15 For now I will stretch out my hand, that I may smite thee and thy people with pestilence; and thou shalt be cut off from the earth.
15 For by now I could have stretched out my hand and struck you and your people with a plague that would have wiped you off the earth.
15 For by now I could have put out my hand and struck you and your people with pestilence, and you would have been cut off from the earth.
15 You know that by now I could have struck you and your people with deadly disease and there would be nothing left of you, not a trace.
15 Now if I had stretched out My hand and struck you and your people with pestilence, then you would have been cut off from the earth.
15 By now I could have lifted my hand and struck you and your people with a plague to wipe you off the face of the earth.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Exodus 9:15
Commentary on Exodus 9:13-21
(Read Exodus 9:13-21)
Moses is here ordered to deliver a dreadful message to Pharaoh. Providence ordered it, that Moses should have a man of such a fierce and stubborn spirit as this Pharaoh to deal with; and every thing made it a most signal instance of the power of God has to humble and bring down the proudest of his enemies. When God's justice threatens ruin, his mercy at the same time shows a way of escape from it. God not only distinguished between Egyptians and Israelites, but between some Egyptians and others. If Pharaoh will not yield, and so prevent the judgment itself, yet those that will take warning, may take shelter. Some believed the things which were spoken, and they feared, and housed their servants and cattle, and it was their wisdom. Even among the servants of Pharaoh, some trembled at God's word; and shall not the sons of Israel dread it? But others believed not, and left their cattle in the field. Obstinate unbelief is deaf to the fairest warnings, and the wisest counsels, which leaves the blood of those that perish upon their own heads.