10So the taskmasters and foremen of the people went out and said to the people, “Thus says Pharaoh: I will not give you any straw. 11You must go and get the straw yourselves wherever you can find it; but there shall be no decrease whatever in your work.” 12Then the people scattered throughout the land of Egypt to gather stubble for straw. 13And the taskmasters pressed them, saying, “You must complete the same work assignment each day as when you had straw.” 14And the foremen of the Israelites, whom Pharaoh’s taskmasters had set over them, were beaten. “Why,” they were asked, “did you not complete the prescribed amount of bricks, either yesterday or today, as you did before?”
15Then the foremen of the Israelites came to Pharaoh and cried: “Why do you deal thus with your servants? 16No straw is issued to your servants, yet they demand of us: Make bricks! Thus your servants are being beaten, when the fault is with your own people.” 17He replied, “You are shirkers, shirkers! That is why you say, ‘Let us go and sacrifice to the LORD.’ 18Be off now to your work! No straw shall be issued to you, but you must produce your quota of bricks!”
19Now the foremen of the Israelites found themselves in trouble because of the order, “You must not reduce your daily quantity of bricks.” 20As they left Pharaoh’s presence, they came upon Moses and Aaron standing in their path, 21and they said to them, “May the LORD look upon you and punish you for making us loathsome to Pharaoh and his courtiers— putting a sword in their hands to slay us.” 22Then Moses returned to the LORD and said, “O Lord, why did You bring harm upon this people? Why did You send me? 23Ever since I came to Pharaoh to speak in Your name, he has dealt worse with this people; and still You have not delivered Your people.”
6 Then the LORD said to Moses, “You shall soon see what I will do to Pharaoh: he shall let them go because of a greater might; indeed, because of a greater might he shall drive them from his land.”
2God spoke to Moses and said to him, “I am the LORD. 3I appeared to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as El Shaddai, but I did not make Myself known to them by My name .a 4I also established My covenant with them, to give them the land of Canaan, the land in which they lived as sojourners. 5I have now heard the moaning of the Israelites because the Egyptians are holding them in bondage, and I have remembered My covenant. 6Say, therefore, to the Israelite people: I am the LORD. I will free you from the labors of the Egyptians and deliver you from their bondage. I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and through ex- traordinary chastisements. 7And I will take you to be My people, and I will be your God. And you shall know that I, the LORD, am your God who freed you from the labors of the Egyptians. 8I will bring you into the land which I sworeb to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and I will give it to you for a possession, I the LORD.” 9But when Moses told this to the Israelites, they would not listen to Moses, their spirits crushed by cruel bondage.
10The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 11“Go and tell Pharaoh king of Egypt to let the Israelites depart from his land.” 12But Moses appealed to the LORD, saying, “The Israelites would not listen to me; how then should Pharaoh heed me, a man of impeded speech!” 13So the LORD spoke to both Moses and Aaron in regard to the Israelites and Pharaoh king of Egypt, instructing them to deliver the Israelites from the land of Egypt.
14The following are the heads of their respective clans.
The sons of Reuben, Israel’s first-born: Enochc and Pallu, Hezron and Carmi; those are the families of Reuben. 15The sons of Simeon: Jemuel, Jamin, Ohad, Jachin, Zohar, and Sauld the son of a Canaanite woman; those are the families of Simeon. 16These are the names of Levi’s sons by their lineage: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari; and the span of Levi’s life was 137 years. 17The sons of Gershon: Libni and Shimei, by their families. 18The sons of Kohath: Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel; and the span of Kohath’s life was 133 years. 19The sons of Merari: Mahli and Mushi. These are the families of the Levites by their lineage.
20Amram took to wife his father’s sister Jochebed, and she bore him Aaron and Moses; and the span of Amram’s life was 137 years. 21The sons of Izhar: Korah, Nepheg, and Zichri. 22The sons of Uzziel: Mishael, Elzaphan, and Sithri. 23Aaron took to wife Elisheba, daughter of Am- minadab and sister of Nahshon, and she bore him Nadab and Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar. 24The sons of Korah: Assir, Elkanah, and Abiasaph. Those are the families of the Korahites. 25And Aaron’s son Eleazar took to wife one of Putiel’s daughters, and she bore him Phinehas. Those are the heads of the fathers’ houses of the Levites by their families.
26It is the same Aaron and Moses to whom the LORD said, “Bring forth the Israelites from the land of Egypt, troop by troop.” 27It was they who spoke to Pharaoh king of Egypt to free the Israelites from the Egyptians; these are the same Moses and Aaron. 28For when the LORD spoke to Moses in the land of Egypt 29and the LORD said to Moses, “I am the LORD; speak to Pharaoh king of Egypt all that I will tell you,” 30Moses appealed to the LORD, saying, “See, I am of impeded speech; how then should Pharaoh heed me!”
7 The LORD replied to Moses, “See, I place you in the role of God to Pharaoh, with your brother Aaron as your prophet.a 2You shall repeat all that I command you, and your brother Aaron shall speak to Pharaoh to let the Israelites depart from his land. 3But I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, that I may multiply My signs and marvels in the land of Egypt. 4When Pharaoh does not heed you, I will lay My hand upon Egypt and deliver My ranks, My people the Israelites, from the land of Egypt with extraor- dinary chastisements. 5And the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD, when I stretch out My hand over Egypt and bring out the Israelites from their midst.” 6This Moses and Aaron did; as the LORD commanded them, so they did. 7Moses was eighty years old and Aaron eighty-three, when they made their demand on Pharaoh.
8The LORD said to Moses and Aaron, 9“When Pharaoh speaks to you and says, ‘Produce your marvel,’ you shall say to Aaron, ‘Take your rod and cast it down before Pharaoh.’ It shall turn into a serpent.” 10So Moses and Aaron came before Pharaoh and did just as the LORD had com- manded: Aaron cast down his rod in the presence of Pharaoh and his courtiers, and it turned into a serpent. 11Then Pharaoh, for his part, summoned the wise men and the sorcerers; and the Egyptian magicians, in turn, did the same with their spells; 12each cast down his rod, and they turned into serpents. But Aaron’s rod swallowed their rods. 13Yet Phar- aoh’s heart stiffened and he did not heed them, as the LORD had said.
14And the LORD said to Moses, “Pharaoh is stubborn; he refuses to let the people go. 15Go to Pharaoh in the morning, as he is coming out to the water, and station yourself before him at the edge of the Nile, taking with you the rod that turned into a snake. 16And say to him, ‘The LORD, the God of the Hebrews, sent me to you to say, “Let My people go that they may worship Me in the wilderness.” But you have paid no heed until now. 17Thus says the LORD, “By this you shall know that I am the LORD.” See, I shall strike the water in the Nile with the rod that is in my hand, and it will be turned into blood; 18and the fish in the Nile will die.
The Nile will stink so that the Egyptians will find it impossible to drink the water of the Nile.’ ”
19And the LORD said to Moses, “Say to Aaron: Take your rod and hold out your arm over the waters of Egypt—its rivers, its canals, its ponds, all its bodies of water—that they may turn to blood; there shall be blood throughout the land of Egypt, even in vessels of wood and stone.” 20Moses and Aaron did just as the LORD commanded: he lifted up the rod and struck the water in the Nile in the sight of Pharaoh and his courtiers, and all the water in the Nile was turned into blood 21and the fish in the Nile died. The Nile stank so that the Egyptians could not drink water from the Nile; and there was blood throughout the land of Egypt. 22But when the Egyptian magicians did the same with their spells, Pharaoh’s heart stiffened and he did not heed them—as the LORD had
