Episode 26: Uncircumcised lips

(Exodus 5-7)

Moses and Aaron talk to the Pharaoh

5 ¹ Moses and Aaron went to the Pharaoh and said to him,

God said, "Let my people go have a feast to me in the wilderness."

² The Pharaoh said,

Why should I obey your god?

I don't know him and I won't let his people go.

³ Moses and Aaron said,

Please let us go into the desert to pray for three days, or else God will kill us with disease or a sword.

⁴ The Pharaoh said,

Why did you and Moses let the people stop working?

Tell them to get back to work.

⁶ The Pharoah's officers said to the people,

⁷ We won't give you any straw. Get it yourselves.

¹² So the Israelites gathered straw, and were beaten for not making enough bricks.

¹⁵ They complained to Pharaoh, saying,

¹⁶ Your officers give us no straw and then beat us for not making enough bricks.

¹⁷ The Pharaoh said to them,

You're lazy.

All you want to do is sacrifice to your god.

¹⁸ Get to work.

You'll get no straw, but you must make bricks.

²¹ The people said to Moses and Aaron,

You're making things worse for us.

Now the Pharaoh will kill us with a sword.

²² Moses said to God,

Why are you being so evil to us? And why did you send me?

²³ The Pharoah isn't listening to me. He's still doing evil to the people.

And you haven't helped us at all.

6 ⁹ Moses spoke to the people but they didn't listen to him. Moses said to God,

The people won't listen to me.

I have uncircumcised lips.

¹³ God said to Moses,

Bring my people out of Egypt.

The genealogy of Moses and Aaron

(6:14-25)

²⁰ Amram married his father's sister, and had two sons Aaron and Moses.

God prepares Moses and Aaron for their meeting with Pharaoh

7 ¹ God said to Moses

I have made you a god to Pharaoh, and Aaron will be your prophet.

² You'll say whatever I tell you, and the Pharaoh will send the Israelites out of Egypt.

³ I will harden Pharaoh's heart. ⁴ The Pharaoh won't listen to you so that I can bring my armies and show the Egyptians that I'm God.

The rod to snake trick

⁸ God said to Moses and Aaron,

⁹ When Pharaoh asks for a miracle, throw your rod down and it will become a snake.

¹⁰ So Aaron threw his rod down and it became a serpent.

¹¹ But the Egyptian magicians knew this trick, too. They threw down their rods and they also became snakes.

¹² But Aaron's snake swallowed theirs.

¹³ And God hardened the Pharaoh's heart, so that he wouldn't let the Israelites go.

The first plague of Egypt: The river turns to blood

¹⁴ God said to Moses,

Take the rod that was turned into a serpent and go down to the water when Pharaoh is there. ¹⁶ And say to him,

The Hebrew God has sent me to you to tell you to let his people go into the wilderness.

¹⁷ This is the way you'll know that I am God: I'll smack the water with this rod and the river will turn to blood.

Moses smote the waters in the river, while the Pharaoh watched. And the river turned to blood. ²¹ All the fish in the river died, the river stank, no one could drink from it, and there was blood everywhere in Egypt.

²² But Pharaoh's magicians knew this trick too. They smote the river with their rods and turned it into blood.