Exodus · chapter 2 of 40
Updated on
Exodus 2 tells how a Hebrew baby from the tribe of Levi is hidden in a basket on the Nile, rescued by Pharaoh's daughter and raised as Moses. As an adult he kills an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew and flees to Midian, where he marries Zipporah, the priest's daughter. Meanwhile God hears Israel's groaning and remembers his covenant.
After Pharaoh ordered the Hebrew baby boys thrown into the Nile, Exodus 2 introduces the man God will use to rescue his people. The chapter moves through three stages of his life: his birth and rescue, his failed attempt to help his own people, and his exile in Midian. It ends with the statement that God has not forgotten Israel.
A man of the house of Levi marries a Levite woman, and she bears a son. Seeing that he was beautiful, she hid him for three months. When she could hide him no longer, she took a basket of papyrus, sealed it with bitumen and pitch, put the child in it and set it among the reeds at the edge of the Nile. His sister stood at a distance to see what would happen.
Pharaoh's daughter came down to bathe in the river, saw the basket and felt compassion for the crying baby. The sister stepped forward and offered to find a Hebrew nurse; she called the child's own mother, and Pharaoh's daughter paid her to nurse him. When the child grew, she brought him to Pharaoh's daughter, who adopted him and named him Moses, because she drew him out of the water.
As a grown man, Moses went out to see his people, saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew and, looking around, struck the Egyptian down and hid him in the sand. The next day a Hebrew challenged him over what he had done, and Moses was afraid the deed was known. Pharaoh tried to kill him, and Moses fled to the land of Midian, where he sat down by a well. There he defended the seven daughters of the priest of Midian from some shepherds, and the priest welcomed him; Moses stayed, married his daughter Zipporah, and they had a son, Gershom.
After a long time the king of Egypt died, and the Israelites groaned under slavery. Their cry rose to God, who heard them, remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, looked on the Israelites and took notice.
References follow ESV book names and verse numbers. Read each verse in your Bible before the explanation.
Unable to hide him any longer, Moses' mother made a waterproof basket of papyrus and set the child by the river. It is an act of faith and ingenuity: she gives her son to the Nile, meant to be his grave, and leaves him in God's hands.
The child grew, was adopted by Pharaoh's daughter and received the name Moses, because she drew him out of the water. The same power that wanted to destroy the Hebrews ended up raising their future deliverer.
Pharaoh heard what Moses had done and sought to kill him, so Moses fled to Midian. His attempt to free Israel by his own strength fails; God will have to prepare him in another way.
God heard Israel's groaning and remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The verse does not say God had forgotten, but that he is now acting according to his promise.
6 questions with answers and references, ready for Sunday school, small group or a Bible quiz night.
Answer: The tribe of Levi. — Exodus 2:1
Answer: She hid him three months, then put him in a papyrus basket among the reeds at the edge of the Nile. — Exodus 2:2-3
Answer: Pharaoh's daughter, who had compassion on him. — Exodus 2:5-6
Answer: I drew him out of the water. — Exodus 2:10
Answer: Because he killed an Egyptian and Pharaoh sought to kill him. — Exodus 2:12-15
Answer: Zipporah, the daughter of the priest of Midian; their son was named Gershom. — Exodus 2:21-22
Exodus 2 shows God at work in unexpected places: a basket of reeds, a princess's compassion, a sister's courage. When God seems absent, this chapter reminds us that his plans move forward in what looks ordinary, and that he prepares people for years before using them.
Moses' story also teaches humility. His attempt to fix injustice by force failed and led to forty years in the wilderness. In Sunday school you can reflect on how to wait for God's timing without ceasing to love justice, and on how the cry of the suffering reaches the Lord, who hears it.
Exodus 2 ends with a decisive sentence: God heard, remembered, looked and took notice of his people. Moses' preparation in Midian is nearing its end, and Exodus 3 tells how God calls him from a bush that burns without being consumed.
The text says she felt compassion when she saw him crying and recognized he was a Hebrew child. It says nothing more; the narrative stresses that God used the compassion of Pharaoh's own household to save his deliverer.
The Bible tells the deed without expressly approving it. Moses acted in secret, and his act was not accepted by his own people nor did it spare him from fleeing. Many readers understand that he tried to help his people on his own, and that God had to prepare him for forty years before calling him to free Israel.
In this chapter he is called Reuel, and elsewhere in Exodus he is called Jethro. He was Zipporah's father and took Moses in when he fled from Egypt.