What Does Exodus 4:31 Mean?

And the people believed. And when they heard that the LORD had visited the people of Israel and that he had seen their affliction, they bowed their heads and worshiped. The response of the people in verse 31 fulfills the purpose God stated at the burning bush: "this is so that they may believe" (verse 5). The people believe; they do not debate, do not demand additional evidence, do not appoint a committee.

The signs and Aaron's speech are sufficient: they believe. The word "believed" (Hebrew: vaya'aminu) is the fulfillment of the goal stated in verse 1 via the aman root: the credibility concern that prompted Moses' third objection has been resolved by the very means God prescribed.

The community's response to hearing that YHWH had "visited" (Hebrew: paqad) them and "seen" their affliction is worship. The same verb paqad that appeared in Exodus 3:16 in God's words to Moses ("I have observed you and what has been done to you") now appears in the people's reception of the news: they hear that God has paqad them, and they bow in worship.

The people are not primarily moved by the prospect of liberation from slavery, though that prospect is in the message; they are moved by the news that the God of their fathers has seen their suffering. The seeing-and-knowing of God, which costs Moses his freedom and his familiar life in Midian to convey, lands with the people as the central theological claim deserving of worship.

The bowing and worshiping in verse 31 is the first act of Israelite communal worship recorded in Exodus. Before any plague, before any deliverance, before any separation from Egypt, the enslaved people bow their faces to the ground and worship YHWH on the basis of the word brought to them by Moses and Aaron. This is faith as the Hebrews 11 definition intends: "the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen" (Hebrews 11:1).

The worship in verse 31 happens while Israel is still in Egypt, still enslaved, still building Pharaoh's cities. They worship the God of their fathers on the word of two men, with the evidence of three signs, before a single plague has fallen. Their worship is the right beginning of the Exodus story.