straw be given you.
3. Notwithstanding the outcry of the oppressed, the tyrant mocks their woe, and treats them with contempt. LESSONS:
1. Never require the impossible.
2. Never attempt the impossible.
3. Adapt methods to ends.
4. Cultivate kindly dispositions toward your employers.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
REASONS REQUIRED FOR MORAL CONDUCT
Exo. 5:15. Wherefore dealest thou thus with thy servants.
I. There are times when men are required to give reasons for their method of moral conduct. They have been oppressive in their conduct. They have to give a reason for their oppression. They have been dishonest, they have to give a reason for their deception. They have occasioned pain to others, and any man who gives pain to his fellow creature ought to be rigorously questioned about it. Public opinion often calls a man to its tribunal. Sometimes men are the questioners. Sometimes God is the Questioner. Kings are not exempt from these interrogations. The world will one day have to give a reason for its conduct at the solemn bar of God.
II. It is highly important that every man should be able to allege heavenly principles and motives as the basis of his conduct. Men must not rest their methods of conduct upon the dictate of their own pleasure, convenience, or arbitrary will, but upon the spiritual law of God. Revenge, envy, and selfishness are vile reasons for conduct, and will meet with severe retribution. Love to God and man is the only true and loyal principle and motive of human action, and only will sustain the scrutiny of infinite rectitude.
III. That a man who can allege heavenly principles as the basis of his conduct will be safe at any tribunal to which he may be called.
1. He will be safe at the tribunal of his own conscience.
2. He will be safe at the tribunal of Gods Book.
3. He will be safe at the tribunal of public opinion.
4. He will be safe at the final tribunal of the universe.
Oppressed souls cannot but complain of cruel and unjust smitings.
Addresses for relief are fittest from the afflicted to the highest power oppressing.
Access, cries, and sad speeches are forced from the oppressed to oppressors.
The execution by instruments is justly charged upon their Lords.
The Oppressor:
1. He has often to give audience to his slaves.
2. He has to hear the cry of his slaves.
3. He has to listen to the complaint of his slaves.
4. He has to give a reason for his conduct to his slaves.
Exo. 5:16. THE EXPOSTULATIONS OF THE SLAVE
I. They expostulate that the means necessary to the accomplishment of their daily work were withheld. There is no straw given to thy servants.
II. They expostulate that they were brutally treated. Thy servants are beaten.
III. They expostulate that they were not morally culpable in their neglect of work. The fault is in thine own people
True servants may justly expostulate about hard dealings from their rulers.
To give no straw and to command bricks is a most unreasonable exaction.
To punish innocent servants when others sin, is a most unjust oppression.
Such wicked dealings sometimes make Gods servants to complain to earthly powers.
The tyrant:
1. Unreasonable in his demands.
2. Cruel in his resentment.
3. Mistaken in his judgment of guilt.
Exo. 5:17-19. Cruel oppressors of Gods people are deaf to complaints.
Crimination, though false, instead of acceptation, is returned to the appeals of the oppressed by cruel powers.
Double labours are branded for idleness by unreasonable oppressors.
Persecutors do not only charge men but God, for making His people idle.
Inhuman persecutors drive the appealing oppressed out of their sight to work.
Cruel oppressors double their denial of help unto sad plaintiffs.
Complaints of exaction upon Gods servants are usually answered by adding more.
Cruel exactions of persecutors may make deep impressions upon Gods servants.
Good overseers are more afflicted when they see themselves forced to oppress the innocent.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
(15) The officers . . . came and cried unto Pharaoh.The Egyptian monarchs were accessible to all. It was a part of their duty to hear complaints personally; and they, for the most part, devoted to this employment the earlier hours of each day (see Herod. ii. 173;. Those who came to them generally cried to them for justice, as is the Oriental wont.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
15, 16. The Hebrew scribes come to Pharaoh and complain that they are beaten for not performing an impossible task . The monuments also give us pictures of labourers working under the stick, showing that it was customary for the superintendents to stimulate by blows . There is a papyrus, translated by M . Chabas, which relates the punishment of twelve labourers who failed to make up the required “tale of bricks . ” The Egyptians had much confidence in the virtue of corporeal punishment .
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
EXPOSITION
Exo 5:15-19
Smarting under the sense of injustice, the Israelite officers “came and cried to Pharaoh” (Exo 5:15), supposing that he could not have intended such manifest unfairness and cruelty. They were conscious to themselves of having done their utmost, and of having failed simply because the thing required was impossible. Surely the king would understand this, if they pointed it out, and would either allow straw as before, or diminish the number of the bricks. But the king had no desire for justice, and did not even pretend to it. He asked for no particulars, ordered no inquiry into the ground of complaint; but turned upon the complainants with the cuckoo cry”Idle, idle yourselveselse ye had no time to come here; go, workgo, work.” Then the officers felt that they were indeed “in evil case” (Exo 5:19)the king was determined not to do justiceno hope remainedthey must be beaten again and again, until they died of the punishment (Exo 5:21).
Exo 5:15
Came and cried. The shrill “cry” of Orientals when making complaint has often been noticed by travellers, and is probably here alluded to. To Pharaoh. See the “Introductory paragraph” at the beginning of the chapter, where it has been noticed that complainants had free access to the presence of Egyptian kings.
Exo 5:16
They say to us. Or, “they keep saying to us.” The participle is used, which implies continuance or repetition. The fruit is in thine own people. Literally, “Thine own people is in fault,” or “sins.”
Exo 5:17
Ye are idle, etc. Compare Exo 5:8. Pharaoh is evidently pleased with his “happy thought.” It seems to him clever, witty, humorous, to tax overworked people with idleness; and equally clever to say to religious people”Your religion is a mere pretence. You do not want to worship. You want a holiday.” We may remark further that idleness and hypocrisy were two sins of the deepest dye, according to Egyptian notions.
Exo 5:18
Go therefore now and worki.e. “Off with you to the brickfields at once, and get to your own special work of superintendence, which you are neglecting so long as you remain here. It is useless to remain. I reject both of your requests. Straw shall not be given; and the tale of bricks required shall be no less.”
Exo 5:19
The officers did see that they were in evil case. See the “Introductory paragraph” to this section, and comp. Exo 5:21.
HOMILETICS
Exo 5:15-18
A wicked man’s persistence in wrong-doing.
Pharaoh when he first gave the order to withhold straw (Exo 5:7), may not have known the amount of misery he was causing. He may have meant no more than to give the people full occupation, and so prevent such gatherings as that from which Moses and Aaron had come (Exo 4:29-31), when they appeared before him with their demands. He may not have realised to himself the idea that he was setting his bondsmen an impossible task. But now this fact was brought home to him, and he was asked, as a matter of simple justice, either to let straw be furnished as before, or to allow some diminution in the number of the bricks. It can scarcely be doubted that he knew and felt the demand made to be just. There were the officers before him with the wheals upon their backs. Would they have incurred the severe punishment, could they by any possibility have avoided it? Pharaoh must have known that they would not. But he would not relent. As he had begun, he would continue. He had been mere cruel than he meant; but he did not careit was only Hebrews and bondsmen who had suffered; what mattered their agonies? So he dismisses the complainants with jeers and scoffs: “Ye are idle, ye are hypocrites; go, work.” So bad men almost always go on from bad to worse by a “facile descent;” severity deepens into cruelty, unkindness into injustice, religious indifference into impiety. Stop, then, the beginnings of wrong-doing. Principiis obsta. Crush the nascent germs of vice in thy heart, O man! Master them, or they will master thee!
Exo 5:16
Sufferings, even at the hand of lawful authorities, not always deserved.
“Thy servants are beaten; but the fault is in thine own people.” Punishment often visits the wrong back. Kings commit injuries or follies, and their subjects suffer. Employers are greedy of gain, and their “hands” must work overtime, go without sleep, trench on the Sunday rest. Wholesale tradesmen adulterate goods, and retail traders are blamed and lose custom. Justice itself is often at fault, and punishes the wrong personsometimes by a mere mistake, as when the wrong man is hanged for a murder; but sometimes also through a defect in the law itself which judges have to administer; as when Christians were delivered to the wild beasts for not sacrificing to the divinity of the emperor, or Protestants were burnt at the stake for denying transubstantiation. It is not to be assumed that the law is always right. The law of any country at any time is only the expression of the will of those who are in authority at the time, and has no more divinity or sacredness about it than they have. Those who transgress the law will, of course, be punished for it; but that fact proves nothing as to their good- or ill-desert. The greatest benefactors of mankind have had to set human law at defiance, and to endure its penalties. Their answer to the authorities who persecute them might constantly be, “Thy servants are beaten, but the fault is in thine own people.”
HOMILIES BY J. ORR
Exo 5:15-20
Unheeded expostulation.
Pharaoh’s treatment of the officers of the children of Israel, when they appeared before him to expostulate with him on his cruelty, betrays his consciousness of the injustice of his cause.
I. AN UNJUST CAUSE BETRAYS ITSELF.
1. By refusal to listen to reason. The Hebrews had reason on their side, and Pharaoh had not. And because he had not, and knew it, he would not hear them, would not enter into any argument with them. This is the sure mark of a weak cause. People are usually willing enough to defend any of their doings which they think defensible. But when causes are indefensible, and they know this, they do not care to have the light let in upon them. “Every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved” (Joh 3:20).
2. By clutching at flimsy and trumped-up pretexts. “Ye are idle; ye are idle; therefore ye say,” etc. (Exo 5:17). Pharaoh knew as well as any that they were not idle, but it served his purpose to put forward this pretence.
3. By falling back in the end on the right of the strong hand (Exo 5:16). This is the tyrant’s unfailing resort. If he cannot argue, he can compel. If he cannot justify his courses, he can fall back upon his power to enforce submission. His might is his right. Pharaoh had the power, and he meant to use it, so the Israelites might save themselves the trouble of expostulating. This sort of authority, resting on force, without support in righteousness or reason, is necessarily precarious. It can, in the nature of things, only last so long as the power to compel remains with it. No throne is so insecure as that propped up on bayonets.
II. AN UNJUST CAUSE ADHERED TO AND DEFENDED
1. Reacts injuriously upon the moral nature. The refusal to listen to expostulation was a new stage in Pharaoh’s hardening. Besides fortifying his determination to brook no interference in his courses, and strengthening the cruelty of his dispositionanew called into action by the increased oppression of the Hebrewsit necessarily reacted to deprive him of a fresh portion of his moral susceptibility. This is the Nemesis of sin; it leaves the sinner less susceptible with each new appeal that is resisted; it darkens while it indurates; not only strengthens him m evil courses, but increasingly disqualifies him for perceiving the truth and reasonableness of the dissuasives that are addressed to him. Pharaoh’s hardening still moves in the region of ordinary morals (see on Exo 5:1-4). The first step in it was the recoil of his pride and wilfulness against what he knew to be the righteous demand of Moses and Aaron. Another step is the rejection of this righteous appeal.
2. Exposes the tyrant to the just judgment of God. The Hebrews were helpless to resist Pharaoh, but there was Another, whose question, “Wherefore dealest thou thus with thy servants?” he would not be able so easily to set aside. God was keeping the account, and for all these things would yet call him to judgment (Ecc 11:9; Ecc 12:14); while the king’s temporary success in his ways, building him up in a presumptuous selfconfidence, and confirming him in his boast of superiority to Jehovah, was a further step in his hardeninga ripening for destruction.
3. Is a fresh call for God to interfere on behalf of the oppressed. This new wrong, instead of leading the Israelites to despair, should only have lent fresh vehemence to their prayers, for it gave them a new plea with which to urge their cause. “For shall not God avenge his own elect, which cry to him day and night, though he bear long with them” (Luk 18:7).J.O.
HOMILIES BY D. YOUNG
Exo 5:4-18
Pharaoh’s first response: his answer in deed.
Pharaoh has given a proud verbal refusal to the request of Moses: but he is not contented to stop with words. The first result, discouraging and discrediting of Moses’ application, is still further to increase burdens and hardships already scarcely tolerable.
I. CONSIDER HOW THIS ADDITIONAL SEVERITY TO ISRAEL ORIGINATEDthat is, how it originated as far as Pharaoh’s part in it was concerned. It came through his utterly mistaken notions as to Moses and Israel. Pharaoh, as an alert politician, was bound to inquire how it was that Moses had been led to prefer this request; and he came to the conclusion that the people had too much leisure timedid their work far too easilyand thus left an opportunity for the success of any designing demagogue, such as he judged Moses to be. And, indeed, Pharaoh’s conjecture showed a very plausible appearance of shrewd insight into human nature. All such readers of this narrative as utterly disbelieve the reality of Divine intervention and supremacy in human affairs, will say that Pharaoh was not far wrong; whereas he was utterly wrong. Moses went into the presence of Pharaoh because the power of God constrained him. He would have gone anywhere to escape the task, if only he could have done it with safety and self-respect. Pharaoh little knew what a profound sense of unworthiness dwelt in the breast of Moses. Other feelings might come and go, mount to flow and sink to ebb; that remained, more penetrating and subduing the more he had to do with God, and the more he had to do with Israel Pharaoh was also utterly mistaken as to the people. The request for liberty had not come from them. They of their own accord and carnal judgment would never have thought of such a request. As soon might the helpless victim of a raging beast of prey turn to it with a real expectation of mercy. The prisoner may devise many plans of escape: but he would reckon it a mere provocative of more painful and stringent captivity, if he addressed to his gaoler a formal request for liberty. Pharaoh then, in his ignorance of God, proved ignorant and mistaken in the whole of his policy. Every view is mistaken, egregiously mistaken, that leaves out the thought of God as a living, intimate, ever-watchful Power.
II. CONSIDER THAT ALL THIS CRUEL TREATMENT DID NOTHING AT ALL FOR PHARAOH. If it had done anything, however little, to delay the final disaster, it would have been something to say: but it did nothing at all He treated Moses as a mere politician, and Israel as being only in a state of incipient insurrection. If such had been the reality of things, then his policy, however damnable for its cruelty, would have merited at least this admission, that there was a real adaptation of means to ends. But Pharaoh was as yet utterly unconscious of his real enemy. His mind was in a state of darkness, deep as that outward darkness which later overspread his land. All his efforts, summed up and stated in the largest way, simply came to thisthat he was making very bitter the temporal life of a fleeting generation. But he himself had not arrested by a single step the advance of a righteous and omnipotent God. Struggling against the visible Moses and the visible Israel, he knew nothing of how to resist the invisible God. A man may rage about, putting out all candles and lamps, leaving us for awhile in darkness, but he has not retarded the sunrise by even the minutest fragment of time. This is our glory and our comfort, if we have the spirit of Christ dwelling in us, that we are contending against one who has only carnal weapons. We are not allowed to take carnal weapons; they are of no use to us; and never should we forget that they are of no use to those who are against us. Pharaoh did not delay God’s liberating work; that work went on in all the majestic ease of its divinity, amid the smitings of the oppressor and the wailings of the oppressed. Making bricks without straw was mere child’s-play compared with the enterprise on which Pharaoh was now embarked. He might as well have gone out with the sword and spear against the pestilence and the famine, as against Israel with a mere increase of oppression and cruelty.
III. THIS ADDITIONAL CRUELTY SHOWED THE IMPERATIVE NEED OF DIVINE INTERVENTION. If Pharaoh was powerless to delay the advance of God, he was very powerful to shut out interference from any other quarter. Help in God, sure and sufficient help, but help only in God, was one of the great lessons which all these painful years were meant to teach Israel. Pharaoh had unmistakable power of the human, despotic, might-makes-right sort over Israel. As the inquisitor by an easy nod signifies to give the thumbscrew another turn, so Pharaoh had only to send out his royal wish, and all the taskmasters had Israel at once in fresh agony. And just so we have to be taught by a bitter experience that as Christ is a Saviour from sin, with all its fatal fruits, so he is the only Saviour. The first attempt at a real protest and resistance against sin brings out all its power. Though the sinner’s miseries do not begin when Christ the accredited deliverer makes his first approach in deliver, there is nevertheless a distinct accession to them. Christ cannot challenge the power of sin in any of us without rousing up into intense activity the evil already working in our breasts. Pharaoh was not really a more powerful ruler after the visit of Moses than he was before; but the disposition and power then became manifest. The hearts of the generation in the midst of which Christ lived and died were not of exceptional malignity or obduracy. The generation immediately before and the generation immediately after, would have treated him in exactly the same way. But it was necessary for him to draw out sin into a full revelation of its hideous potency, in order that it might be made perfectly clear that none but himself could deal with it. True, Pharaoh was glorying in what was only a fabric of delusions and a refuge of lies; but, frail though it was, no breath of man had strength enough to blow it down. None but God could make the effectual and dissipating storm to descend upon it.Y.
HOMILIES BY J. URQUHART
Verse 15-6:1
The troubled find consolation in God only. The three cries.
I. ISRAEL‘S EXPOSTULATION WITH PHARAOH (15-19). They complain to him of the wrongs they suffer; but he who does not hear God will not listen to man.
1. It was reasonable to expect that their remonstrance might lead to redress. Pharaoh’s decree might have. been issued under momentary irritation.
2. They came with humility and modesty. They brought no railing accusation. They used no threats. They did not even make. a silent show of their strength. And yet the only outcome of their appeal is deeper grief, more utter hopelessness (19). They who have no hope but in man will find little to sustain them.
II. THEIR UPBRAIDING OF MOSES AND AARON (20, 21).
1. They spoke truth. The demand, for liberty of worship had been seized by Pharaoh as a pretext for more oppressive measures.
2. They did not speak the whole truth. God and his purpose were kept out of sight. They were counted as nothing. How often is this done in our despondency and murmuring!
3. Their reproaches, though met by silence and grief equal to their own, brought no help to them. There is as little help in upbraiding friends for failure as in spreading their injustice before foes.
III. MOSES‘ CRY TO GOD.
1. He “returned to the Lord.” He did not seek in unburden his soul even to Aaron. The first step to help is to seek God’s presence.
2. The holy boldness of his prayer. The grieved spirit is poured out. There is nothing kept back. God does not complain of our boldness, but of our restraining prayer before him.
3. God’s answer (Exo 6:1).
(1) This very failure shows God’s truth (Exo 4:21).
(2) God shall fight for them: “Now shalt thou see what I will do to Pharaoh.”
(3) Pharaoh’s wrath and power will serve only to make their deliverance perfect. He will “drive them out of his land.” Israel found no consolation; Moses does.U.
Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary
Exo 5:15. The officerscame and cried unto Pharaoh Theirs was an evil case, no doubt. The remonstrance they made was as just and humble, as the answer they receive is tyrannical and severe. For, 1. They are his servants, willing to labour, and are beaten, when the fault is in Pharaoh’s people. It is ever the lot of God’s people to suffer unjustly. 2. They are received with taunts and reproaches. How could they, who were dying under hard servitude, be reproached with idleness? and was their desire to sacrifice to God, such a crime? Note; The world’s reproaches are usually as groundless as Pharaoh’s; and whatever pretence they may make, the real cause is, the inbred enmity of their hearts against our God and his holy ways.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Isa 53:7
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Exo 5:15 Then the officers of the children of Israel came and cried unto Pharaoh, saying, Wherefore dealest thou thus with thy servants?
Ver. 15. Came and cried unto Pharaoh. ] They did not rail upon him to his face, as the Janizaries did a in an uproar upon Bajazet II, their prince, saying that they would by and by teach him, as a drunkard, a beast, and a rascal, to use his great place and calling with more sobriety and discretion. Neither did they go behind his back and call him, as Sanders did Queen Elizabeth, his natural sovereign, Lupam Anglicanam , the English wolf, or as Rhiston calleth her, leoenam, omnes Athalias, Macchas, Iezabeles, Herodiades, &c., superantem, a lioness worse than any Athalia, Maacha, Jezabel. A foul-mouthed Jesuit made this false anagram of her, Elizabeth, Jezabel. T is omitted; the presage of the gallows – whereon this anagrammatist was afterwards justly executed. Aretine, by a longer custom of libellous and contumelious speaking against princes, had got such a habit, that at last he came to diminish and disesteem God himself. b
a Turk. Hist., fol. 444.
b Rivetti Jesuita Vapulans, p. 263. Fuller’s Holy State, fol. 317.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Moses Appeals from Pharaoh to God
Exo 5:15-23; Exo 6:1
Gods way is to bring men to an end of themselves before He arises to their help. Our efforts to deliver ourselves only end in increasing our perplexities. The tale of bricks is doubled; the burdens augment; the strength of our purpose is broken; we are brought to the edge of despair. Probably this was the darkest hour in the life of the great leader. But from all the obloquy that was heaped on him, he took refuge in God. There is no other refuge for a limited man than to return unto the Lord, Exo 5:22. Return unto the Lord with your story of failure! Return unto Him for fresh instructions! Return unto Him with your appeal for his interposition! Be perfectly natural with your Heavenly Father! Humble yourself under His mighty hand! Even dare to reason with Him, saying: Why! Then the Lord will say to you, as to Moses: Now thou shalt see what I will do.
Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary
Reciprocal: Exo 1:11 – to afflict Exo 5:6 – taskmasters Job 3:18 – they