3 They replied, “The God of the Hebrews has come to meet us. Let us go a three days’ journey in the wilderness, that we may offer sacrifice to the Lord, our God, so that he does not strike us with the plague or the sword.”
4 The king of Egypt answered them, “Why, Moses and Aaron, do you make the people neglect their work? Off to your labors!”
5 Pharaoh continued, “Look how they are already more numerous than the people of the land, and yet you would give them rest from their labors!”
6 That very day Pharaoh gave the taskmasters of the people and their foremen this order:
7 “You shall no longer supply the people with straw for their brickmaking as before. Let them go and gather their own straw!
8 Yet you shall levy upon them the same quota of bricks as they made previously. Do not reduce it. They are lazy; that is why they are crying, ‘Let us go to offer sacrifice to our God.’
9 Increase the work for the men, so that they attend to it and not to deceitful words.”