Exodus 2

Moses’s Birth and Adoption

¹Now a man from the family of Levi married a Levite woman. ^{a 2}The woman became pregnant and gave birth to a son; when she saw that he was beautiful, ^b she hid him for three months. ^{c 3}But when she could no longer hide him, she got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with asphalt and pitch. She placed the child in it and set it among the reeds by the bank of the Nile. ⁴Then his sister ^d stood at a distance in order to see what would happen to him.

⁵Pharaoh’s daughter went down to bathe at the Nile while her servant girls walked along the riverbank. She saw the basket among the reeds, sent her slave girl, took it, ⁶opened it, and saw him, the child #— #and there he was, a little boy, crying. She felt sorry for him and said, “This is one of the Hebrew boys.”

⁷Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Should I go and call a Hebrew woman who is nursing to nurse the boy for you? ”

⁸“Go,” Pharaoh’s daughter told her. So the girl went and called the boy’s mother. ⁹Then Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child and nurse him for me, and I will pay your wages.” So the woman took the boy and nursed him. ¹⁰When the child grew older, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. She named him Moses, ^e “Because,” she said, “I drew him out of the water.”

Moses in Midian

¹¹Years later, ^f after Moses had grown up, he went out to his own people ^g and observed their forced labor. ^h He saw an Egyptian striking a Hebrew, one of his people. ¹²Looking all around and seeing no one, he struck the Egyptian dead and hid him in the sand. ¹³The next day he went out and saw two Hebrews fighting. He asked the one in the wrong, “Why are you attacking your neighbor? ” ⁱ

¹⁴“Who made you a commander and judge over us? ” the man replied. “Are you planning to kill me as you killed the Egyptian? ”

Then Moses became afraid and thought, “What I did is certainly known.”

¹⁵When Pharaoh heard about this, he tried to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh and went to live in the land of Midian, ^j and sat down by a well. ^k

¹⁶Now the priest of Midian ^l had seven daughters. They came to draw water and filled the troughs to water their father’s flock. ¹⁷Then some shepherds arrived and drove them away, but Moses came to their rescue and watered their flock. ¹⁸When they returned to their father Reuel, ^m,ⁿ he asked, “Why have you come back so quickly today? ”

¹⁹They answered, “An Egyptian rescued us from the shepherds. He even drew water for us and watered the flock.”

²⁰“So where is he? ” he asked his daughters. “Why then did you leave the man behind? Invite him to eat dinner.”

²¹Moses agreed to stay with the man, and he gave his daughter Zipporah ^o to Moses in marriage. ²²She gave birth to a son whom he named Gershom, ^p for he said, “I have been a resident alien ^q in a foreign land.”

²³After a long time, the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned because of their difficult labor, they cried out, ^r and their cry for help because of the difficult labor ascended to God. ²⁴God heard their groaning, and God remembered ^s his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. ^{t 25}God saw the Israelites, and God knew. ^u