Chapter 1-2
Because Pharaoh wanted to eliminate all males born to the Hebrews, and because nothing else, to this point, had eliminated boys; the king of Egypt, ordered all babies born boys were to be thrown in the Nile. Once again baby girls could live, boys could not. Remember girls were great! They did not cause uprisings or fight wars. What is surprising is Pharaoh said all boys born from this date forward should be thrown into the Nile River.
The majority of translations of Scripture makes it clear that it was every boy. Quoting from Scripture (1:22) “And Pharaoh charged all his people, saying, every son that is born you shall cast into the river.” There are a few translations that say that it is every boy from the Hebrew tribe that should be thrown in the Nile.
It was confusing because why would Pharaoh kill off his own future army. While searching for that answer it was easy to realize all that is necessary is to go back to Exodus 1:16 where the Midwives were instructed to “kill all baby boys of the Israelites”. The only difference now is Pharaoh is no longer expecting the midwives to commit infanticide on all Israeli baby boys, but he is now instructing ALL the Egyptians to participate in this practice.
Going on to chapter two we are told “A certain man of the house of Levi went and married a Levite woman.” We are not given their names, evidently God wanted us to focus on the result of this union and not on the people. That woman conceived and bore a son and when she saw how beautiful he was she hid him for three months. Moses’s birth was in no way miraculous. Later we learn Amram and Jochebed were the parents of Moses.
God chose Moses to lead the Jews out of Egypt because of his exceptional moral and leadership traits. He was not preordained to lead and he was a normal mortal. It was Moses’s mother who played the critical role in saving him and the whole story plays out like a beautiful fairy tale. We’ve all heard the story before.
When she could hide him no longer, she got a wicker basket and caulked it with bitumen and pitch. The same substances that were used on Noah’s Ark. She placed her child in it and placed it among the reeds, by the bank of the Nile River. His older sister, Miriam, sat nearby so she could see what happened to him.
The daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe in the Nile. Her maidens gave her privacy and walked down the Nile. While going in to bathe, Pharaoh’s daughter spied the basket among the reeds and sent her slave girl to retrieve it. She opened it and saw it was a child. Actually, a crying baby boy. She took pity on it and said “This must be a Hebrew child.” It’s rather ironic that we are told she knew it was a Hebrew boy baby and yet she took pity on it. Her own father set out to annihilate the Hebrews and yet she was going to save one of them.
This is a lesson for all of us. It doesn’t matter what your lineage, it matters who and what you are. You can be moral and good even if you are raised by bad people. It doesn’t even matter what your past has been – you can still act moral and good. Another figure in this story who is moral and good is Moses’s sister who was brave enough to speak up and ask, “Shall I go and get you a Hebrew nurse.” Here she was, being bold enough to make herself known and to offer assistance to the daughter of the king when she herself was only a slave girl.
Being moral and good has nothing to do with our station or situation in life. It solely depends on our own character.
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