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MOSES – NO
ORDINARY CHILD
All Bible references are to the Anglicised New International Version
(NIV-UK)
At that time Moses was
born, and he was no ordinary child. For three
months
he was cared for
in his father’s house. When he was placed outside, Pharaoh’s daughter took him
and brought him up as her own son. Moses was
educated
in all the wisdom of the
Egyptians and was powerful in speech and action.
Acts
7: 20–22
IT
SEEMS QUITE REMARKABLE
that the great man who was to be God’s agent in leading
His chosen people Israel out of slavery in Egypt, should have been the adopted
son of the great Pharaoh’s daughter. Adopted son? Yes, and his story
illustrates the love of two women ― his birth mother and his adoptive
mother.
Jochebed and Amram were happy at the birth of a
second son, a brother for Miriam and Aaron, but fearful for his life, as the
ruthless Egyptian Pharaoh had recently ruled that all male children born to
Hebrew women must be drowned. This was a period of great
oppression, when the Egyptians, concerned at the phenomenal increase of the immigrant people in their midst,
‘made their lives bitter with hard labour in brick and mortar and with all kinds of work in the
fields; in all their hard
labour the Egyptians used
them ruthlessly’ (Exodus 1: 14). Pharaoh’s edict was an effort to halt the
increase of the Hebrew families, regarded as a threat to the native population.
Moses’
mother had not complied with the command, but it became increasingly
difficult to keep the child hidden. Fearing his abduction by the Egyptian
authorities, she prayed for God’s guidance, and constructed a basket of papyrus
reeds, made it waterproof with tar, put her baby comfortably inside and placed
the little craft among the reeds along the bank of the Nile, leaving her
daughter to watch from a distance to see what would happen to the baby.
Miriam
crouched among the reeds and waited. Soon she heard laughter and saw the
princess, daughter of the Pharaoh, coming down to the river to bathe,
accompanied by her maid servants. Perhaps Jochebed had
deliberately chosen the spot, or was directed by God where to place the cradle,
and its discovery by the princess was certainly no accident. She realised the
child was a Hebrew, but being childless herself, her motherly longings were
immediately drawn to the beautiful baby, and her mind was made up. He would be
hers!
Miriam was
old and wise enough to think quickly, and running out
suggested that the princess might want a nurse to care for the child. She
agreed, and of course it was the baby’s mother who was entrusted with that
responsibility. So Jochebed nursed her baby boy
through his infancy and was even paid for the privilege. After a few years she
took him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. She named him Moses,
which means ‘drawn out’ ― because ‘I drew him out of
the water’, she said (Exodus 2: 8–10).
A Prince in
Egypt
As the son
of an influential woman in the dynasty ruling in Egypt at that time, Moses was
accorded all the privileges and honours of nobility ― the finest linen clothing,
the richest diet, a staff of slaves to attend his every need. In luxurious
palace surroundings his was a princely existence. Tutors were appointed to
educate the adopted prince in all the arts and sciences of the Egyptians, a
learned and accomplished people, and though he was born a slave, Moses earned
the respect and acclaim of many in his adoptive nation as he grew to
manhood.
Yet there
would be some who resented the elevation of a slave boy to the status of a
future ruler, potentially even to the office of Pharaoh. In royal circles also,
Moses was watched suspiciously, and his survival of any schemes to remove him
from his privileged position indicates the immense power of his princess mother, and a real fear of her revenge if Moses were harmed.
It is
reasonable to believe that throughout those years he was permitted to visit the
Hebrew woman who had nursed him through infancy, and he would be fully aware of
his humble origins. Jochebed and Amram would instruct their son in the knowledge of the true
God, tell him of their forefathers and of the divine promises to Abraham and his
descendants. Moses would perhaps wonder in those years what God’s purpose might
be in placing him in a strange situation, among a people worshipping various
false gods and goddesses, and it proved to be many years before he would have
the answer to his questions.
The
Refugee
The
extensive building ambitions of the Pharaohs in those years still kept the
Hebrew slaves in hard labour. As Moses toured the building sites in his chariot
he grieved to see the suffering of his kinsmen sweating in the scorching sun,
whipped by their Egyptian masters, but he felt powerless to change the
situation.
But a day
came when Moses witnessed an Egyptian supervisor beating up a Hebrew slave, and
his anger drove him to drastic action. Glancing around and believing he was
unobserved, he killed the Egyptian bully and buried his
body in the sandy ground.
Back on the
site the next day, Moses intervened when he saw two Hebrews fighting each other.
He parted them and asked the one who started it, ‘Why are you hitting your
fellow Hebrew?’ The man retorted, ‘Who made you ruler and judge over us? Are you thinking
of killing me as you killed the Egyptian?’ In sudden alarm, Moses realised that
what he had done had become known. Now his own life was
in danger!
The Bible
record simply states that when Pharaoh heard of it, he tried to kill
Moses.
Though Moses’ high
status would protect him from punishment for the murder of a mere overseer,
Pharaoh and other ambitious Egyptians may have viewed the incident as
a means of removing the Hebrew prince from his privileged position.
They asserted that Moses killing the man for carrying out his duties to
Pharaoh would brand him a rebel against the king, and accordingly, Pharaoh
ordered his execution.
Escape to
Midian
Moses surely had
some help in making his escape from Egypt ― a sturdy horse, a supply of food and
water, some basic tools, and perhaps a few items precious to himself as tokens
of the love of family and friends. His journey took him south-east along the
Sinai Peninsula, passing through terrain usually referred to as wilderness, wild
grass grown spaces with hardy shrubs, crossed by the few tracks used by nomadic
tribes and occasional travelling tradesmen.
Moses had covered
perhaps two hundred miles when his journey ended in the land of Midian, either by his own choice, or by the guidance of God.
The Midianites were in fact distant relatives of the
Hebrews, and a surprising event earned for Moses the gratitude and respect of a
family of herdsmen settled in the area at that time. Approaching a well and
needing to replenish his water supply, he found seven young women trying to draw
water for their father’s flocks, but being harassed and pushed away by some
rough shepherds. With his habitual sense of justice, Moses challenged the
bullies and made them wait their turn at the well while he drew water for the
girls, who then hurried home to tell Reuel, their
father what had happened.
Moses had found a
new home, a new life and a wife who loved him ― Zipporah, Reuel’s eldest daughter.
Once a prince in Egypt, he became a hard-working, humble shepherd. For forty long years
in Midian he wondered about God’s purpose in putting a
Hebrew slave boy through such strange experiences. But the time was coming when
he would be faced with a greater challenge than he could ever have imagined.
That must be the subject of another story, and it will prove that Moses, who had
been no ordinary child, in his old age proved himself to be no ordinary man.
_____________
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