But the king of Egypt said to them, “Moses and Aaron, why do you let the people neglect their work? Get back to your labors!”
Parallel translations
- WEB The king of Egypt said to them, “Why do you, Moses and Aaron, take the people from their work? Get back to your burdens!”
- KJV And the king of Egypt said unto them, Wherefore do ye, Moses and Aaron, let the people from their works? get you unto your burdens.
- BSB But the king of Egypt said to them, “Moses and Aaron, why do you draw the people away from their work? Get back to your labor!”
- NKJV Then the king of Egypt said to them, “Moses and Aaron, why do you take the people from their work? Get back to your labor.”
- NLT Pharaoh replied, “Moses and Aaron, why are you distracting the people from their tasks? Get back to work!
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
Pharaoh accuses Moses and Aaron of distracting the people from labor and orders them back to work. He treats God's demand as mere idleness.
Overview
Pharaoh refuses the religious appeal and reduces it to a labor dispute, commanding the people back to their burdens. His response shows a heart that values productivity and control over the worship of God. By dismissing the divine claim as a pretext for laziness, Pharaoh sets himself against the LORD and intensifies the oppression that the coming verses describe.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 6
- Exod 1:11Therefore they set taskmasters over them to afflict them with their burdens. They built storage cities for Pharaoh: Pithom and Raamses.
- Luke 23:2They began to accuse him, saying, “We found this man perverting the nation, forbidding paying taxes to Caesar, and saying that he himself is Christ, a king.”
- Acts 24:5For we have found this man to be a plague, an instigator of insurrections among all the Jews throughout the world, and a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes.
- Amos 7:10Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, “Amos has conspired against you in the middle of the house of Israel. The land is not able to bear all his words.
- Acts 16:20–21When they had brought them to the magistrates, they said, “These men, being Jews, are agitating our city,
- Jer 38:4Then the princes said to the king, “Please let this man be put to death; because he weakens the hands of the men of war who remain in this city, and the hands of all the people, in speaking such words to them: for this man doesn’t seek the welfare of this people, but harm.”
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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 5:4 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
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.