Samaritan Torah, פַּרְשַׁת וָאֵרָא
Saturday, January 5th, 2013 07:22 pmIn Exodus 6, God tells Moses to tell the Israelites, "I have heard the groaning of the children of Israel, whom the Egyptians keep in bondage; and I have remembered my covenant. Therefore say unto the children of Israel, 'I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will rid you out of their bondage, and I will redeem you with a stretched out arm, and with great judgments.'"
The Samaritan text then adds:
Exodus 6:3-9 שמות ו ג-ט Moses spoke so unto the children of Israel: but they did not hear him on account of their anguish of spirit and hard labour. וַיְדַבֵּר מֹשֶׁה כֵּן אֶל־בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל וְלֹא שָׁמְעוּ אֶל־מֹשֶׁה מִקֹּצֶר רוּחַ וּמֵעֲבֹדָה קָשָׁה׃
This is typical of the Samaritan text, which fills in implied but absent speeches like this. There's a lot of these throughout the next two sidros, in which the God's instructions to Moses to say X to Pharaoh are followed by Moses saying exactly the same words to Pharaoh, for example:
They said to Moses, "Please, cease [bothering] us, and we shall serve Egypt, for it is better for us to serve Egypt than that we die in the wilderness." וַיאֹמְוּ אֶל מֹשֶה חֲדַל־נָא מִמֶנוּ וְנַעֲבֹדָה אֶת־מִצְרָיִם כִּי טוֹב לָנוּ עֲבֹד אֶת־מִצְרַיִם מִמוֹתְנוּ בַּמִדְבָּר׃
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There's a few other minor differences in the above text, but I got bored of typing them all in. As you see, it's rather boring repetition, and I won't be typing any more of these in. As well as Moses repeating what God has told him to say word-for-word to Pharaoh, he also does this for what God has told him to say to Aaron, e.g. Ex. 8:1.
Samaritan Torah notes
Jewish learning notes index