What Does Exodus 7:5 Mean?
And the Egyptians shall perceive that I am the LORD, when I stretch out my hand upon Egypt and bring out the children of Israel from among them.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD, when I stretch forth mine hand upon Egypt, and bring out the children of Israel from among them.THE KEY
Egypt encounters the LORD through the hand upon it, while Israel emerges from within it: the same act makes divine power known and opens a way out.
THE MEANING
The verse holds two audiences within one movement: Egypt meets the LORD through the hand stretched over it, while Israel is brought out from among the Egyptians. The Hebrew word for knowing points to recognition through encounter; here, that encounter is an action that changes who is held and who can leave. The reader meets the LORD as one whose nature becomes visible in both judgment and release.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Recognition of the LORD is not limited to the people being delivered; even those experiencing the force of the deliverance come to know who is acting.
THE ROOT
וְיָדְעוּ
veyad'u
GROWS FROM
ידע
Know, recognize, perceive through encounter.
“perceive” in this verse is veyad'u. The Egyptians do not merely receive information about the LORD; they come to know through what happens before them. The verse joins recognition to an act whose consequences can be experienced.
ALSO GROWS
yada: Know, recognize, perceive
יָדַע
This is the verb used here: the Egyptians’ knowing arises through encounter with the LORD’s action.
da'at: Knowledge, understanding
דַּעַת
This noun from the same root points to knowledge as something formed through recognition, not merely a name heard.
וְהוֹצֵאתִי
vehōṣē’tî
GROWS FROM
יצא
Go out, emerge.
The form translated “bring out” grows from the root for going out: Israel’s deliverance is an emergence from within the place holding them. That visible emergence is part of what makes the LORD known.
ALSO GROWS
yatsa: Go out, emerge
יָצָא
The root’s basic movement is outward, making the release in this verse a passage from being among the Egyptians to going out.
hotsi: Bring out, lead out
הוֹצִיא
This causative form expresses the LORD bringing Israel out, the action through which recognition takes shape.
THE PATTERN
Recognition of the LORD takes shape through actions whose visible consequences make divine agency known.
And the Egyptians will perceive that I am the LORD, when I show my weight upon the Great House, upon his chariots and upon his horsemen.The LORD is known in the judgment he makes; the wicked is snared in the deed of his own palms. Higgaion. Selah.But if I do them, even if you do not trust me, lean your weight on the works, so that you may come to perceive, and keep on perceiving, that the Father is in me, and I in the Father.THE THREAD
And I will take you to me for a people, and I will be to you a God, and you shall perceive that I am the LORD your God, who brings you out from under the loads of the Egyptians.The same root, ידע (yada), links Israel’s knowing in Exodus 6:7 with Egypt’s knowing here. The act that brings Israel out makes the LORD known to the people released and to the people from whose midst they emerge.
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