Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Harold Holmyard <hholmyard AT ont.com>]

Dear Bob,

> Seems I recall that in each case (the Exodus passages) that 
> God told Moses to tell Pharoah to let his people SERVE HIM, 
> but by the time that Moses and Aaron got to Pharaoh it was 
> transformed into "make sacrifices unto Him."  
>
> To me, its as though the persons who put the details in 
> writing were careful to not change what God said, but they 
> seem to have recast the instructions into a form that either 
> made them more palatable to Pharoah OR to build a case 
> (after the fact) for adopting sacrifices as a thing to do.
>
> Jeremiah 8:8 may be applicable (Lying pens of scribes).
> KJV does not do this passage justice.  
>
> Not sure what "serve Him" might entail but I suspect that 
> it involved being obedient to whatever God laid on them to do.
>  


HH: The Hebrew verb "serve" also means "worship," which at that time 
would and did include sacrifices.

HH: If the Israelites in talking with Pharaoh were twisting what God 
said, God would probably have called them on it. This was not even 
written, so the lying pen of the scribes does not seem relevant. I 
believe that Jer 8:8 passage refers to a much later time when Israel was 
in Canaan.

Yours,
Harold Holmyard