---
title: "Exodus 4 – Catholic Bible (CPDV) & Latin Vulgate · Bless"
url: https://blessbible.app/bible/exodus/4/
description: "Moses is empowered to confirm his mission with miracles: his brother Aaron is… Exodus 4 in the Catholic Public Domain Version, with the Latin Vulgate."
---

# Exodus 4

Exodus 4 is chapter 4 of 40 in the Book of Exodus. Here are all 31 verses in the Catholic Public Domain Version, with the Latin of the Clementine Vulgate beside them.

> Moses is empowered to confirm his mission with miracles: his brother Aaron is appointed to assist him.
>
> — Bp. Richard Challoner, chapter summary

## Exodus 4 (Catholic Public Domain Version)

1. Responding, Moses said, “They will not believe me, and they will not listen to my voice, but they will say: ‘The Lord has not appeared to you.’”
2. Therefore, he said to him, “What is that you hold in your hand?” He answered, “A staff.”
3. And the Lord said, “Cast it down upon the ground.” He cast it down, and it was turned into a snake, so that Moses fled away.
4. And the Lord said, “Reach out your hand, and take hold of its tail.” He reached out his hand and took hold, and it was turned into a staff.
5. “So may they believe,” he said, “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 again, “Put your hand into your bosom.” And when he had put it into his bosom, he brought it out leprous, resembling snow.
7. “Put your hand back,” he said, “into your bosom.” He put it back and brought it out again, and it was like the rest of his flesh.
8. “If they will not believe you,” he said, “and will not listen to the sermon of the first sign, then they will believe the word of the subsequent sign.
9. But if they will not believe even these two signs, and they will not listen to your voice: take from the water of the river, and pour it upon the dry land, and whatever you will have drawn from the river will be turned into blood.”
10. Moses said: “I beg you, O Lord, I was not eloquent yesterday or the day before. And from the time that you have spoken to your servant, I have a greater impediment and slowness of tongue.”
11. The Lord said to him: “Who made the mouth of man? And who has formed the mute and the deaf, the seeing and the blind? Was it not I?
12. Go on, therefore, and I will be in your mouth. And I will teach you what you shall say.”
13. But he said, “I beg you, O Lord, send whomever else you would send.”
14. The Lord, being angry at Moses, said: “Aaron the Levite is your brother. I know that he is eloquent. Behold, he is going out to meet you, and seeing you, he will rejoice in heart.
15. Speak to him, and put my words in his mouth. And I will be in your mouth and in his mouth, and I will reveal to you what you must do.
16. He will speak for you to the people, and he will be your mouth. But you will be with him in those things that pertain to God.
17. Also, take this staff into your hand; with it you will accomplish the signs.”
18. Moses went forth, and he returned to Jethro, his father in law, and he said to him, “I shall go and return to my brothers in Egypt, so that I may see if they are still alive.” And Jethro said to him, “Go in peace.”
19. And so the Lord said to Moses in Midian: “Go, and return to Egypt. For all those who sought your life have died.”
20. Therefore, Moses took his wife and his sons, and he placed them upon a donkey, and he returned into Egypt, carrying the staff of God in his hand.
21. And the Lord said to him, as he was returning to Egypt: “See that you accomplish, in the sight of Pharaoh, all the wonders that I have placed in your hand. I will harden his heart, and he will not release the people.
22. And you shall say to him: ‘Thus says the Lord: Israel is my firstborn son.
23. I have said to you: Release my son, so that he may serve me. And you were not willing to release him. Behold, I will put to death your firstborn son.’”
24. And while he was on the journey, at an inn, the Lord met him, and he was willing to kill him.
25. For this reason, Zipporah took a very sharp stone, and she circumcised the foreskin of her son, and she touched his feet, and she said, “You are a bloody spouse to me.”
26. And he released him, after she had said, “You are a bloody spouse,” because of the circumcision.
27. Then the Lord said to Aaron, “Go into the desert to meet Moses.” And he went directly to meet him on the mountain of God, and he kissed him.
28. And Moses explained to Aaron all the words of the Lord, by which he had sent him, and the signs which he had commanded.
29. And they arrived at the same time, and they gathered together all the elders of the sons of Israel.
30. And Aaron spoke all the words which the Lord had said to Moses. And he accomplished the signs in the sight of the people,
31. and the people believed. And they heard that the Lord had visited the sons of Israel, and that he had looked with favor upon their affliction. And falling prostrate, they worshiped.

## Exodus 4 in Latin (Clementine Vulgate, 1592)

1. Respondens Moyses ait: Non credent mihi, neque audient vocem meam, sed dicent: Non apparuit tibi Dominus.
2. Dixit ergo ad eum: Quid est quod tenes in manu tua? Respondit: Virga.
3. Dixitque Dominus: Projice eam in terram. Projecit, et versa est in colubrum, ita ut fugeret Moyses.
4. Dixitque Dominus: Extende manum tuam, et apprehende caudam ejus. Extendit, et tenuit, versaque est in virgam.
5. Ut credant, inquit, quod apparuerit tibi Dominus Deus patrum suorum, Deus Abraham, Deus Isaac et Deus Jacob.
6. Dixitque Dominus rursum: Mitte manum tuam in sinum tuum. Quam cum misisset in sinum, protulit leprosam instar nivis.
7. Retrahe, ait, manum tuam in sinum tuum. Retraxit, et protulit iterum, et erat similis carni reliquæ.
8. Si non crediderint, inquit, tibi, neque audierint sermonem signi prioris, credent verbo signi sequentis.
9. Quod si nec duobus quidem his signis crediderint, neque audierint vocem tuam: sume aquam fluminis, et effunde eam super aridam, et quidquid hauseris de fluvio, vertetur in sanguinem.
10. Ait Moyses: Obsecro, Domine, non sum eloquens ab heri et nudiustertius: et ex quo locutus es ad servum tuum, impeditioris et tardioris linguæ sum.
11. Dixit Dominus ad eum: Quis fecit os hominis? aut quis fabricatus est mutum et surdum, videntem et cæcum? nonne ego?
12. Perge, igitur, et ego ero in ore tuo: doceboque te quid loquaris.
13. At ille: Obsecro, inquit, Domine, mitte quem missurus es.
14. Iratus Dominus in Moysen, ait: Aaron frater tuus Levites, scio quod eloquens sit: ecce ipse egreditur in occursum tuum, vidensque te lætabitur corde.
15. Loquere ad eum, et pone verba mea in ore ejus: et ego ero in ore tuo, et in ore illius, et ostendam vobis quid agere debeatis.
16. Ipse loquetur pro te ad populum, et erit os tuum: tu autem eris ei in his quæ ad Deum pertinent.
17. Virgam quoque hanc sume in manu tua, in qua facturus es signa.
18. Abiit Moyses, et reversus est ad Jethro socerum suum, dixitque ei: Vadam et revertar ad fratres meos in Ægyptum, ut videam si adhuc vivant. Cui ait Jethro: Vade in pace.
19. Dixit ergo Dominus ad Moysen in Madian: Vade, et revertere in Ægyptum, mortui sunt enim omnes qui quærebant animam tuam.
20. Tulit ergo Moyses uxorem suam, et filios suos, et imposuit eos super asinum: reversusque est in Ægyptum, portans virgam Dei in manu sua.
21. Dixitque ei Dominus revertenti in Ægyptum: Vide ut omnia ostenta quæ posui in manu tua, facias coram Pharaone: ego indurabo cor ejus, et non dimittet populum.
22. Dicesque ad eum: Hæc dicit Dominus: Filius meus primogenitus Israël.
23. Dixi tibi: Dimitte filium meum ut serviat mihi; et noluisti dimittere eum: ecce ego interficiam filium tuum primogenitum.
24. Cumque esset in itinere, in diversorio occurrit ei Dominus, et volebat occidere eum.
25. Tulit idcirco Sephora acutissimam petram, et circumcidit præputium filii sui, tetigitque pedes ejus, et ait: Sponsus sanguinum tu mihi es.
26. Et dimisit eum postquam dixerat: Sponsus sanguinum ob circumcisionem.
27. Dixit autem Dominus ad Aaron: Vade in occursum Moysi in desertum. Qui perrexit obviam ei in montem Dei, et osculatus est eum.
28. Narravitque Moyses Aaron omnia verba Domini quibus miserat eum, et signa quæ mandaverat.
29. Veneruntque simul, et congregaverunt cunctos seniores filiorum Israël.
30. Locutusque est Aaron omnia verba quæ dixerat Dominus ad Moysen: et fecit signa coram populo,
31. et credidit populus. Audieruntque quod visitasset Dominus filios Israël, et respexisset afflictionem illorum: et proni adoraverunt.

## Bishop Challoner's notes

Bp. Richard Challoner, notes on the Douay-Rheims (1750); they comment on its older wording.
- Verse 21: Not by being the efficient cause of his sin; but by withdrawing from him, for his just punishment, the dew of grace that might have softened his heart; and so suffering him to grow harder and harder.
- Verse 24: This was an angel representing the Lord, who treated Moses in this manner, for having neglected the circumcision of his younger son; which his wife understanding, circumcised her child upon the spot, upon which the angel let Moses go.

Source: Catholic Public Domain Version (Ronald L. Conte Jr., 2009), public domain; Latin: Clementine Vulgate (1592).