They said one to another, Let us make a captain— We learn from Nehemiah 9:17 that they actually appointed a captain in the height of this their mutiny, insolence, and ingratitude, not only against Moses and Aaron, but against the Lord himself, who, in so wonderful a manner, had delivered them from Egypt, and continually demonstrated such miracles of mercy towards them. Bishop Warburton remarks, that this unwillingness to leave Egypt, and impatience to return thither, are convincing proofs of their fondness of its customs and superstitions. "When I consider this," says he, "I seem more inclined than the generality to excuse the false accounts of the pagan writers concerning the Exodus, or departure of the Israelites, who concur to represent the Jews as expelled or forcibly driven out of Egypt; for so indeed they were; their mistake was only about their driver; the pagans supposed him to be the King of Egypt; when, indeed, it was the God of Israel himself, by the ministry of Moses."
REFLECTIONS.—Discontent now spreads through the camp; every face is overcast; despair sinks the courage of the host, and unmanly tears bespeak their coward-terrors. The bitterest sorrows that the heart knows, are often those which we make ourselves without cause or reason. They clamour loud against Moses and Aaron, and wish they had died in Egypt or the wilderness, rather than been reduced to their present imaginary distresses; and as the devil's power is then confirmed, when he can suggest hard thoughts of God, they charge that gracious Jehovah, who had fed and preserved them so long and so richly, with the most horrid design of deceiving and destroying them. At last they come to the desperate resolution of returning to Egypt, and resolve to choose a captain in order to head their mutiny, and lead them back to that land of bondage. The purpose was folly, the attempt madness. How were they to return when God had left them without provision or guide? And what could they hope in Egypt, but a repetition of misery to which death itself were preferable? Note; (1.) The headstrong and unmortified passions of sinners hurry them on to their ruin. (2.) They who are discontented under God's providences, and resolve to mend themselves, will ever make bad worse. (3.) How much need have we to fear, lest, after suffering many toils; we start like Israel at new difficulties, turn back and walk no more with Jesus! Dreadful state of apostacy!