Commentaria in Exodum
12. HOW WILL PHARAO HEAR ME, ESPECIALLY AS I AM OF UNCIRCUMCISED LIPS?—Since I labour under a defect of tongue, since I am of slower and more impeded speech. The Hebrews call uncircumcised in heart, mind or tongue him who labours under some defect of heart, mind or tongue. For as circumcision was the first and highest Sacrament among the Hebrews, so to be uncircumcised was the greatest fault and disgrace; hence by uncircumcision, or the foreskin, they signify any fault. To this complaint of Moses the Lord will answer at the beginning of chap. 7. For what follows in this chapter looks elsewhere, to the genealogy of Moses.
Hence it is plain that this defect of tongue remained in Moses after his conversation with God, in his very embassy to Pharao; and this for the exercise of humility, and that God might show that He uses weak and unfit instruments, lest glory be given to the instruments but to God alone.
Allegorically, Moses, as though dumb, used Aaron as interpreter, to signify that the old law, as it were silent and mute, is the shadow and figure of the new law, which clearly preaches God and Christ.
13. AND THE LORD SPOKE TO MOSES AND AARON, AND GAVE THEM A COMMANDMENT TO THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL.—This is a general epilogue, or gathering of all that was said before, which Moses here subjoins, that through it he may pass to his own and Aaron’s genealogy; and this to the end that the faith of the history of Exodus, and of the promise fulfilled by God, of delivering them from Egypt, may stand the more assured, since it appears most certainly that the thing was done and accomplished not by some stranger, but by one of the posterity of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to whom the promise was made, namely by Moses.
14. THESE ARE THE HEADS OF THEIR HOUSES BY THEIR FAMILIES,—as if to say: These are the heads of the Israelite families; for the families which are elsewhere called kindreds are called houses. In Hebrew it is, these are the heads of the house of their fathers, that is, these are the heads who presided over the families of their ancestors, or fathers; for each of the twelve patriarchs’ sons had and established a particular family, in which he himself was head, and after him his firstborn son; e.g. the sons of Ruben were four, namely Henoch and Phallu, Hesron and Charmi; each of these had their own families in which they themselves were heads.
16. AND THESE ARE THE NAMES OF THE SONS OF LEVI.—Moses stops at the genealogy of Levi, because from Levi were born Moses and Aaron, whose lineage the Holy Ghost chiefly intends to carry out here, because these were the deliverers and leaders of Israel. So St. Augustine, Quest. 15. Note here: The first son of Jacob was Ruben, the second Simeon, the third Levi; of these three only Moses carries out the genealogy here; both for the cause already stated, and because Jacob seemed to have cursed them, Genesis chap. 49, verses 3 and 5. Hence, lest these three tribes be thought rejected by God, Moses wished to record the many and illustrious families of those three sons of Jacob.
BY THEIR KINDREDS.—In Hebrew, by their generations, that is, families. These three therefore are the same: generation, family, kindred; and so one generation is one family, because it descends from one begetter.
AND THE YEARS OF THE LIFE OF LEVI WERE A HUNDRED AND THIRTY-SEVEN.—From what was said on Genesis 30 it is plain that Levi was four years older than Joseph. Hence it follows first that Levi was 43 years old when he went down with Jacob into Egypt, because Joseph was then 39 years old, as I showed on Genesis 41. It follows secondly that Levi died 23 years after the death of Joseph; for Joseph died in the 110th year of his age, but Levi in his 137th. It follows thirdly that Levi, after Jacob’s entry into Egypt, lived in Egypt 94 years.
It follows fourthly that Levi died 121 years before the going out of the Hebrews from Egypt: for from Jacob’s entry into Egypt to the exodus of the Hebrews 215 years passed; but Levi, after Jacob’s entry into Egypt, lived there 94 years: therefore from the death of Levi to the exodus of the Hebrews from Egypt there remained 121 years. It follows fifthly that Levi died 44 years before the birth of Moses; for he was 80 years old at the going out of the Hebrews from Egypt.
20. JOCHABED HIS COUSIN-GERMAN,—a kinswoman, not an aunt, as I said chap. 2, 2. AND THE YEARS OF THE LIFE OF AMRAM WERE A HUNDRED AND THIRTY-SEVEN.—Eusebius in his Chronicle relates that Amram, who was the father of Moses, begot Moses in the 70th year of his age; whence it follows that he died when Moses was sixty-seven years old, namely 13 years before the going out of the Hebrews from Egypt; although Alexander Polyhistor, in Eusebius, would have it that Amram died 20 years before the exodus of the Hebrews from Egypt.
The Hebrews relate, as Genebrard reports, book 1 of his Chronology, that seven men measure all the ages of men from the beginning of the world to the end. For Adam saw Mathusalem, he saw Sem, Sem saw Jacob, Jacob saw Amram, Amram saw Ahias the Silonite, Ahias saw Elias, who lives and will live to the end of the world. But they err about Amram; for he, as I said, died 13 years before the exodus from Egypt: therefore he could not have seen Ahias the Silonite, who is brought in as a prophet after the death of Solomon, 3 Kings 11. For from the going out of Egypt to the 4th year of Solomon, in which the temple was built, 480 years passed, as is plain from 3 Kings 6:1. More briefly and truly would they measure every age by two men: for Adam saw Henoch, Henoch, who was taken up, will return and will see the end of the world. See here how slight is all this our time, how fleeting this whole age.
Let the Christian hear Laelius, truly philosophizing, in Seneca, book 6 Natural Questions. When someone said to him: I am sixty years old; he answered elegantly: Do you call these sixty years which you have not yet? We do not have the years, hours and ages that are past: nor do we have those to come; we live by moments and points of fleeting time: of the day of life and of the hours we have certain points. And again: “Neither is what is to come mine, nor what has been: I hang on a point of fleeting time.” For that philosopher rightly said that we do not properly have time, but a point of time, namely the now itself: for the past is not, but was; the future is not, but will be: therefore we have only the present itself, namely the moment now. See how slight is our time, how slight pleasure, and this present life.
23. AND AARON TOOK TO WIFE ELISABETH, DAUGHTER OF AMINADAB, SISTER OF NAHASON.—This Nahason, at the going out of Egypt, was prince of the tribe of Juda, as is plain from Numbers 1:7.
Note: Moses, a humble man, here carefully carries out the genealogy of Aaron and almost neglects his own, except so far as was necessary for knowing the call of God and the mission of a certain person.
25. THESE ARE THE HEADS OF THE FAMILIES.—Hebrew: these are the heads of the fathers, who were, namely, among the fathers the princes and heads of families.
26. THIS IS THAT AARON AND MOSES,—who were sent to Pharao.
28. IN THE DAY WHEN THE LORD SPOKE TO MOSES IN THE LAND OF EGYPT.—In the Hebrew and Chaldee a new sentence begins here, in this manner: And it came to pass in the day when the Lord spoke to Moses in this wise: I am the Lord, speak to Pharao. Whence the Latin codices also begin here verse 28.
“This is that Aaron and Moses,” who were the leaders of so great a deed, who like two thunderbolts of war laid low Pharao and all enemies, as a thousand; who like sun and moon enlightened Israel. Behold how much one or another man can do, one illustrious leader of a people. So one Epaminondas raised the Thebans to empire, so that Agesilaus, though an enemy, seeing him, rightly exclaimed: “O magnificent man!” So one Scipio ended the long duel of the Romans and Carthaginians for empire and secured it to the Romans, so that Cato said of him while still a soldier: “He alone is wise, the rest wander like shadows”; and Metellus gave thanks to the gods for Rome’s sake that Scipio had not arisen elsewhere. Nay, the Numantines, enemies of the Romans, being asked why they now fled from the Romans under Scipio’s leadership whom they had formerly put to flight, answered: “The sheep are indeed the same, but they now have another shepherd.” Plutarch is witness in the Roman Apophthegms.
29. SPEAK TO PHARAO.—Here Moses resumes and pursues the narrative begun at verse 14 and interrupted by the description of his genealogy.
30. AND MOSES SAID BEFORE THE LORD,—said to the Lord, who was before him, or before whom Moses stood and acted. I AM OF UNCIRCUMCISED LIPS,—I am impeded in tongue, rude in speaking and unfit, as I said chap. 4, verse 10.
Among the faithful what did not one Moses effect, one Josue, one David, one Josias, one Elias, one Eliseus, one Daniel, one Paul, one Gregory, one Athanasius, one Chrysostom, one Jerome, one Benedict, one Francis, one Dominic, one Bernard, one Xavier? And we, how many years have we lived? what illustrious thing have we done? We are a mere number. Thou hast multiplied the nation, and hast not magnified the joy. Julius Caesar wept reading the deeds of Alexander, and said: “At the age at which Alexander conquered Darius, I have as yet done nothing illustrious.”