Then the Israelite foremen, whom Pharaoh’s taskmasters had set over the people, were beaten and asked, “Why have you not fulfilled your quota of bricks yesterday or today, as you did before?”
Cruel princes always find cruel servants willing to obey them, and this enmity against God's people breaks through all bounds of reason and justice. The scattered Israelites, forced to gather stubble while the work stays the same, made Pharaoh's tyranny known throughout Egypt; persecution never wins good-will, even from a despot's own subjects.
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Commenting on Exodus 5:10-14
The taskmasters beat the Israelite officers for falling short, knowing full well why the brick count dropped: men cannot make the same number when half their time goes to hunting straw. To flog them for a deficiency they caused themselves is simple cruelty.
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The beating was likely bastinadoing, the common Egyptian punishment: the victim lies prone, legs raised, and the executioner strikes the soles of the feet with a stick so brutally that the sufferer cannot walk for weeks, sometimes lamed for life.
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