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At a time when the Jews were so oppressed, Moses was born, and his mother, seeing how beautiful he was, hid him, risking her life, as long as she could hide him. She was afraid that for neglecting the command of Pharaoh and hiding the baby, as soon as this was revealed, her entire family would be killed, and Moses would not survive. Look, the Egyptians watched the Jews so strictly that the mother of Moses could no longer hide the baby with her. And note at the same time that the goodness of God so carefully preserved the Jews that they left Egypt numbering six hundred thousand. The mother of Moses put the baby in the ark, returned home, knelt down and in prayer with bitter tears complained about Pharaoh to the God of Abraham, saying: “You blessed our people to multiply, and now they are numerous, as you blessed. But Pharaoh intended evil, so that after the destruction of the infants the land would be left without cultivators, and after the destruction of those born, the seed that You blessed would disappear.” Moses' sister Miriam sat on the bank of the river, “so that he might know” (Ex. 2:4) what would happen to the child placed in the ark. For she hoped in God and in the beauty of the baby, she thought that the first one to see the ark would take and save the baby from death. The heat of the day forced Pharaoh's daughter to go to the river at an unusual time and “wash herself” in it (Ex. 2:5). Although she apparently went out of her own free will, due to the heat of the day, but since she did not come out at the usual time, it was not done according to her will. So, her own will involuntarily led her to the river in order to extract from it the one who was appointed to take revenge for the babies drowned in the river by drowning the Egyptians in the sea. Seeing how beautiful the baby was, Pharaoh’s daughter reasoned with her slaves that the Egyptian gods had prepared a son for her barrenness in the river. She rejoiced that by this she would be freed from reproach, would receive great consolation, and for her father there would be a successor to his throne. Then Mariam approached, neither sad nor joyful, in order to hide her real intention with a decent appearance. “And the speech... to the daughter of Pharaoh:... I will call you a Jewish nurse” (Exodus 2:7), who has both pure milk and a beautiful heart, and who is very suitable for both of your kingships. Mariam hurriedly goes home and brings “the child’s mother” (Ex. 2:8) in decent clothes, and for the great gifts the mother agrees to be her son’s nurse. The one who would give the whole house for Moses, so that they would not throw him into the river when they give Moses to her, does not want to raise him for nothing. Finally, she takes her son, but does not leave the ark. And whomever she carried out of the house with sorrow, she brings into the house with joy; whomever she brought to the river in the dark, she brings him back to her, carries him through the streets and brings him into the house with lamps. So it became possible for the mother to see the child she had born, who had been hidden for three months so that no one could see him. So the one who was thrown into the river to lose the light there saw the light. When, at the end of his upbringing, Moses was brought to the house of the pharaohs, he pleased his parents with his beauty, but their tongue-tiedness saddened them. Moses, by his circumcision and, especially by the stories he secretly heard from his mother and sister, knew that he was the son of Jochebed. And since the completion of four hundred years was approaching, Moses came to his brothers to test whether the deliverance of the Jews could not be accomplished by his hand. And since the overseer killed by Moses was superior in cruelty to all the overseers of Pharaoh, and although Moses very often reproached him, he did not listen to the reproaches, then, having killed him, Moses hid in the sand the one who oppressed the seed, which, by the blessing of God, was destined to become more numerous than the sand of the sea. Moses hid him in the sand of the river before those of his brethren, whose bodies were to be thrown out by the sea onto the sand of the seashore. “And on the second day he came out and saw two men... fighting” (Ex. 2:13). As the king's son, he had the power to punish and put to death, but he does not use the power, but only gives a fair reprimand to the offender. And the offender, instead of accepting a reprimand, in front of everyone accuses the king’s son of murder and says: “Who made you a prince... over us?” ( Ex. 2:14 ). How can you, a shamelessly self-willed man, say to the king’s son: “Who made you a prince... over us?” He is also the prince over the guards who supervise you. How is he not a prince over you? However, Moses was horrified when, beyond his expectations, he learned that his case had been disclosed. It was not the Jew who was saved by him who accused Moses of murder. If the reproach was unfair, it means that Moses did not kill the Egyptian for him. The Jew, delivered from the Egyptian, was offended, just like the virgins who were offended at the well. Moses, having killed the Egyptian, wanted to make it easier for the Jews who were oppressed by the Egyptian. But the delivered one revealed it to another Jew out of friendship, but the other one, out of malice, accused Moses. And so Pharaoh learned about this, and the commander and the princes had an opportunity to complain against Moses, who reproached them for causing evil to the Jews without mercy. Pharaoh became so angry that he was ready to stain his hands with the blood of his adopted son and put to death the heir to his throne. Moses was afraid to cause grief to his true parents when those who adopted him subjected him to torture, and fled to the land of Midian. “And he sat down by the storehouse” (Ex. 2:15). When he sees that the lazy shepherds are insolently taking away the water drawn by the virgins, then, in his truthfulness, he delivers them from violence and, out of pity, waters their sheep. And since the father asked his daughters about the reason for his quick return, they tell him about the truthful and compassionate act of Moses. The father sends to call him so that he can come and eat his bread, and thus in his house he is rewarded for the good deed he showed to his daughters at the storehouse. And since Moses was occupied with the thought of where to go and where to stay, then, as soon as the priest sent for him, he understood from this that He who had delivered him from death in the river by the hand of Pharaoh’s daughter and who had saved him from the hands of the king by fleeing from the eyes of Pharaoh, had now given the priest the idea of ​​bringing him to himself and making him his daughter’s groom. So God delivered Moses from the wise men and brought him to the priest. Moses was not afraid of the priest, just as he was not afraid of the wise men; if he did not receive benefit from them, he did not suffer harm. Aaron and Miriam grieve over the one in whom they once boasted and were magnified. And Jethro, seeing the beauty and fidelity of Moses (especially for the sake of God accompanying him), convinces Moses to take Zipporah as his wife in order to free Zipporah and her sisters from pastoral (shepherd) labors, just as Jacob freed Laban’s daughters from similar labors. And Moses took Zipporah, and she bore him two sons. He circumcised the first, but Zipporah did not allow him to circumcise the other, relying on his father and his brothers. For although she agreed to be Moses’ wife, she did not want to be of the same faith with him. As the daughter of a priest, raised by the meat of victims, she was accustomed to the veneration of many gods. And she did not allow him to circumcise both sons, and did not refuse to circumcise both of them. And having given up one son so that Abraham’s circumcision might be accomplished in him, she refused another, so that the uncircumcision of her father’s house might continue in him. But when naming the names of his sons, Moses did not please either her mother or her father. He gave the name to the first in memory of his migration, which he endured for the sake of God, and to the other - in memory of his deliverance from Pharaoh. After forty years had passed, which Moses spent in the land of Midian, Pharaoh, who tormented the Jews, died, and they calmed down after their hard slavery. They remembered God’s covenant with Abraham and that the time had already been fulfilled, even that another thirty years had passed, and they began to pray and were heard. “And God looked upon the children of Israel” (Ex. 2:25) and God knew what their sorrows were and how to heal them. You might be interested in: