Charles Ellicott Commentary Exodus 1:9

"And he said unto his people, Behold, the people of the children of Israel are more and mightier than we:" — Exodus 1:9 (ASV)

He said unto his people. —It is not intended to represent the Egyptian monarch as summoning a popular assembly and addressing it. The phrase “His people” is antithetical to “the people of the children of Israel” and simply indicates that those whom he addressed were of his own nation. No doubt they were his nobles, or, at any rate, his courtiers.

More and mightier than we. —Hebrew, great and mighty in comparison with us. The more to impress his counselors, and gain their consent to his designs, the king exaggerates.

Ancient Egypt must have had a population of seven or eight million, which would imply nearly two million adult males, whereas the adult male Israelites, nearly a century later, were no more than six hundred thousand (Exodus 12:37). Wicked men do not scruple at misrepresentation when they have an end to gain.