'Better' in the Bible

Did we not say to you in Egypt, Let us be as we are, working for the Egyptians? for it is better to be the servants of the Egyptians than to come to our death in the waste land.

And the children of Israel said to them, It would have been better for the Lord to have put us to death in the land of Egypt, where we were seated by the flesh-pots and had bread enough for our needs; for you have taken us out to this waste of sand, to put all this people to death through need of food.