Moses

Easton's Bible Dictionary (1897)

Drawn (or Egypt. mesu, “son;” hence Rameses, royal son). On the invitation of Pharaoh (Gen. 45:17-25), Jacob and his sons went down into Egypt. This immigration took place probably about 350 years before the birth of Moses. Some centuries before Joseph, Egypt had been conquered by a pastoral Semitic race from Asia, the Hyksos, who brought into cruel subjection the native Egyptians, who were an African race. Jacob and his retinue were accustomed to a shepherd’s life, and on their arrival in Egypt were received with favour by the king, who assigned them the “best of the land”, the land of Goshen, to dwell in. The Hyksos or “shepherd” king who thus showed favour to Joseph and his family was in all probability the Pharaoh Apopi (or Apopis). Thus favoured, the Israelites began to “multiply exceedingly” (Gen. 47:27), and extended to the west and south. At length the supremacy of the Hyksos came to an end. The descendants of Jacob were allowed to retain their possession of Goshen undisturbed, but after the death of Joseph their position was not so favourable. The Egyptians began to despise them, and the period of their “affliction” (Gen. 15:13) commenced. They were sorely oppressed. They continued, however, to increase in numbers, and “the land was filled with them” (Ex. 1:7). The native Egyptians regarded them with suspicion, so that they felt all the hardship of a struggle for existence. In process of time “a king [probably Seti I.] arose who knew not Joseph” (Ex. 1:8). (See PHARAOH.) The circumstances of the country were such that this king thought it necessary to weaken his Israelite subjects by oppressing them, and by degrees reducing their number. They were accordingly made public slaves, and were employed in connection with his numerous buildings, especially in the erection of store-cities, temples, and palaces. The children of Israel were made to serve with rigour. Their lives were made bitter with hard bondage, and “all their service, wherein they made them serve, was with rigour” (Ex. 1:13, 14). But this cruel oppression had not the result expected of reducing their number. On the contrary, “the more the Egyptians afflicted them, the more they multiplied and grew” (Ex. 1:12). The king next tried, through a compact secretly made with the guild of midwives, to bring about the destruction of all the Hebrew male children that might be born. But the king’s wish was not rigorously enforced; the male children were spared by the midwives, so that “the people multiplied” more than ever. Thus baffled, the king issued a public proclamation calling on the people to put to death all the Hebrew male children by casting them into the river (Ex. 1:22). But neither by this edict was the king’s purpose effected. One of the Hebrew households into which this cruel edict of the king brought great alarm was that of Amram, of the family of the Kohathites (Ex. 6:16-20), who with his wife Jochebed and two children, Miriam, a girl of perhaps fifteen years of age, and Aaron, a boy of three years, resided in or near Memphis, the capital city of that time. In this quiet home a male child was born (B.C. 1571). His mother concealed him in the house for three months from the knowledge of the civic authorities. But when the task of concealment became difficult, Jochebed contrived to bring her child under the notice of the daughter of the king by constructing for him an ark of bulrushes, which she laid among the flags which grew on the edge of the river at the spot where the princess was wont to come down and bathe. Her plan was successful. The king’s daughter “saw the child; and behold the child wept.” The princess (see PHARAOH’S DAUGHTER [1]) sent Miriam, who was standing by, to fetch a nurse. She went and brought the mother of the child, to whom the princess said, “Take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages.” Thus Jochebed’s child, whom the princess called “Moses”, i.e., “Saved from the water” (Ex. 2:10), was ultimately restored to her. As soon as the natural time for weaning the child had come, he was transferred from the humble abode of his father to the royal palace, where he was brought up as the adopted son of the princess, his mother probably accompanying him and caring still for him. He grew up amid all the grandeur and excitement of the Egyptian court, maintaining, however, probably a constant fellowship with his mother, which was of the highest importance as to his religious belief and his interest in his “brethren.” His education would doubtless be carefully attended to, and he would enjoy all the advantages of training both as to his body and his mind. He at length became “learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians” (Acts 7:22). Egypt had then two chief seats of learning, or universities, at one of which, probably that of Heliopolis, his education was completed. Moses, being now about twenty years of age, spent over twenty more before he came into prominence in Bible history. These twenty year

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Smith's Bible Dictionary (1863)

(Heb. Mosheh, “drawn,” i.e. from the water; in the Coptic it means “saved from the water”), the legislator of the Jewish people, and in a certain sense the founder of the Jewish religion. The immediate pedigree of Moses is as follows: Levi was the father of: Gershon— Kohath— Merari Kohath was the father of: Amram = Jochebed Amram = Jochebed was the father of: Hur = Miriam— Aaron = Elisheba— Moses = Zipporah Aaron = Elisheba was the father of: Nadab— Abihu— Eleazar— Ithamar Eleazar was the father of: Phineas Moses = Zipporah was the father of: Gershom— Eliezer Gershom was the father of: Jonathan The history of Moses naturally divides itself into three periods of 40 years each. Moses was born at Goshen, In Egypt, B.C. 1571. The story of his birth is thoroughly Egyptian in its scene. His mother made extraordinary efforts for his preservation from the general destruction of the male children of Israel. For three months the child was concealed in the house. Then his mother placed him in a small boat or basket of papyrus, closed against the water by bitumen. This was placed among the aquatic vegetation by the side of one of the canals of the Nile. The sister lingered to watch her brother’s fate. The Egyptian princess, who, tradition says, was a childless wife, came down to bathe in the sacred river. Her attendant slaves followed her. She saw the basket in the flags, and despatched divers, who brought it. It was opened, and the cry of the child moved the princess to compassion. She determined to rear it as her own. The sister was at hand to recommend a Hebrew nurse, the child’s own mother. here was the first part of Moses’ training,—a training at home in the true religion, in faith in God, in the promises to his nation, in the life of a saint,—a training which he never forgot, even amid the splendors and gilded sin of Pharaoh’s court. The child was adopted by the princess. From this time for many years Moses must be considered as an Egyptian. In the Pentateuch this period is a blank, but in the New Testament he is represented as “learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians,” and as “mighty in words and deeds.” (Acts 7:22) this was the second part of Moses’ training. The second period of Moses’ life began when he was forty years old. Seeing the sufferings of his people, Moses determined to go to them as their helper, and made his great life-choice, “choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season; esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt.” (Hebrews 11:25,26) Seeing an Israelite suffering the bastinado from an Egyptian, and thinking that they were alone, he slew the Egyptian, and buried the corpse in the sand. But the people soon showed themselves unfitted as yet to obtain their freedom, nor was Moses yet fitted to be their leader. He was compelled to leave Egypt when the slaying of the Egyptian became known, and he fled to the land of Midian, in the southern and southeastern part of the Sinai peninsula. There was a famous well (“the well,”) (Exodus 2:15) surrounded by tanks for the watering of the flocks of the Bedouin herdsmen. By this well the fugitive seated himself and watched the gathering of the sheep. There were the Arabian shepherds, and there were also seven maidens, whom the shepherds rudely drove away from the water. The chivalrous spirit which had already broken forth in behalf of his oppressed countrymen broke forth again in behalf of the distressed maidens. They returned unusually soon to their father, Jethro, and told him of their adventure. Moses, who up to this time had been “an Egyptian,” (Exodus 2:19) now became for a time an Arabian. He married Zipporah, daughter of his host, to whom he also became the slave and shepherd. (Exodus 2:21; 3:1) Here for forty years Moses communed with God and with nature, escaping from the false ideas taught him in Egypt, and sifting out the truths that were there. This was the third process of his training for his work; and from this training he learned infinitely more than from Egypt. Stanely well says, after enumerating what the Israelites derived from Egypt, that the contrast was always greater than the likeness. This process was completed when God met him on Horeb, appearing in a burning bush, and, communicating with him, appointed him to be the leader and deliverer of his people. Now begins the third period of forty years in Moses’ life. He meets Aaron, his next younger brother, whom God permitted to be the spokesman, and together they return to Goshen in Egypt. From this time the history of Moses is the history of Israel for the next forty years. Aaron spoke and acted for Moses, and was the permanent inheritor of the sacred staff of power. But Moses was the inspiring soul behind. he is incontestably the chief personage of the history, in a sense in which no one else is described before or since. He was led into a closer communion with the invisible world than was vou

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