Moses Confronts Pharaoh

5 Later, 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.”^(A)

² But 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.”^(B)

³ Then 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.”

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

Further Oppression of Israel

⁶ That day Pharaoh commanded the overseers^(D) of 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. ⁸ But 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,^(E) ‘Let us go and sacrifice to our God.’ ⁹ Impose heavier work on the men. Then they will be occupied with it and not pay attention to deceptive words.”

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

¹⁵ So the Israelite foremen went in and cried for help to Pharaoh: “Why are you treating your servants this way? ¹⁶ No 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.”

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

¹⁹ The Israelite foremen saw that they were in trouble when they were told, “You cannot reduce your daily quota of bricks.” ²⁰ When 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!”^(H)

²² So Moses went back to the Lord and asked, “Lord, why have You caused trouble for this people? And why did You ever send me?^{(I) 23} Ever 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.”