Matthew Henry on Exodus 8:20–end
Here is the story of the plague of flies, in which we are told,
I. How it was threatened, like that of frogs, before it was inflicted. Moses is directed (Exo 8:20) to rise early in the morning, to meet Pharaoh when he came forth to the water, and there to repeat his demands. Note, 1. Those that would bring great things to pass for God and their generation must rise early, and redeem time in the morning. Pharaoh was early up at his superstitious devotions to the river; and shall we be for more sleep and more slumber when any service is to be done which would pass well in our account in the great day? 2. Those that would approve themselves God's faithful servants must not be afraid of the face…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on Exodus 8:25
Pharaoh called for Moses, . . . Go ye, sacrifice to your God in the land, &c.--Between impatient anxiety to be freed from this scourge and a reluctance on the part of the Hebrew bondsmen, the king followed the course of expediency; he proposed to let them free to engage in their religious rites within any part of the kingdom. But true to his instructions, Moses would accede to no such arrangement; he stated a most valid reason to show the danger of it, and the king having yielded so far as to allow them a brief holiday across the border, annexed to this concession a request that Moses would entreat with Jehovah for the removal of the plague. He promised to do so, and it was removed the follo…
Read the whole note in the consoleAdam Clarke on Exodus 8:25
Sacrifice to your God in the land - That is, Ye shall not leave Egypt, but I shall cause your worship to be tolerated here.
John Gill on Exodus 8:25
He and his people not being able to endure this plague of flies any longer; and we read in profane history of such creatures being so troublesome, that people have been obliged to quit their habitations, and seek for new ones; so Pausanias (t) relates of the inhabitants of Myus, that such a number of flies rose out of the lake, that the men were obliged to leave the city, and go to Miletus; so Aelian (u) reports, that the inhabitants of Megara were driven from thence by a multitude of flies, as were the inhabitants of Phaselis by wasps, which creatures also might be in this mixture of insects:
and said, go ye, sacrifice to your God in the land; that is, in the land of Goshen, in the place w…
