Matthew Poole and continuators on Exodus 4:24

24 And it came to pass by the way in the Inn, that the LORD met him ; and sought to kill him .

(i. e.) Appeared to him in some visible shape.

Whom? Moses, spoken of and to before. He offered and endeavoured to kill him, either by inflicting some sudden and dangerous disease or stroke upon him, or by shewing himself in some threatning posture, possibly as the Angel did to Balaam and afterwards to David with a drawn Sword in his hand, ready to give him a deadly blow. The reason of this severity was not Moses his distrust of God, nor delay in his journey, nor the bringing of his Wife and Children along with him, (which it was convenient for him to carry with him, both that his father might not think he intended to desert them, and for the greater assurance and encouragement of the Israelites, when they saw that he exposed his dearest relations to the same hazards with them all) but the neglect of circumcising his Child, which also the Lord some way or other signified to Moses and Zipporah, as plainly appears, 1. From Zipporahs following fact upon that occasion. 2. From the Lords dismission of Moses upon the circumcision of the Child. 3. From the threatning of Death or cutting of for this sin, Gen. 17. 14. which, because there was now no Magistrate to do it, God himself offers to execute it, as he sometimes saith he would do in that case. And this was a greater sin in Moses than in another man, and at this time then it had been before, because he understood the Will and Law of God about it better then any man, and God had lately minded him of that Covenant of his with Abraham, &c. whereof circumcision was a seal; the blessings and benefits of which Covenant Moses was now going to procure for himself and for his people, whilest he remained under the guilt of gro[illegible: 1+ letters]ly neglecting the condition of it. Besides, what could be more absurd than that he should come to be a Lawgiver who lived in a manifest violation of Gods Law, or that he should be the chief Ruler and Instructer of the Israelites, whose duty it was to acquaint them with their duty of circumcising their Children, and, as far as he could, to punish the wilfull neglect of it, and yet at the same time be guilty of the same sin; or that he should undertake to govern the Church of God that could not well rule his own house, 1 Tim. 3. 5? And this was not onely a great sin in it self, but a great scandal to the Israelites, who might by this great example easily be led into the same miscarriage; and moreover might not without colour of probability suspect the call of such a person, and conclude that God would not honour that man who should continue in such a visible contempt of his Law. And therefore it is no wonder that God was so angry at Moses for this sin. Quest. How came Moses to neglect this evident duty? Answ. From Zipporahs averseness to and dread of that painful, and, as she thought, dangerous Ordinance of God, which she her self evidently discovers in this place; and the rather because of the experience which she had of it in her eldest Son. And as she seems to have been a Woman of an eager and passionate temper, so Moses was eminently meek and pliable and in this matter too indulgent to his Wife, especially in her Fathers house, and therefore he put it off till a more convenient season, when he might either perswade or over-rule her therein. Which was a great fault, for God had obliged all the Children of Abraham not onely to the thing, but to the time also, to do it upon the eighth day, which season Moses had grosly and for some considerable time slipped, and so had preferred the pleasing of his Wife before his Obedience to God.

Marginal references: Num. 22. 22.