It is the Lord that advanced Moses and Aaron. — The Hebrew should be rendered, “even the Eternal that advanced Moses and Aaron.” The elders of Israel (1 Samuel 12:5) had with one consent cried out, in reply to Samuel’s solemn calling God and the king to witness, He is witness. Then Samuel takes up their words with great emphasis, even the Eternal that advanced Moses, &c. The English rendering greatly weakens the dramatic force of the original Hebrew. The LXX. has caught accurately the thought by supplying the word “witness “: thus, The Lord is witness, &c.
The Exodus is mentioned in this and in many places in these ancient records of the people as the great call of love by which the Eternal assumed the sovereignty over Israel. The Talmud here comments: “It is the Lord that made Moses and Aaron” (1 Samuel 12:6); and it is said (1 Samuel 12:11), “And the Lord sent Jerubbaal, and Bedan, and Jephthah, and Samuel.” Scripture balances in the same scale the three least important with the three most important personages, in order to teach thee that Jerrubbaal in his generation was like Moses in his, Bedan (said to be Samson) like Aaron, and Jephthah like Samuel. Hence the most insignificant man, if appointed a ruler of the congregation, has the same authority as the most important personage. — Treatise Rosh-Hashanah, fol. 25, Colossians 2.