MOSES APPEARS
Chapter 2
The Pharaoh's decree ordering the Egyptians to throw in the river Nile all male Hebrew children as they were born was in force for three years, according to the oral traditions of the Hebrews.
From the sons of Jacob, the Israelites were divided into tribes and, it seems, avoided marriages outside each tribe so as not to confuse inheritances. We read here of a man from the tribe of Levi, who married a descendant of Levi. He was Amram (high people), grandson of Levi and his wife was Jochebed (Jehovah-gloried) (Chapter 6:20). Before the birth of Moses they had two children, Miriam (Mary, rebelliously) and Aaron (mountaineer), before the above-mentioned Decree had been issued.
Jochebed could hide their third child for three months, but then handed him into the hands of God: cautiously obeying the Pharaoh's decree, she placed him in the reeds by the River Nile in an ark made of bulrushes, covered with waterproof bitumen and tar. The word for ark found here, in the original Hebrew is the same as in the case of Noah’s ark (the boats used on the river Nile at that time were built in the same way as this ark). The bulrushes (papyrus reeds) grow up to five metres in height, are easy to pluck, and an ark made like this and placed between them would be protected from weather and would be hard to see. Miriam, fifteen years of age at the time, stood at a distance watching what would happen.
According to some scholars Egyptian princesses wouldn't be in the habit of going down to the Nile River to bathe, for they would have had their own private baths. This must have been an exceptional occasion, totally unexpected by Jochebed: if she had suspected that the Pharaoh's daughter was coming to that place, she would hardly have left him there. But in all this we see the hand of God, who used the gesture of faith of this Hebrew mother to put her son in the palace of the Pharaoh.
Sometimes, we also feel surrounded by evil and frustrated because there is not much we can do ourselves to avoid it: like this woman, we must use the resources at our disposal, and trust God to use our efforts, no matter how small they may seem, to face the evil.
Pharaoh's daughter proved not to be as evil as her father. Hearing the child weep, while recognising him to be of the Hebrews, she had compassion, heard and accepted the offer of Miriam to find a wet nurse from his people.
We also see how Miriam boldly went to speek to Pharaoh's daughter when she saw her little brother in her hands, and offered to find a wet nurse. With this, the family could be reunited, now under the protection of the daughter of Pharaoh and receiving her pay. God often gives us unexpected opportunities to serve him: one must be prepared to take advantage of them, without fearing the circumstances.
Moses was nursed and brought up initially by his mother: she would have told him some of the history of his people, and passed on to him the knowledge of God.
When Moses had grown, Jochebed took him to Pharaoh's daughter, who adopted him, calling him Moses (drawn out, or rescued). So he became a member of the royal family of Egypt. It is likely that his mother continued to be kept as his nanny for a long time at the palace, which was very important for his religious training and to get him to admit the Hebrews as his brethren (v. 11).
The narrative continues, in verse 11, when Moses was already a man of 40 years of age (Acts 7:23). He would have grown up in the middle of the grandeur and luxury of Pharaoh's court, being instructed in the arts and sciences of the Egyptians, improving himself physically and intellectually (Acts 7:22). Historians tell us that Egypt at that time already had two universities, so it is presumed that he would have graduated in one of them, probably at Heliopolis, at about the age of twenty.
According to a Hebrew tradition, during the following twenty years he served in Pharaoh's army as an officer, and led a military campaign against Ethiopia, where he acquired fame as a general of great skill. After the war, Moses returned to the Egyptian court, where he received medals, honours and riches. But beneath this exterior of a member of the royal family and a national hero, no doubt there was some secret uneasiness knowing that he was a Hebrew, and that his people was being afflicted by the Egyptians.
One day Moses decided to leave the palace to go and see firsthand what was happening to his people. He witnessed their burdens (v. 11), and undoubtedly felt on his shoulders the responsibility to do something for them. He could not remain indifferent to the prevailing situation.
He realised that the time had come to give them his support so that they could break their yoke, which meant refusing to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, and choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin (Hebrews 11:24-25), certain that God would bless his decision for the welfare of His people.
He was outraged when he saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew. Perhaps without thinking of the consequences, seeing no one around, he killed the Egyptian and hid his body in the sand. But there was at least one witness: the Hebrew that he had thus relieved.
The next day, he witnessed a fight between two Hebrews and was reprimanding the aggressor. This individual not only proved to be insubordinate but revealed that he knew that Moses had killed the Egyptian. Moses then realized that the news had spread.
The case reached the ears of the supreme authority, the Pharaoh, who soon sought to kill Moses; but he fled Egypt and went to the land of Midian, South of the Sinai peninsula. He probably followed the same path that later he would take ahead of the people of Israel to go to Mount Sinai.
Moses, because of his crime done in secret (as he thought) was forced to flee to a distant land, and stay in exile for the next forty years, alien in a strange land, separated from his home and his family. However, the Bible tells us that by faith he forsook Egypt: (forty years later) he did not fear the wrath of the king; but he endured as seeing God who is invisible (Hebrews 11:27): a great spiritual progress was achieved by him during his exile.
As had happened with Jacob centuries before (Genesis 29: 2) he reached a well where there were troughs for livestock. There he met the seven daughters of the priest of Midian, named Reuel or Jethro (Chapter 3: 1): they were descendants of Abraham by Keturah (Genesis 25:2) and he served the true God (chapter 18: 9-12).
Shortly afterward shepherds came and began to shoo them away, but Moses stood up and defended them (an Egyptian warrior, veteran of military campaigns, Moses had no difficulty in dealing with a group of shepherds). Then he gave water to their flock.
Upon learning what had happened, Jethro received him at home as part of his family. In due course he gave him one of his daughters, Zipporah (female bird), and Moses called his first son Gerson (expulsion). There he remained for over forty years, tending sheep.
It was an apprenticeship in the art of shepherding, for the Lord was preparing Moses to lead the people of Israel, after releasing them from the Egyptians as promised (Genesis 15:16, 46:3,4). The people had waited a long time for this to happen, but God did it when the right time came. This was when the Pharaoh who wanted to kill Moses died.
R David Jones
1 And a man of the house of Levi went and took as wife a daughter of Levi.
2 So the woman conceived and bore a son. And when she saw that he was a beautiful child, she hid him three months.
3 But when she could no longer hide him, she took an ark of bulrushes for him, daubed it with asphalt and pitch, put the child in it, and laid it in the reeds by the river's bank.
4 And his sister stood afar off, to know what would be done to him.
5 Then the daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe at the river. And her maidens walked along the riverside; and when she saw the ark among the reeds, she sent her maid to get it.
6 And when she opened it, she saw the child, and behold, the baby wept. So she had compassion on him, and said, "This is one of the Hebrews' children."
7 Then his sister said to Pharaoh's daughter, "Shall I go and call a nurse for you from the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for you?"
8 And Pharaoh's daughter said to her, "Go." So the maiden went and called the child's mother.
9 Then Pharaoh's daughter said to her, "Take this child away and nurse him for me, and I will give you your wages." So the woman took the child and nursed him.
10 And the child grew, and she brought him to Pharaoh's daughter, and he became her son. So she called his name Moses, saying, "Because I drew him out of the water."
11 Now it came to pass in those days, when Moses was grown, that he went out to his brethren and looked at their burdens. And he saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his brethren.
12 So he looked this way and that way, and when he saw no one, he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.
13 And when he went out the second day, behold, two Hebrew men were fighting, and he said to the one who did the wrong, "Why are you striking your companion?"
14 Then he said, "Who made you a prince and a judge over us? Do you intend to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?" So Moses feared and said, "Surely this thing is known!"
15 When Pharaoh heard of this matter, he sought to kill Moses. But Moses fled from the face of Pharaoh and dwelt in the land of Midian; and he sat down by a well.
16 Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters. And they came and drew water, and they filled the troughs to water their father's flock.
17 Then the shepherds came and drove them away; but Moses stood up and helped them, and watered their flock.
18 When they came to Reuel their father, he said, "How is it that you have come so soon today?"
19 And they said, "An Egyptian delivered us from the hand of the shepherds, and he also drew enough water for us and watered the flock."
20 So he said to his daughters, "And where is he? Why is it that you have left the man? Call him, that he may eat bread."
21 Then Moses was content to live with the man, and he gave Zipporah his daughter to Moses.
22 And she bore him a son. He called his name Gershom, for he said, "I have been a stranger in a foreign land."
23 Now it happened in the process of time that the king of Egypt died. Then the children of Israel groaned because of the bondage, and they cried out; and their cry came up to God because of the bondage.
24 So God heard their groaning, and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob.
25 And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God acknowledged them.
Exodus chapter 2