TITLE: They Cry Out Upon Moses And Aaron. Exodus 5:19-21
Scripture: Exodus 5:19-21 (KJV)
19And 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.
20And they met Moses and Aaron, who stood in the way, as they came forth from Pharaoh:
21And 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.
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 [diminish] ought from the [your] bricks of your daily task.
Egyptian officers believed the children of Israel did not meet their daily quota of bricks because they were (in evil case) "lazy." They scolded the Israelites when they said, "The LORD (Jehovah) look upon you, and judge" (21). Jehovah will not leave you unheeded and unpunished for the evil you have brought upon the people. "Ye have made our Savior abhorred in the eyes of Pharaoh and the eyes of his servants. Ye have made our Savior stink."
Moreover, ye have simply allowed Pharaoh to ruin us by asking permission for the pilgrimage. The officers were too full of their wrongs to wait until questioned. They took the word and implied it without relating the result of their interview. They said, "consider your conduct, and judge it" not strictly, "condemn it and punish it, but "pass sentence on it," "judge whether it has been right or not." Nevertheless, ye have at any rate done us a great injury - Indeed, ye have done more - ye have put a sword in the hand of his servants to slay us. That is to say, "ye have armed them with a weapon we expect will take our lives." Either they will beat us to death - and death is a not the infrequent result of a repeated use of the bastinado (bastinado is a method of inflicting pain and humiliation by administering a beating on the soles of a person's bare feet) - or when they find that punishment futile they will execute us as traitors.
What perversity of the natural heart! They call upon God to judge, while they show that they have no confidence in God and His power to save by their very complaining. Moses (Exodus 5:22) turned to Jehovah with the question, "Why hast Thou done evil to this people," - increased their oppression by my mission to Pharaoh, and yet not delivered them? "These are not words of contumacy (stubborn resistance) to authority; or indignation, but of inquiry and prayer." The question and complaint proceeded from faith, which flies to God when it cannot understand the dealings of God, to point out to Him how incomprehensible are His ways, to appeal to Him to help in the time of need, and to remove what seems opposed to His nature and His will.
Ye are idle (in evil case)- The old Egyptian language abounds in epithets that show contempt for idleness. The charge was equally offensive and ingenious, which would be readily believed by Egyptians who knew how much festivals and other religious ceremonies impeded public and private labors. Among the great sins which, according to Egyptian belief, involved condemnation in the final judgment, idleness is mentioned twice
Moreover, the taskmasters punished them with beatings—As the nearest fields were bared and the people had to go farther for stubble, they could not meet the demand for the usual tale of bricks. "The beating of the officers is just what might have been expected from an Eastern tyrant, especially in the valley of the Nile, as it appears from the monuments that ancient Egypt, like modern China, was principally governed by the stick." "The beating mode was by the offender being laid flat on the ground and generally held by the hands and feet while the chastisement was administered" (Deuteronomy 25:2).
After Pharaoh said, "Ye shall not minish (diminish) ought from your daily total of bricks and confirmed it, they had no hope of things being better with them but looked upon their unhappy lot as irretrievable.
20And they met Moses and Aaron, who stood in the way, as they (the officers who went to pour out their complaints to Pharaoh) came forth from Pharaoh:
"Who stood in the way" means that Moses and Aaron were "standing"—i.e., waiting to meet them and know the result of their interview with the monarch.
The Egyptian taskmasters were very severe. The head-workmen justly complained to Pharaoh: but he taunted them. The Israelites should have humbled themselves before God and taken to themselves the shame of their sin, but instead, they quarreled with those who were to be their deliverers. The malice of Satan has often represented the service and worship of God, as fit employment only for those who have nothing else to do, and the business only of the idle; whereas, it is the duty of those who are most busy in the world. Those who are diligent in making sacrifices to the Lord will, before God, escape the doom of the slothful servant, though, with men, they do not.
Moses returned to the Lord. He knew that what he had said and done was by God's direction; and therefore appeals to Him. When we find ourselves perplexed about the path of our duty, we ought to go to God and lay open our case before Him by fervent prayer. Disappointments in our work must not drive us from our God, but still, we must ponder why they are sent.
It was no accident but God brought the two brothers to wait for the officers by design. (the officers who went to pour out their complaints to Pharaoh) They were as anxious as the officers to know what course Pharaoh would take - whether he would relax the burthens of the people or no - whether he would have compassion or the contrary.
It is no surprise that they poured out their pent-up indignation upon them. Were not Moses and Aaron the sole cause of the existing state of things? Did not the extreme affliction of the people, did not their sufferings in the past, did not their apprehended sufferings in the future, originate wholly in the seductive words which the two brothers had addressed to them at the assembly of the people? (Exodus 4:29-31).
They made the circumstances of the people worse.
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.
“Ye have made our savour to be abhorred.”—Heb., to stink. An expression common to the Hebrews with the Egyptians and very expressive.
“In the eyes.”—Mixed metaphors occur in all languages, and may generally be accounted for by the literal meaning of some familiar expression having come to be forgotten.
“A sword . . . to slay us.”—This was not, perhaps, mere Oriental hyperbole (exageration). The officers may have feared that their inability to enforce the Pharaoh's impracticable (unrealistic) demands would ultimately lead to their death. To “put a sword in their hand to slay us” — To give them the occasion they have long sought for. They have simply, by asking permission for the pilgrimage, “put a sword in their hand to slay us.”
“The Lord look upon you and judge” — They should have humbled themselves before God, but instead of that they fly in the face of their best friends. Those that are called to public service for God and their generation, must expect to be tried not only by the threats of proud enemies, but by the unjust and unkind censures of unthinking friends. "Jehovah look upon you and judge" (i.e., punish you, because) "ye have made the smell of us to stink in the eyes of Pharaoh and his servants," i.e., destroyed our good name with the king and his servants, and turned it into hatred and disgust. A pleasantant smell, is a figure of speach employed for a good name or reputation, and the figurative (metaphoric) use of the word explains the connection with the eyes instead of the nose.
