Exodus 1:9

World English Bible

Contextual Overview

⁸ Now there arose a new king over Egypt, who didn't know Joseph. ⁹ He said to his people, "Behold, the people of the children of Israel are more and mightier than we. ¹⁰ Come, let us deal wisely with them, lest they multiply, and it happen that when any war breaks out, they also join themselves to our enemies, and fight against us, and escape out of the land." ¹¹ Therefore they set taskmasters over them to afflict them with their burdens. They built storage cities for Pharaoh: Pithom and Raamses. ¹² But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and the more they spread out. They were grieved because of the children of Israel. ¹³ The Egyptians ruthlessly made the children of Israel serve, ¹⁴ and they made their lives bitter with hard service, in mortar and in brick, and in all manner of service in the field, all their service, in which they ruthlessly made them serve.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

the people: Numbers 22:4, Numbers 22:5, Job 5:2, Psalms 105:24, Psalms 105:25, Proverbs 14:28, Proverbs 27:4, Ecclesiastes 4:4, Titus 3:3, James 3:14-16, James 4:5

Reciprocal: Genesis 26:16 - mightier Exodus 1:12 - grieved Deuteronomy 4:34 - take him Psalms 73:8 - speak wickedly Acts 7:19 - General

Cross-References

Genesis 1:1
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

Genesis 1:2
Now the earth was formless and empty. Darkness was on the surface of the deep. God's Spirit was hovering over the surface of the waters.

Genesis 1:5
God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. There was evening and there was morning, one day.

Genesis 1:6
God said, "Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters."

Genesis 1:8
God called the expanse sky. There was evening and there was morning, a second day.

Genesis 1:9
God said, "Let the waters under the sky be gathered together to one place, and let the dry land appear," and it was so.

Genesis 1:11
God said, "Let the earth put forth grass, herbs yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit after their kind, with its seed in it, on the earth," and it was so.

Genesis 1:28
God blessed them. God said to them, "Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it. Have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves on the earth."

Genesis 1:29
God said, "Behold, I have given you every herb yielding seed, which is on the surface of all the earth, and every tree, which bears fruit yielding seed. It will be your food.

Job 26:7
He stretches out the north over empty space, And hangs the earth on nothing.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

And he said unto his people,.... His princes, nobles, and courtiers about him, his principal ministers of state:

behold, the people of the children of Israel are more and mightier than we: which could not be true in fact, but is said to stir up his nobles to attend to what he was about to say, and to work upon them to take some speedy measures for the crushing of this people; for that they were more in number, and mightier in power and wealth than the Egyptians, it was impossible; and indeed it may seem strange, that the king should tell such an untruth, which might be so easily contradicted by his courtiers; though the words will bear to be otherwise rendered, as that "the children of Israel are many" o; as they were very greatly multiplied, and became very numerous; and they might be "mightier", that is, more robust and strong, and fitter for war than the Egyptians, and therefore, were formidable, and a people to be guarded against; and it was high time to think of securing themselves from them, before they grew too mighty and powerful; or they might be more numerous and mighty in that part of the land in which they were, in Goshen, though not more and mightier than the Egyptians in general.

o רב "multus", Pagninus, Montanus, Drusius, Rivet.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Exodus 1:9. He said unto his people — He probably summoned a council of his nobles and elders to consider the subject; and the result was to persecute and destroy them, as is afterwards stated.