“Pharaoh said: Behold, the people of the land are now many; and will you cause them to cease from their burdens?” (Exodus 5:5). “Pharaoh said: Behold, the people of the land are now many” – he said to them: ‘If it were one thousand people that you seek or two thousand, I would allow it. Is it six hundred thousand that you seek? Go to your burdens.’
Another interpretation: Rabbi Nehorai said: From where do you derive that only two of six hundred thousand of Israel emerged from Egypt?30All the rest died in the three days of pitch darkness during the plague of darkness. Regarding the wilderness it is stated: “I said I would pour My fury upon them in the wilderness, to consume them” (Ezekiel 20:13), and regarding the wilderness it is stated: “I said I would pour My fury upon them, to spend My anger upon them in the midst of the land of Egypt” (Ezekiel 20:8).
Just as in the wilderness only two of six hundred thousand remained of them,31Of the six hundred thousand men who left Egypt, only Caleb and Joshua entered the land of Israel. so too, in Egypt, only two of six hundred thousand remained of them. “Behold, the people of the land are now many.”32They are many now, but ultimately they will be far fewer.