21 And Moses was content to 22 And she bare him a son, and dwell with the man: and he he called his name Gershom; for gave Moses Zipporah his daugh-he said, I have been a stranger in a strange land. ter. S sch. 4. 25. & 18. 2. t ch. 18. 3. u Acts 7. 29. Hebr. 11. 13, 14. of interpreting the instincts of maidenly in a union with one of the daughters. reserve into an ungrateful return for generous services. But what they failed to say to Moses himself they no doubt said for him to their father, and were happy to be able, under his sanction, to express their thanks by ministering all in their power to his comfort as a guest. —¶ That he may eat bread. That is, partake of an entertainment. See Note on Gen. 21. 14. He gave Moses Zipporah his daughter; to whom reference is made Numb. 12. 1, And Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married; for he had married an Ethiopian.' The original has Cushite' instead of 'Ethiopian,' not, probably, because her family was descended from Cush, or that she had the features and complexion of the modern Ethiopian race, but simply from the fact that they inhabited a country to which the name of Cush or Ethiopia was applied. See Pict. Bib. p. 137. 21. Moses was content to dwell with the man. Heb. 7 yoel, was willing; or perhaps more strictly, prevailed upon himself, adopted the resolution. The word occurs in the following passages; Gen. 18. 27, Behold now I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord;' i. e. have persuaded myself. Josh. 7. 7, 'Would to God we had been content, and dwelt on the other side Jordan;' i.e. had prevailed upon ourselves. Judg.jective derived from the root 19. 6, Be content, I pray thee, and tarry all night;' i. e. consent. 2 Sam. 7. 29, 'Therefore now let it please thee to bless the house of thy servant;' i. e. be thou willing. With characteristic brevity, Moses says nothing of the previous proposition and negotiation which led to this arrangement, but the simple fact of the compact to remain is alone mentioned. The nature of the services he was to perform is not here specified, as it was in the case of Jacob in similar circumstances, but we learn from the opening of the ensuing chapter, what might be inferred from the manners and habits of those pastoral tribes, that the humble occupation of a shepherd was that in which the illustrious exile now consented to engage. Being thus brought into daily intimacy with kindred minds, it was natural that his intercourse with Jethro's family should result, as it did, 22. He called his name Gershom, &c. Heb. Du gëreshom, which appears to be a compound made up of gër, stranger, and D sham, there. Others take the final syllable to be an ad. sha mam, to be desolate, implying a lonely or desolate stranger. The import however of this member of the word is of little consequence, as its main significaney is concentrated in that of stranger conveyed by the other. The Gr. version here adds: And she conceived again and bare a second son; and he called his name Eliezer, saying, For the God of my father is my helper, and hath delivered me from the hand of Pharaoh.' This addition, which is transferred also into the Vulg., was borrowed from Ex. 18. 4, where nearly the same words occur. The birth of a second son is also expressly mentioned in this connexion by Stephen, Acts, 7. 29, Then fled Moses at this saying, and was a stranger in the land of Midian, where he begat two sons.' At what period of Moses' forty years sojourning in Midian his marriage with Zipporah, or the birth of his children took place, we have no means of ascertaining. From the incident mentioned, Ex. 4. 24, 25, it has generally been supposed that the children were then young, as one of them was circumcised on that occasion by his mother. But it strikes us as extremely improbable that Moses should have deferred his marriage for near forty years after entering Midian, or that being married shortly after that time, so long an interval should have elapsed before he became a father. It is to be remembered that he was at the time mentioned, ch. 4. 24, 25, on the way to Egypt, and is it conceivable that he was then the father of two small children? True indeed it is said, Ex. 4. 20, that he took his wife and his sons and set them upon an ass, and returned to Egypt,' from which it is argued that the sons must have been mere children, or they could not have been carried, with their mother, on a single ass. But this objection will be obviated in our note on that passage, and as the advanced age of the eldest son at this time is an important item in our interpretation of the context in question, we are forced for the present to lay great stress on the intrinsic probability that Moses was both married and begat one at least of his two sons very early during his residence in Midian. 23. It came to pass in process of time. Heb. 7 ¬¬ ba-yamim ha rabbim hahem, in those many days. Gr. μετα δε τας ημέρας της πολλας εκείνας, after those many days. On this phrase. ology Ainsworth remarks that the Heb. in is here rightly translated by the cry came up unto God, by reason of the bondage. 24 And God a heard their groaning, and God bremembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. a ch. 6. 5. bch. 6. 5. Ps. 105. 8, 42. & 106 45. c Gen. 15. 14. & 46. 4. Gr. UETA, after, as is clear from Num. 28. 26,' After your weeks (Ɔ¬nyawa in your weeks),' and elsewhere. So in the New Testament, Mark, 13. 24, ' In those days' is parallelled by Mat. 24. 29, ' Aƒter the tribulation of those days.' But it is perhaps sufficient to understand by the phrase simply that in the course and towards the latter part of the forty years of Moses' sojourn in Midian the king of Egypt died. As to the precise date of the event, it was not important that we should be informed of it.T Sighed by reason of the bondage. The time was now fast approaching in which the Most High had proposed to visit and redeem his people, and still no symptoms of favor as yet are perceived. On the contrary, though Egypt had changed its sovereign in the mean time, yet the seed of Jacob experienced no mitigation of their distress. Every change which they had undergone was rather a change from evil to worse, till at length their calamities are represented, like the blood of murdered Abel, as having a voice and crying to heaven for vengeance. 24. God remembered his covenant, &c. There is a pitch of oppression which will not fail to awaken the wrath of heaven. The groans and tears extorted by violent wrong, especially if they come from humbled and penitent hearts, will pierce the ear of God, and prove a presage of deliverance. 'Cum latera duplicantur Moses adest,' when the bricks are doubled, Moses is at hand. Yet it seems that in the present case it was not solely from a regard to their miseries that God determined to inter 25 And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God had respect unto them. dch. 4. 31. 1 Sam. 1. 11. 2 Sam. 16. 12. Luke 1. 25. e ch. 3. 7. gratitude. Yet it should not be for- fere. His own faithfulness was at stake. He remembered his covenant, and his covenant is his engagement. To the three patriarchs here mentioned he had solemnly bound himself to enlarge, to prosper, and to bless their seed, and after the lapse of a certain period to bring them out of bondage and plant them in the land of promise. As this period had now nearly expired, and the enemies of Israel by making their condition to the utmost degree intolerable were doing what in them lay to crush and exterminate the race, and thus counteract the fulfilment of the divine promises, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob saw that it was time to awake, and make bare his arm, lest his word should fail for evermore. What is meant by God's 'remembering' his covenant we have explained in the Note on Gen. 8. 1. It is an effective remembrance evinced by the perform ance of some special act of his care.lish him in faith, hope, and love, as a We may understand it the better by conceiving of its opposite. God is said to forget or not to remember, when he fails to assist or deliver. And in like manner his looking upon a people is the opposite of turning his back upon them, and the term for one of the most fearful forms of the divine judgments. 25. God had respect unto them. Heb. yeda, knew them. That is, compassionately regarded them, tenderly cared for them. On the peculiar import of the word 'know,' see Note on Ex. 1. 8. REMARKS.-(1.) The doctrine of a special overruling providence is no where more impressively taught than in the early history of Moses; and in contrasting the perils which surrounded his infancy with the security and comfort with which we can rear our own offspring, we have abundant grounds of (2.) It is doing no violence to the spirit of the sacred text to conceive of our heavenly Father as saying to the believer when presenting his infant-offspring in baptism, Take this child away and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages.' Take him out of the pollution that is in the world through sin, and bring him up in the nur. ture and admonition of the Lord. Take him from the many perils which beset him by the lusts of the flesh, the pride of life, and the malice of Satan, and estab devoted servant of the Savior, and verily thou shalt by no means lose thy reward. (3.) What a powerful principle is true faith! And how illustrious the exhibition of it in the choice of Moses! We know how hardly men are persuaded to resign a little wealth, to forego a little honor, to resign the faintest pros pect of rank and power. Yet Moses freely gave up all that was tempting in this respect, as a noble sacrifice of sense to faith! Several of the circumstances which rendered this sacrifice so remarkable have been already considered. Consider in addition, that there were other than selfish objections to be overcome. Pharaoh's daughter had strong claims on the gratitude of Moses. He was a poor foundling, rescued from the peril of a watery grave, by the kindness of his benefactor; and no one acquainted 1 were the afflictions of the people of God,' and the reproach incurred 'the reproach of Christ,' and these he well knew would be sanctified to any one who should encounter them for conscience sake. CHAPTER III. with the sympathy and tenderness of woman's heart needs to be told, how strong is the attachment formed for a helpless infant thus strangely and unexpectedly thrown upon her hands. A deep and affectionate interest would inevitably spring up in her bosom towards her orphan charge, an interest all the deeper and stronger from having no children of her own. Now can we suppose that Moses when he had attained to years of reflection and was made acquainted with the events of his history, could have been insensible to what he owed to his preserver? Would it not be a mighty struggle to tear himself away from one who had been a mother to him from his infancy; who had watched with kind solicitude over his advances from childhood to youth, and from youth to manhood; whose heart had exulted to note his expanding intellect as he grew learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and to see him entitling himself by his intrinsic merit to the station to which he had been fortuitously raised? Shall he then summon up an iron resolve, sunder the ties that bound him to his earliest benefactor, and bid her adieu for ever? Shall he do this when in doing it he would seem to be resigning the only hope of aiding and of finally emancipating his brethren? For if he would consent to be called the son of his patroness, retaining his place in the court, and watching the events of providence, some opportunity might at length occur for effecting an object so near his heart. But we see the conviction of present duty outweighing every other consideration, and triumphing over the promptly to have endured as seeing Him who is ings of affection and the dictates of worldly policy. So complete is the dominion of Faith over his whole soul that he resolves to take the momentous step, though assured that he should thereby plunge into affliction and incur reproach. But the afflictions anticipated Of the events which marked the history of Moses during the forty years of his residence in the land of Midian, the Scriptures have furnished us with no detailed account. As Moses is himself the historian of his own life, it is reasonable to infer from his silence that the period was not distinguished by any occurrences sufficiently important in his view to deserve a record. His days probably passed quietly away in the wonted discharge of his duties as a shepherd, and the shepherd too of another man's flock. His situation was no doubt favorable to contemplation and communion with God. He could scarcely fail to make progress in that divine knowledge which would do more to qualify him for his future mission than all the learning he had acquired in Egypt. The life too which he led was happily adapted to work within him that hardihood of constitution and character, of which he would afterwards stand so much in need, and of which the sequel of his story affords us so many striking instances. Still, it could not but be a severe trial of his faith to find year after year elapsing, and the prime and vigor of his age apparently wearing away, while no tokens from above indicated that the great work of his vocation was any nearer at hand. Yet he seems meek invisible, and to have evinced that true wisdom which consists in waiting for and following the call of heaven, instead of running before it. It was evidently no part of his design to hold up for admiration his own example of submissive patience, yet the Holy Spirit is 1. Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro. Heb. hayah roeh eth tzon, was feeding the flock, or acting the shepherd towards. See Note on Gen. 37. 2. He who is before, Ex. 2. 18, called Reuel, is here denominated Jethro. Our reasons for thinking them the same person have already been given. In Num. 10. 29, he is called Raguel, and is expressly said to have flock to the back side of the desert, and came to b the mountain of God, even to Horeb. b ch. 18. 5. 1 Kings 19. 8. and lonely places have often been those Came to the mountain of God, so called, not so much from its great height, as tall cedars are called cedars of God, &c. (see Note on Gen. 23. 6), as by anticipation, from several very remarkable events having afterward occurred upon this memorable mount tending to confer upon it a sacred character. It was here (1.) that God appeared to Moses in the bush; (2.) that he manifested his glory at the delivery of the law; (3.) that Moses with his rod brought water out of the rock; (4.) that by lifting up his hands he made Joshua to prevail against Amelek; (5.) that he fasted twice forty days and forty been the father of Hobab.-There is no doubt a very marked contrast between Moses in the court of Egypt, making his abode in a palace, and surrounded with all the splendors of royalty, and Moses a humble hireling shepherd, leading his flocks over the rough places of the desert, sleeping often in the open air, exposed to heat and to cold, to weariness and watchings, and living upon the coarsest fare. But as we know that he had voluntarily and deliberately made the exchange of one condition for the other, and as we know too the motives by which he had been governed in doing it, it would be no matter of surprise could we be assured, as was doubt-nights; (6.) that from hence he brought less the fact, that he was as truly happy while thus traversing the rocky region of Midian, his tent his only shelter, as when treading the marble pavements of Egyptian halls, or reposing on couches of state, with a crowd of menials prompt to do his pleasure. As it was from a supreme regard to the glory of God that he had entered this humble sphere, so God was not unmindful of the sacrifices he had made, nor did he leave him without witness of his special favor, Desert the two tables of the law; and (7.) that Elijah was vouchsafed a glorious vision. The Chal. renders it, 'the mount where the Glory of the Lord was revealed.' Even to Horeb. Heb. horeb, i. e. dryness, from the character of the soil; it being a dry, sterile, bleak, rocky region. The names 'Horeb' and 'Sinai' are interchanged in the Scriptures; and modern travellers give such varied accounts of them, that we are left in great uncertainty with regard to their original |