Go and get your own straw wherever you can find it; but your workload will in no way be reduced.’”
Parallel translations
- WEB Go yourselves, get straw where you can find it, for nothing of your work shall be diminished.’”
- KJV Go ye, get you straw where ye can find it: yet not ought of your work shall be diminished.
- NKJV Go, get yourselves straw where you can find it; yet none of your work will be reduced.’ ”
- NASB You go, get straw for yourselves wherever you can find it; but none of your labor will be reduced.’ ”
- NLT Go and get it yourselves. Find it wherever you can. But you must produce just as many bricks as before!”
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
The people are told to find straw themselves while their quota stays the same. The impossible demand deepens their distress.
Overview
The decree is made explicit: gather your own straw, yet produce no fewer bricks. This sets an unachievable standard designed to ensure failure and punishment. The injustice intensifies the suffering of God's people, setting the stage for their complaint and for God's ultimate vindication through deliverance.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 1
- Exod 5:13–14The taskmasters kept pressing them, saying, “Fulfill your quota each day, just as you did when straw was provided.”
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
The Passover lamb whose blood turns away death, the exodus through the sea, the manna, the rock, and the tabernacle where God dwells with his people all foreshadow Jesus — our Passover, our redemption, the bread from heaven, and God-with-us in the flesh.
How Exodus 5:11 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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