Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Exodus, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
God’s Identity and Power
Redemption and Deliverance
The Covenant
Mediators and the Priesthood
Summary
Analysis
Moses and Aaron approach Pharaoh, telling him that God has said, “Let my people go” so that they can go into the wilderness and worship. Pharaoh replies that he doesn’t know the LORD—why should he listen? When Moses and Aaron persist, Pharaoh demands that the Israelites return to their work. That day, he tells the people’s taskmasters that they must no longer supply the Israelites with straw for their brickmaking; the Israelites will have to gather it for themselves. Nevertheless, the people must produce the same quantity of bricks as before—they are just lazy, and that’s why they’re asking permission to go away and worship God.
Moses and Aaron have their first meeting with Pharaoh, and it goes as God foretold—Pharaoh stubbornly refuses to release the Israelites. Besides demonstrating God’s control over the situation, this also sets the tone for Moses’s coming struggle with Pharaoh. In fact, Pharaoh cruelly doubles down on his oppression of the slaves.
Themes
So the taskmasters tell the Israelites to gather their own straw and make the same quantity of bricks. When the Israelites struggle to fulfill this quota, Pharaoh’s taskmasters beat the Israelites’ supervisors. When the supervisors complain of this unjust treatment, Pharaoh insists that the Israelites are simply lazy. In turn, the supervisors accuse Moses and Aaron of making things worse for them. Moses prays to the LORD, lamenting that God has not yet done anything to deliver his people.
Moses’s struggle with Pharaoh and the resentful supervisors establishes that his role won’t be easy. Even when Moses advocates for them, the people won’t always appreciate it; and from Moses’s perspective, God’s power and care won’t always be obvious. Right now, in fact, it looks like God has just made the Israelites’ situation harder.
Themes
