Now get back to work. You will not be given any straw, but you must produce your full quota of bricks. Pharaoh's final word to the foremen is monosyllabic in its brutality: go, work, produce. No acknowledgment of the injustice named, no adjustment of the system, no concession to the impossibility of the demand. The hardness is not simply personal stubbornness — it is the hardness that power in its most dehumanizing form always displays when confronted with the legitimate claims of those it controls. Isaiah 10:1–2 pronounces woe on those who make unjust laws and issue oppressive decrees, to deprive the poor of their rights and withhold justice from the oppressed. Pharaoh fulfills this description perfectly. His decree has been issued and will not be modified. The impossibility of the demand is now complete, and the crisis that will unlock the Exodus is fully constructed.

COMMUNITY REFLECTIONS

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