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12 But the more they afflicted children of Israel to serve with them, the more they multiplied rigour. and grew. And they were grieved because of the children of Israel. 13 And the Egyptians made the

tains a very able and interesting view of the topography of Goshen.

12. The more they afflicted them, &c. Heb. ka-asher ye-annu otho, according as they afflicted him (collect. sing.), so he multiplied and so he brake forth (into a multitude). The latter verb yiphrotz is the same as that which occurs Gen. 28. 14, to denote a rapid and, as it were, a bursting increase and diffusion; 'Thou shalt spread abroad (7 tiphrotz) to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south.' The historian's words depict to us the conflict between the favor of God and the cruelty of the Egyptian king. The more his people suffered from the tyranny of their masters, the more prolific the women proved to be, thus showing, that' there is no wisdom nor understanding nor counsel against the Lord.' Some commentators have been disposed to resort to natural causes to account for this amazing increase, but we are satisfied with the solution offered by the words of the promise, Gen. 15. 5, 'Look now toward heaven and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them—so shall thy seed be.'- They were grieved because of the children of Israel. Heb. yakutzu. The leading idea is doubtless that of mingled chagrin and abhorrence. Finding that, in spite of all their efforts, the people continued to increase, they were filled with inward vexation, and there was something irksome in the very thought of the hated race of Israel. Chal. 'There was tribulation (vexation) to the Egyptians by reason of the children of Israel.' Gr. εdeλvoσovтo, they were abominated, just as one is said to be 'scandalized' by that which is a cause of offence; they

14 And they m made their lives

m ch. 2. 23. & 6. 9. Numb 20. 15. Acts

7. 19, 34.

regarded the Israelites as an abomina. tion. The import of the original word may be gathered from its use in the following connexions. Gen. 27. 46, ' I am weary (p) of my life, because of the daughters of Heth.' Num. 21. 5,

Our soul loatheth (p) this light bread.' Lev. 20. 23, 'They committed all these things, and therefore I abhorred (YPN) them.' A passage still more to the point occurs Num. 22. 3, where a like cause of vexation is hinted at;

And Moab was sore afraid of the people, because they were many; and Moab was distressed () because of the children of Israel;' where Ainsworth renders, as in Gen. 27. 46, ' was irked.'

bepharek,

13. With rigor. Heb. 7 with fierceness. Gr. Bia, with force. Chal. With hardness.' From the orig inal pherek comes the Latin ferox and the English fierce. The Israelites were subsequently prohibited from ruling in this manner over their brethren, Lev. 25. 46, 'But over your brethren, the children of Israel, ye shall not rule one over another with rigor (bepherek) ;' i. e. without mercy. So far were the pretended fears of the Egypt ians from working within them the least sentiment of clemency, that they were evidently goaded on by the frus tration of their hopes, to a still more relentless course of oppression. Wicked men are slow to be taught, when their mad schemes are defeated, that God fights against them; and even if such a thought now and then glances upon their minds, they seem to be stung and exasperated by it, to rush on yet more recklessly in the way of rebellion. This is strikingly evident from the sequel of the present narrative.

14. Made their lives bitter, &c. Gi

KATWdVvWV AVTWV Tηv (wny, made sorrow ful their life. 'Of a bad man it is said, in the East, 'He makes the lives of his servants bitter.' Also, Ah! the fellow: the heart of his wife is made bitter.' 'My soul is bitter.' 'My heart is like the bitter tree.'-Roberts. The intensity of their hardships could not well be better expressed, for as nothing is sweeter than life, it is only the extremest misery that can render existence itself grievous and burdensome. —¶ In mortar. Heb. behomer; more properly 'in clay' of which bricks are made. This is considered by some as subversive of the statement of Josephus, that the pyramids were built by the Israelites, as it is well known that they are constructed of stone, instead of brick. But all the pyramids are not of stone, as in the province of Fayoum, the ancient Arsinoe, as also at Dashour and Saccara, pyramids of sun-dried brick are still found in a reinarkable degree of preservation. Yet even if they were all of them stone structures, it is not a legitimate conclusion that because the Hebrews worked in brick, they therefore did not work in stone also. After all, however, the agency of the Israelites in rearing the pyramids is a point on which nothing positive can be asserted, although it is no doubt safe to affirm that, if the pyramids were built during the bondage of the Israelites, they were engaged upon them, and indeed upon all the public works which were then undertaken. Prisoners and slaves would seem to have been generally employed in such labors; for it was the proud boast of some of the princes of that country, that no Egyptian hand had labored in the greatest of their works. 'What masses were employed, and how profusely human life was wasted, is evinced by the statement in a previous note, that Necho worked away 100,000 lives in the attempt to cut a canal from the Nile to the Red Sea. Things are much the same now

in the same country. Mehemet Ali the Pasha of Egypt, obliged 150,000 men, chiefly Arabs from Upper Egypt, to work on his canal connecting the Nile with the sea at Alexandria: 20,000 of the number perished during the progress of the work. A new canal was in progress when Carne was at Alexandria. That writer says: The bed of the canal presented a novel spectacle, being filled with a vast number of Arabs of various colors, toiling in the intense heat of the day, while their Egyptian (?) task-masters, with whips in their hands, watched the progress of their labor. It was a just and lively representation of the children of Israel forced to toil by their oppressive masters of old. The wages Mahmoud allowed to these unfortunate people, whom he had obliged to quit their homes and families in Upper Egypt, were only a penny a day and a ration of bread.' ('Letters from the East,' p. 71, 72.) Thus were the lives of the Israelites ter with hard bondage.'-Pict. Bib

made bit

-T In all manner of hard service in the field. That is, in all kinds of agricultural labor. We may here remark, that although the condition of the He brews in Egypt at this time was one of bondage, yet it does not appear to have been that of house-slaves or personal servants. It was rather a servitude which consisted in being subject to very grievous and excessive exactions imposed by public authority. They were slaves to the state rather than to individuals. In this respect their bondage differed very considerably from that which is unhappily common in our own country. It resembled more the condition of the serfs or vassals of feudal times, who held their lands at the pleasure of their lords, and who were subject to any exactions of rent or labor at the will of the baron. It appears clear from Ex. 12. 38, that the Hebrews as a body had continued to hold property of their own, though heavy bur.

bitter with hard bondage, in mor- | service wherein they made them serve was with rigour.

tar, and in brick, and in all manner of service in the field: all their

n Ps. 81. 6.

15 And the king of Egypt spake to the Hebrew midwives (of which

quires to be somewhat more particularly considered. The original word for

dens had been laid upon them; and the accounts given elsewhere of the offerings and presents made to the taberna-midwives' (meyalledoth) is cle, &c., make it evident that the nation as such had not been reduced to precisely that kind of slavery with which we are familiar in modern times. They had only been subject to severe and oppressive demands of service, in behalf of the king of Egypt and his officers. Still it was a state of cruel suffering to which an innocent people, against the faith of covenants, were condemned, and such as could not but in the end draw down the judgments of Heaven. But let us not forget the wise and ultimately beneficent purposes which these afflictions were designed to subserve. To the suffering Israelites they were at once penal and disciplinary. One great end to be attained by them was, that they might be inspired with so deep an abhorrence of the land of their oppressions, that the prospect of returning to Canaan should become more and more refreshing to their hearts, and that when once embarked in the journey thither, they might, remembering the wormwood and the gall, feel no desire to retrace their steps, and fix themselves again in the house of bondage. And as the ensuing narrative acquaints us with the fact, that notwithstanding all their previous calamities, many of them, during the sojourn in the wilderness, did actually project a return to Egypt, we can easily conjecture what would have been the case had they lived in ease, in fulness, and in pleasure, in the place of their sojourn.

15. The king of Egypt spake to the Hebrew midwives. Finding himself baffled in his first scheme of open and atrocious wrong, he now resorts to a secret stratagem of a more bloody character to compass his ends. This re

not a substantive, but a participle, sig-
nifying those who cause to bring forth,
and the words, according to several of
the ancient versions, and some modern
critics, may be rendered,' And the king
spake to those who made or aided the
Hebrew women to bring forth; thus
understanding from the original' mid-
wives of the Hebrew women,' instead
of' Hebrew midwives.' The construc-
tion certainly renders it in a degree
doubtful whether they were Egyptian
or Hebrew women. On the one hand it
is difficult to suppose that the king
should have entrusted such an order to
Hebrew women. Could he have sup-
posed that they would conspire with
him in an attempt to extinguish their
own race? And when they excused
themselves by the plea mentioned v. 19,
could he have relied implicitly on their
word, without suspecting fraud, had
they been Israelitish women? Yet he
seems to have admitted the truth of
their statement without the slightest
hesitation. This was natural, provided
the women were Egyptians, but less so
if they were not. It is indeed said, ver.
17, that these women 'feared God,' and
consequently refused to obey the royal
mandate; from which it is inferred that
they must have been Hebrew women.
But the original 'Elohim' is here pre-
ceded by the article, and may, it is said,
be rendered 'the gods,' i. e.
the powers
above; implying merely such a belief
in a divine being and a superintending
providence, as was perhaps generally
prevalent in this early age of the world.
But then, on the other hand, (1.) The
more obvious import of the text leads

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the name of one was Shiphrah, and
the name of the other Puah ;)
16 And he said, When ye do the
office of a midwife to the Hebrew

women, and see them upon the stools; if it be a son, then ye shall kill him; but if it be a daughter, then she shall live.

the chief persons of the profession, having the direction of the rest. We learn from Plutarch, that some of the nations of antiquity had schools established among them where females were taught the obstetrical art. This was perhaps the office of these two individuals.

meant, whether we regard the construction of the original, or of the translation. Doubtless there were Hebrew women capable of employing themselves in this service in behalf of their kindred, and if Egyptian women had been procured, it would have excited suspicion at once, and perhaps prevented their 16. See them upon the stools. Heb. access to them. (2) It cannot be de-al ha-obnayim, upon the nied that the character given of them, stones. Commentators have been much v. 17, as 'fearers of God,' applies more divided in opinion as to the nature and naturally to Hebrew women, who had use of the objects intended by the term been instructed in the religion of their here translated stools, but which is literfathers. The phrase, we think, is indi- ally stones. It would seem perhaps at cative of general character, and not of first view, that they were some contrivany sudden dread with which they may ance for procuring a more easy delivery have been smitten on this occasion. for women in labor. But besides that, Being habitually under the influence of stone-seats were obviously very unfit for a salutary fear of God, they could not such a purpose, the Heb. word in Ex. 7. be persuaded for a moment to entertain 19, signifies a vessel of stone for holding the thought of such horrid cruelty, water, a trough. A far more probable though they may have been restrained, interpretation, therefore, is made out from motives of policy, from expressly by referring the pronoun them,' which saying to the king at the time that they it will be observed is not in the original, would have no hand in the perpetration not to the mothers, but to the children; of such a deed. (3) Their names are 'When ye see the new-born children purely Hebraic and not Egyptian. (4) laid in the troughs or vessels of stone, As to the improbability of Pharaoh's for the purpose of being washed, ye selecting Hebrew women to be the in- shall destroy the boys.' A passage from struments of such a cruel scheme against the travels of Thevenot seems to contheir own flesh and blood, it may be re- firm this construction: The kings of plied that the same reason held against Persia are so afraid of being deprived his appointing Hebrew officers over their of that power which they abuse, and own countrymen, which yet we find he are so apprehensive of being dethroned, actually did, Ex. 5. 14. On the whole, that they destroy the children of their therefore, we cannot but conclude that female relations, when they are brought the midwives were Hebrew and not to bed of boys, by putting them into Egyptian women, notwithstanding that an earthen trough, where they suffer Josephus affirms the contrary. The them to starve; that is, probably, name of the one was Shiphrah, &c. Two under pretence of preparing to wash individuals only are mentioned, but as them, they let them pine away or desthis number would be wholly inade- troy them in the water. This view of quate to the service of so many thou- the meaning represents the midwives sand Israelites, it is with great reason above spoken of, as acting in the capasupposed, that Shiphrah ana Puah were city of superintendents, for they are not

17 But the midwives feared God, and did not pas the king of Egypt commanded them, but saved the inen-children alive.

18 And the king of Egypt called for the midwives, and said unto them, Why have ye done this thing, and have saved the men-children alive?

o Prov. 16. 6. p Dan, 3. 16, 18. & 6. 13. Acts 5. 29.

supposed to place the children on the 'stools,' but to examine them after they are placed there by others. It is evident that if they actually assisted at the birth, the sex of the infant would be known without the necessity of inspecting its person during its ablutions at the trough.- —¶ If it be a son, &c. The reason of the order is obvious; the state had nothing to apprehend on the score of insurrection from the weaker sex, and as they were fairer than the daughters of Egypt, they would naturally be preserved, with a view to their finally becoming inmates of the harems of their lords.

17. The midwives feared God, &c. Their faith shines conspicuous in this, for they must have been aware that it was dangerous to incur the king's wrath by disobeying his orders. Tyrants are not wont to suffer their decrees to be disregarded with impunity, and it was no doubt at the peril of their lives that they gave way to the dictates of piety towards God rather than comply with the injunction of the king.

19. Because the Hebrew women are lively, &c. Heb. 7 ha-yoth; i. e. quick and strong in bearing; being possessed of greater natural vigor and robustness of constitution. It is well known that women inured to hard labor have but little pain in child-bearing, compared with those who are accustomed to an easier mode of life. It is worthy of note also that the original here is the term usually applied to wild beasts (see Note on Gen. 1. 24),

19 And 4 the midwives said unto Pharaoh, Because the Hebrew women are not as the Egyptian women; for they are lively, and are delivered ere the midwives come in unto them.

20 Therefore God dealt well with the midwives; and the people multiplied, and waxed very mighty.

q See Josh. 2. 4, &c. 2 Sam. 17, 19, 20. r Prov. 11. 18. Eccles. 8. 12. Isai. 3. 10. Hebr. 6. 10

and the latent implication may be, that they brought forth somewhat after the manner of the beasts of the forest, without requiring any obstetrical aid. This assertion of the midwives was doubtless true in itself, although not the whole truth; but the withholding a part of the truth from those who would take advantage of the whole to injure or destroy the innocent, is not only law. ful but laudable.

20. God dealt well with the midwives. We may doubtless fairly infer from this that, in some way not expressly record. ed, they were favored with special to kens of the divine approbation for the conduct they had evinced. At the same time, the fact of granting to the Israelites such a continued extraordinary multiplication was in itself a 'dealing well' with the midwives. They were no doubt many of them mothers themselves, and they could not but rejoice in the preservation and the increase of their families, nor could the general favor thus bestowed upon the nation fail to redound to them. Indeed, we are strongly inclined to consider the final clause of this verse as perfectly synonimous with the expression 'made them houses,' in the next. The connexion between the two will be obvious from the remarks that immediately follow. In the mean time let us not fail to observe, that an upright and exemplary conduct, by whom. soever displayed, may be of the most eminent service to a whole community. Even a few feeble but right-minded women may, without their dreaming of

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