Exodus 1:8-12 J, Exodus 1:13 P, Exodus 1:14 a ( to field) J, Exodus 1:14 b P. Repression of Israel. Forced labour was the first device for checking Hebrew increase. The new king is probably Rameses II (1300- 1221 B.C., pp. 56, 63, so Petrie). The phrase has no reference to a change of dynasty, as some have supposed, but to the beginning of an epoch affecting Israel. In Exodus 1:9 read mg.; to represent Israel as stronger than the Egyptians would have been absurd, but such a people might easily grow too strong for their dependent position and close proximity. Brugsch estimates the proportion of foreigners in that reign as one-third. The risk foreseen in Exodus 1:10 (read, with Sam., LXX, etc., when any war befalleth us) was, as the monuments show, constantly in view. The large, virtually slave, population was ready to take advantage of any Hittite or other invasion. Under the 12th dynasty (c. 1980 B.C.) a line of forts had been erected against the Bedawin incursions. Most of the great palaces and temples of antiquity were built by help of the corvé e. Solomon used such labour-gangs or levies, and the fate of Adoniram (1 Kings 12:18) showed their unpopularity. Pithom (Exodus 1:11 b), dwelling of Turn, was identified by Naville in 1883. It lies about 60 miles N.E. of Cairo, and about 20 miles E. of Tel el Kebir, which stands at the N.E. corner of Goshen as traced by Petrie. Inscriptions show that Pithom was built by Rameses II. It had huge, thick walls of brick, and contained sunken magazines, with brick walls also very thick. The Hebrews are not named as its builders. It is properly called a store-city, though it was also a fortress (cf. LXX) and the site of a temple. Raamses has been plausibly located by Petrie (1906) at Tell er Relabeh, 10 miles W. of Pithom, half way to the border of Goshen along the narrow fertile valley of the Wady Tumilot. The scheme may have made Egypt stronger against external attack, but it failed to repress the Israelites, and only made the Egyptians abhor (mg.) or loathe (Numbers 21:5) them. The graphic details in Exodus 1:14 (cf. Exodus 1:5 and Genesis 11:3) are perhaps from J. The building tasks are distinguished from the agricultural toils, i.e. making canals and dams, and drudging at the irrigation poles, with their heavy buckets, day by day (cf. Deuteronomy 11:10 *). The black Nile mud was used for mortar as well as for brick-clay. Josephus and Philo specify canals, and Josephus pyramids, as made by Israel. The tradition of the house of bondage was ground into the very bones of the Hebrews.
Exodus 1:10. deal wisely has a sinister meaning, cf. LXX, followed by Stephen (dealt subtilly, Acts 7:19).
Exodus 1:11. taskmasters: better gangmasters.