d. Offer of deliverance (4:29-6:27)
Moses and Aaron’s initial announcement (4:29-31) met with a good deal of acceptance. The prospect of a magical release without cost or difficulty always meets with such approval. However, God’s activity is never without cost and difficulty, as it was not here. It is in the context of this difficulty that the underlying issue of the book emerges: Who is Yahweh? (5:2) What is his power? Can he be trusted? The real problem of the people was their ignorance of God. Until they came to know him, mere physical deliverance could only lead to a different kind of bondage.
Since Pharaoh was considered God incarnate by the Egyptians, there was no reason why he should obey some unknown god of the Semites. Since he could not accept the reality of Yahweh’s revelation, he had to imagine some other reason for the Hebrews' request. Surely they had too much time on their hands (5:8). Let them spend that time gathering the straw used to bind the mud bricks together while drying.
God’s offer of deliverance made the situation worse, not better. This is often true in life: to begin to follow God is to attract the attention and the wrath of God’s enemies. Verse 23 brings to a sharp focus the questions that emerged about God’s nature and character.
In 6:1-12 we see how the crisis, which now existed as a result of Pharaoh’s recalcitrance and the dramatically worsened situation, provided a setting for the needed demonstration of God’s character.
The precise meaning of 6:2-3 is uncertain since the name (here appearing as the Lord) certainly does appear in the Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob narratives. Either of two solutions is possible. Perhaps Moses in transcribing those narratives has inserted the name in those places where the personal, covenant-keeping nature of God had appeared (e.g., note where “Lord” appears in Ge 22). The other possibility is that while the patriarchs knew and used the title “the Lord,” they had never known the character (name) of God as would these Israelites.
God’s larger purpose in the Exodus is explained here (6:6-8). Political freedom is not an end, but a means whereby the people might know God and enter into a living relation with him. Likewise, deliverance from guilt and condemnation is also a means to those same ends. To know God (v.7) is to learn his character by intimate personal experience. The importance of this concept is revealed in its occurring eleven times in chs. 6-14. “Faltering lips” (6:12, 30) speaks of Moses' continuing sense of inadequacy, either physically or spiritually.
It is not clear why Moses and Aaron’s family tree is included at this point (6:13-27). Perhaps it serves to remind the reader that Moses and Aaron were not just anyone, but full-blooded members of the Levitic clan whom God had chosen to be his particular ministers. This interpretation is favored by the genealogy’s being bracketed before and after by Moses' protest about faltering (uncircumcised) lips. Although only three generations are cited between Jacob and Moses, at least 407 years elapsed between the birth of Levi and the death of Amram (based on 12:40).