A TRIAL, test — the noun behind the place-name Massah, where Israel tested Jehovah for water (Exodus 17:7, already on these pages), and here reversed: what Jehovah tested ISRAEL with, in the plural. Deuteronomy repeats the exact phrase ha-masot ha-gedolot, ‘the great trials’, of the same exodus events at 4:34 and 7:19 (already on these pages), always beside otot and mofetim, signs and wonders — three nouns for one set of events, none of them fully distinguished from the others. → first discussed at Deut 4:34