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¹ AND Moses answered and said, But, behold, they will not believe me, nor listen to my voice; for they will say, The LORD has not appeared to you.² And the LORD said to him, What is that in your hand? He said, A staff.³ And the LORD said, Cast it on the ground. And he cast it on the ground, and it became a serpent; and Moses fled from before it.⁴ And the LORD said to Moses, Put forth your hand and take it by the tail. And he put forth his hand and caught it, and it became a staff in his hand;⁵ This is done that they may believe that the LORD God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has appeared to you.⁶ And the LORD said furthermore to him, again, Put now your hand into your bosom. And he put his hand into his bosom; and when he took it out, behold, his hand was leprous, as white as snow.⁷ Then the LORD said to him, Put your hand back into your bosom again. And he put his hand back into his bosom; and when he took it out of his bosom, behold, it was clean like his other flesh.⁸ And if they will not believe you, neither hearken to the voice of the first sign, they will believe the voice of the latter sign.⁹ And if they will not believe also these two signs, neither listen to you voice, you shall take some of the water of the river and pour it upon the dry land; and the water which you take from the river shall become blood upon the dry land.

¹⁰ And Moses said to the LORD. I beseech thee, O my LORD, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore nor since thou has spoken to thy servant; for I am a stutterer and slow of speech.¹¹ The LORD said to him, Who has made mans mouth? or who makes the dumb, or the deaf, or the seeing, or the blind? Is it not I the LORD?¹² Now therefore go, and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall speak.¹³ And Moses said to him, O my LORD, send I beseech thee, by the hand of whomsoever thou wilt send.¹⁴ And the anger of the LORD kindled against Moses, and he said to him, Behold, Aaron, your brother, the Levite. I know that he is a good speaker, and also, behold, he will come forth to meet you, and when he sees you, he will be glad in his heart.¹⁵ And you shall speak to him and put my words in his mouth; and I will be with your mouth and with his mouth, and will teach you what you shall do.¹⁶ And he shall be your spokesman to the people; and he shall be an interpreter for you, and you shall be to him instead of God.¹⁷ And you shall take this staff in your hand, with which you shall do signs.

¹⁸ And Moses returned, and went to Jethro his father-in-law, and said to him, Let me go and return to my brethren who are in Egypt and see whether they are still alive. And Jethro said to Moses, Go in peace.¹⁹ And the LORD said to Moses in Midian, Go, return to Egypt; for all the men who sought your life are dead.²⁰ And Moses took his wife and his sons, and set them upon an ass, and started on his way back to Egypt; and he took the staff of God in his hand.²¹ And the LORD said to Moses. When you return to Egypt, see that you perform all the wonders before Pharaoh which I have performed by your hand, but I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go.²² And you shall say to Pharaoh, Thus says the LORD, Israel is my first-born son;²³ And I say to you, Let my son go, that he may serve me; and if you refuse to let him go, behold, I will slay your first-born son.

²⁴ And it came to pass when Moses was on his way to the inn that the LORD met him and sought to kill him.²⁵ Then Zipporah took a flint and cut off the foreskin of her son, and she fell down at the feet of the LORD and said, I have a bloody husband.²⁶ So the LORD let him go. Then she said, You are a bloody husband, because of the circumcision.²⁷ And the LORD said to Aaron, Go into the wilderness to meet Moses. And he went and met him in the mountain of God, Horeb, and kissed him.²⁸ And Moses told Aaron all the words of the LORD, who had sent him, and all the signs which he had commanded him to perform.²⁹ Then Moses and Aaron went and gathered together all the elders of the children of Israel;³⁰ And Aaron spoke all the words which the LORD had said to Moses, and performed the signs in the presence of the people.³¹ And the people believed; and when they heard that the LORD had remembered the children of Israel, and that he had seen their affliction, then they knelt down and worshipped before the LORD.