We cried to the LORD: the sense is that they protested, they prayed in anguish and pain to the LORD to rescue them.

The God of our fathers: again the sense is “our ancestors.” This is usually a reference to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. In some languages direct speech will be used for the first part of this verse: “We called out to Yahweh the God our ancestors worshiped, saying, ‘Please help us!’ ”

The LORD heard our voice: that is, the LORD heard our prayers, our cries, our protests.

Saw our affliction … toil … oppression: again three terms that are similar in meaning are used to stress the desperate nature of their situation. Here Good News Translation uses three terms: “our suffering, hardship, and misery.” Contemporary English Version has only two: “we were in trouble and abused.” Another possible model for the final part of this verse is “He heard our cries for help, and saw how miserable we were as the Egyptians oppressed us and made us work hard.”

Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Deuteronomy. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2000. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .