Exodus 4:17
And take this rod in thy hand, wherewith thou shalt do the signs.
Open Exodus 4:17 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Virgam quoque hanc sume in manu tua, in qua facturus es signa.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- καὶ τὴν ῥάβδον ταύτην τὴν στραφεῖσαν εἰς ὄφιν λήμψῃ ἐν τῇ χειρί σου, ἐν ᾗ ποιήσεις ἐν αὐτῇ τὰ σημεῖα.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- וְאֶת הַמַּטֶּ֥ה הַזֶּ֖ה תִּקַּ֣ח בְּיָדֶ֑ךָ אֲשֶׁ֥ר תַּעֲשֶׂה בּ֖וֹ אֶת הָאֹתֹֽת
Haydock's commentary
Rod. So the devil taught Mercury and Bacchus to mimic Moses, and to carry a wand. Tum virgam capit, hâc animas ille evocat orco. (Virgil, iv.) (Calmet)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Hippolytus The Refutation of All Heresies, Chapter XI
Now, he says, the stars are the gods of destruction, which impose upon existent things the necessity of alterable generation. These, he says, Moses denominated serpents of the wilderness, which gnaw and utterly ruin those who imagined that they had crossed the Red Sea. To those, then, he says, who of the children of Israel were bitten in the wilderness, Moses exhibited the real and perfect serpent; and they who believed on this serpent were not bitten in the wilderness, that is, (were not assailed) by (evil) powers. No one therefore, he says, is there who is able to save and deliver those that come forth from Egypt, that is, from the body and from this world, unless alone the serpent that is perfect and replete with fulness. Upon this (serpent), he says, he who fixes his hope is not destroyed by the snakes of the wilderness, that is, by the gods of generation. …