1And Moses answered, and he said, “And here, they won’t believe me and won’t listen to my voice, because they’ll say, ‘YHWH hasn’t appeared to you!’”
4:1. they won’t listen to my voice. Moses’ third response is surprising because he appears to doubt, even to contradict, what God has already told him explicitly. YHWH instructs him to gather the elders of Israel and tell them that their ancestors’ God has appeared to him and is going to take them out of Egypt, and YHWH informs him directly that “They’ll listen to your voice” (3:18). God then goes on for five verses with details of what Moses should say to the king of Egypt, what the king’s response will be, what YHWH will do in return, and how Israel will leave and despoil Egypt. But Moses, appearing to have missed the content of these last five verses, questions the earlier point, the last point that directly referred to him himself. He says, “And here, they won’t believe me and won’t listen to my voice” (4:1). This can also be understood to mean “And what if they will not believe me and will not listen to my voice.” Even on this understanding, it is remarkable. Either way, it is depicting Moses as questioning what God has just told him. When God Himself tells a human, “They’ll listen to you,” we do not normally expect the human to say, “But what if they don’t?” Again YHWH does not answer the question but instead responds directly to the problem at hand. That is, instead of telling Moses what to do if they do not listen, God gives Moses three miraculous signs, which will guarantee that they will listen.
2And YHWH said to him, “What’s this in your hand?”
And he said, “A staff.”
3And He said, “Throw it to the ground.”
And he threw it to the ground. And it became a snake! And Moses fled from it.
4And YHWH said to Moses, “Put out your hand and take hold of its tail.”
And he put out his hand and held onto it, and it became a staff in his hand.
5“So that they will believe that YHWH, their fathers’ God, Abraham’s God, Isaac’s God, and Jacob’s God, has appeared to you!”
6And YHWH said to him further, “Bring your hand into your bosom.”
And he brought his hand into his bosom. And he brought it out; and, here, his hand was leprous like snow!
7And He said, “Put your hand back to your bosom.”
And he put his hand back to his bosom. And he brought it out from his bosom; and, here, it had gone back like its flesh.
8“And it will be, if they won’t believe you and won’t listen to the voice of the first sign, then they’ll believe the voice of the latter one.
9And it will be, if they also won’t believe in these two signs and won’t listen to your voice, then you’ll take some of the water of the Nile and spill it on the dry ground. And it will be water that you’ll take from the Nile, and it will become blood on the dry ground.”
4:9. two signs. The two signs are that the staff becomes a snake and his hand becomes leprous as snow. Why these two things? They foreshadow coming events: the snake on a pole (Num 21:5–9) and Miriam’s being leprous as snow (Num 12:10).
10And Moses said to YHWH, “Please, my Lord, I’m not a man of words. Neither yesterday nor the day before—nor since you spoke to your servant! Because I’m heavy of mouth and heavy of tongue.”
4:10. I’m not a man of words. These words, Moses’ fourth response, will reverberate at the beginning of Moses’ last speech. (See the comment on Deut 1:1.)
4:10. heavy of mouth and heavy of tongue. This is frequently taken to mean some sort of speech defect. It is frequently translated as “slow of speech”; and a famous midrash goes so far as to recount the origin of Moses’ speech impediment in a story that pictures him burning his tongue in his infancy in the Egyptian palace. More cautiously, we are best advised to seek the meaning of a biblical idiom by, first of all, observing where else it occurs in Scripture. “Heavy of tongue” occurs in one other place, Ezek 3:5–7. There YHWH tells Ezekiel that he is not being sent to peoples who are “deep of lip and heavy of tongue,” whose words Ezekiel cannot understand. YHWH says, ironically, that such peoples would listen, but the house of Israel will not listen! In that context, “heavy of tongue” refers to nations who speak foreign languages. It has therefore been suggested that Moses’ protest here in Exodus is that he does not speak Egyptian. This is difficult to defend, though, given the explicit report in Exodus 2 that Moses has been raised in the Egyptian court. Still, the meaning of “heavy of tongue” as referring to speaking a foreign language fits our context in Exodus 4, I believe, because YHWH has told Moses to gather and speak to the elders of Israel. Moses’ protest may perhaps be best understood, then, as being on the grounds that he does not yet speak Hebrew! God’s response in fact confirms that the problem for Moses is speaking “to the people,” not to the Egyptians (4:16). And the final confirmation is that in the first meeting with the people’s elders “Aaron spoke all the words that YHWH had spoken to Moses” (4:30); but in the first meeting with Pharaoh, both Moses and Aaron speak (5:1,3).
4:10. nor since you spoke to your servant. Another understanding of “I’m not a man of words” and “heavy of mouth and heavy of tongue” is that Moses is saying that he is not eloquent. And this is a wonderful irony, because his humble wording here is in fact an eloquent formulation (“Neither yesterday nor the day before—nor since you spoke to your servant!”). Moses, as it were, undermines his own denial.
Whether “heavy of mouth and heavy of tongue” means a speech defect, a foreign language, or a lack of eloquence, a question remains: why choose a man who has a speaking problem for a task that requires speaking?! The lesson may be (as with Jacob) that God can work through anyone. Or it may be that it takes divine insight to comprehend what would make someone the best person for a task. Perhaps it is precisely Moses’ heaviness of mouth that makes his acts most impressive in Egypt, rather than their being performed by a person who heralds each of the miraculous plagues with a grand speech. And perhaps such a greater speaker would shift the focus too much from God to the human himself. Also, one can learn from the divine choice that one should not judge a person’s ability to do a task too hastily or by the most obvious characteristics. Even an individual who has a disadvantage may be the best suited to be successful.
11And YHWH said to him, “Who set a mouth for humans? Or who will set a mute or deaf or seeing or blind? Is it not I, YHWH?
12And now go, and I’ll be with your mouth, and I’ll instruct you what you shall speak.”
4:12. I’ll be. Hebrew ’HYH. Note the significance of the first recurrence of the word here. It also came in 3:12, before the revelation of the divine name. It will come again in 4:15. So the answer to Moses’ first, second, third, and fourth responses is, in essence, the same: ’HYH. I Am. I’ll Be with you.
13And he said, “Please, my Lord, send by the hand you’ll send.”
4:13. send by the hand you’ll send. There are two opposite meanings that this strange clause may have. It may mean: send whoever—which is to say, anyone but me. Or it may mean that Moses now acquiesces to the divine will, in the sense of “Very well, then, send the one you want.” The fact that God is angry at Moses in the next verse fits more naturally with the former meaning. In either case, the one common element of the two meanings is: they both denote that Moses is out of excuses. God has nullified each of his four attempts to avoid this task. He can only acquiesce or beg off. He cannot raise problems or objections. This is also further evidence that fear of the task is what has motivated Moses all along. He is forced now to the essential point. It is not “Who am I” or “What shall I tell them?” or “They won’t believe me.” It is Moses’ reluctance about the hand whom God has chosen to send.
Through all five responses, Moses’ reluctance stands out and perhaps comes as a surprise to many who find it difficult to imagine someone’s receiving a prophetic commission directly from God and trying to avoid it. Yet this image of the reluctant prophet recurs in several other places in the Bible (Elijah, Jonah, Jeremiah). It does not appear to me to be simply a recurring literary motif in the way that some understand, for example, the “wise courtier” theme. It seems rather to reflect a shared conviction, by a number of the biblical authors, that it is not necessarily an honor or a joy to be a prophet. It is a burden, almost beyond human endurance. Here, in the book that introduces the role of the prophet as the individual who brings a revelation to a community, we learn from the beginning that this is not attractive. To hear the voice of God is frightening. To experience the divine power is terrifying. To deliver a divine message to the community is thankless, frustrating, and occasionally even dangerous.
14And YHWH’s anger flared at Moses, and He said, “Isn’t Aaron your Levite brother? I knew that he will speak! And also here he is, coming out toward you! And he’ll see you and be happy in his heart.
4:14. your Levite brother. This means a fellow Levite. The text does not yet identify Aaron as Moses’ actual brother. That is not stated explicitly until Exod 6:20. After that, Aaron is referred to as “your brother” (7:1,2) and never again as “your Levite brother.”
4:14. I knew that he will speak! This has usually been taken to mean only that God is aware that Aaron is a capable speaker. But the tenses and context possibly indicate that it is much stronger: that God is informing Moses that He knew all along that Aaron would have to do the talking for Moses. This would only be a case of divine foreknowledge (knowing something in advance), not of God preordaining or manipulating human affairs. This in turn opens the question of why God would be angry at Moses’ protest. The ambiguity here is tied to the complexity of Hebrew verb tenses (which are not simply past, present, and future, as they are often taught), and so the meaning of this verse remains uncertain.
15And you’ll speak to him and set the words in his mouth, and I, I shall be with your mouth and with his mouth, and I shall instruct you what you shall do.
16And he will speak for you to the people. And it will be: he will become a mouth for you, and you will become a god for him!
4:16. you will become a god for him. No matter how figuratively we take this image, it is extraordinary. To speak of a human, Moses, in terms of the divine is awesome, and it will recur later when God tells Moses, “I’ve made you a god to Pharaoh!” (7:1). The idea that Moses will in any way be godlike in other humans’ perceptions sets up a theme that will continue after the exodus: Moses must repeatedly insist to the people that their complaints are against God and not against him. This in turn recalls Joseph’s insistence to the wine steward, the baker, and Pharaoh that “Not I. God will answer . . . ” (Gen 41:16).
17And you shall take this staff in your hand, by which you’ll do the signs.”
18And Moses went.
And he went back to Jether, his father-in-law, and said to him, “Let me go so I may go back to my brothers who are in Egypt and see if they’re still living.”
And Jethro said to Moses, “Go in peace.”
4:18. Jether. His name is Jethro. The change to yeter here may be part of a wordplay to come later (10:5; see the comment there).
19And YHWH said to Moses in Midian, “Go. Go back to Egypt, because all the people who sought your life have died.”
20And Moses took his wife and his sons and rode them on an ass, and he went back to the land of Egypt. And Moses took the staff of God in his hand.
21And YHWH said to Moses, “When you’re going to go back to Egypt, see all the wonders that I’ve set in your hand, and you shall do them in front of Pharaoh. And I: I’ll strengthen his heart, and he won’t let the people go.
22And you shall say to Pharaoh, ‘YHWH said this: My child, my firstborn, is Israel.
4:22. My child, my firstborn, is Israel. God tells Moses to say this to Pharaoh, but Moses is never reported as saying it. He also is never reported as saying the rest of this message: “Should you refuse to let it go, here: I’m killing your child, your firstborn!” Why does he not say this to Pharaoh? It is apparently because his first words to Pharaoh do not work. Moses begins by speaking strongly to Pharaoh: “YHWH said, ‘Let my people go.’” But Pharaoh, unmoved, replies, “I don’t know YHWH, and I won’t let Israel go.” Moses then changes his approach dramatically. He starts over and this time does not use the commanding wording (the imperative), but rather the polite particle of request (Hebrew n’) and the gentler form: “please that we might go” (the cohortative). Moses has backed off somewhat and taken a more conciliatory approach rather than taking the even tougher approach of threatening Pharaoh with the death of his own son. This conciliatory wording is given to Moses at the burning bush as well (3:18), so it appears that God is giving Moses both the tough and the gentle options. In any negotiation—in law, business, or any human relationship, including marriage—one must use wisdom to know when to exercise each approach.
23And I’ve said to you: Let my child go and serve me. And should you refuse to let it go, here: I’m killing your child, your firstborn!’”
24And he was on the way, at a lodging place, and YHWH met him, and he asked to kill him.
4:24. he asked to kill him. No one knows what the episode at the lodging place means. The explanation that accounts for more of the connections than any other is that of my colleague William Propp: The reason that God seeks to put Moses to death is because Moses still bears the bloodguilt for having killed an Egyptian. The blood of the circumcision serves to expiate the guilt, making it possible for Moses to live and return to Egypt. The word for “blood” in this story is the plural dmîm, which is usually associated with bloodguilt. The word for “bridegroom” also means “circumcision” in Arabic (and in some cultures circumcision is performed just before marriage). Propp suggests that the original bridegroom/circumcision connection had been lost by the time this story was composed, and so it was created to explain an old expression:
tan d
mîm, “bridegroom of blood.” Also, this use of blood to avert death is a foreshadowing of the tenth plague in Egypt.
Still, like all explanations I have seen, this leaves the question of why God would choose Moses, make a miraculous appearance to him, insist on his going to Egypt despite his five attempts to avoid it, and then seek to kill him. I therefore understand the confused use of the pronoun “he” in this story in a different way. All commentators recognize that it is unclear when it refers to God, to Moses, or to Moses’ son. But they all take the first “he” to refer to God: He (God) sought to kill Moses. I am raising the possibility (reflected in my translation: “he asked to kill him”) that it means that Moses is asking God to take his life (rather than send him to Egypt). This is consistent with another time in Moses’ life when he will ask God to kill him (Num 11:15, where he says emphatically: “Kill me!”). And it fits with a model of prophets who ask God to take their lives—Elijah (1 Kings 19:4) and Jonah (4:4)—or say that they prefer death to being prophets—Jeremiah (20:14–18). (Note that these are the same three prophets who, like Moses, are famous for being reluctant; see the comment on 4:13.)
If Moses is seeking his own death here, then Zipporah’s action might be understood as her passionate response to her husband’s wish to die: You have a wife! You have a son, who should live to marry and be a part of the covenant!
25And Zipporah took a flint and cut her son’s foreskin and touched his feet, and she said, “Because you’re a bridegroom of blood to me.”
26And he held back from Him. Then she said, “A bridegroom of blood for circumcisions.”
4:26. And he held back from Him. Meaning that Moses stopped asking God to kill him.
27And YHWH said to Aaron, “Go toward Moses, to the wilderness.” And he went, and he met him in the Mountain of God, and he kissed him.
28And Moses told Aaron all YHWH’s words that He had sent him and all the signs that He had commanded him.
29And Moses went, and Aaron, and they gathered all the elders of the children of Israel,
30and Aaron spoke all the words that YHWH had spoken to Moses. And he did the signs before the people’s eyes.
31And the people believed, and they heard that YHWH had taken account of the children of Israel and that He had seen their degradation. And they knelt and bowed.