John Gill Commentary Exodus 5:18

"Go therefore now, and work; for there shall no straw be given you, yet shall ye deliver the number of bricks." — Exodus 5:18 (ASV)

Go therefore now, and work
Go about your business, attend to your work, even you officers, as well as your people; work yourselves, as well as see that your people do theirs, and do not trouble me with such impertinent applications:

for there shall no straw be given you, yet shall you deliver the tale of
bricks ;
the usual number of bricks, as the Vulgate Latin version has it; though in (Exodus 5:8) , it is rendered in that version the measure of bricks, and so another word is translated by them, (Exodus 5:14) , and perhaps both may be intended, both number and measure; that is, that it was expected and insisted on that they delivered the full number of bricks they used to make, and these of full measure; for bricks were made of different measures, as Vitruvius ^F16 observes; some among the bricks were of two hands' breadth, others of four, and a third sort of five. (See Gill on Exodus 5:7).

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FOOTNOTES:

• F16: Ut supra. (Vide Vitruvium de Architectura, l. 2. c. 3. p. 46)