World English Bible · Egypt and Sinai
Exodus 2
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A man of the went and took a daughter of as his wife. The woman conceived and bore a son. When she saw that he was a fine child, she hid him three months. When she could no longer hide him, she took a papyrus basket for him, and coated it with tar and with pitch. She put the child in it, and laid it in the reeds by the river's bank. His sister stood far off, to see what would be done to him. daughter came down to bathe at the river. Her maidens walked along by the riverside. She saw the basket among the reeds, and sent her servant to get it. She opened it, and saw the child, and behold, the baby cried. She had on him, and said, "This is one of the ' children." Then his sister said to daughter, "Should I go and call a nurse for you from the women, that she may nurse the child for you?" daughter said to her, "Go." The young woman went and called the child's mother. 9 daughter said to her, "Take this child away, and nurse him for me, and I will give you your wages." The woman took the child, and nursed it. The child grew, and she brought him to daughter, and he became her son. She named him , and said, "Because I drew him out of the water." In those days, when had grown up, he went out to his brothers and saw their burdens. He saw an striking a , one of his brothers. He looked this way and that way, and when he saw that there was no one, he killed the , and hid him in the sand. He went out the second day, and behold, two men of the were fighting with each other. He said to him who did the wrong, "Why do you strike your fellow?" He said, "Who made you a prince and a judge over us? Do you plan to kill me, as you killed the ?" was afraid, and said, "Surely this thing is known." Now when heard this thing, he sought to kill . But fled from the of , and lived in the land of , and he sat down by a well. Now the priest of had seven daughters. They came and drew water, and filled the troughs to water their flock. The came and drove them away; but stood up and helped them, and watered their flock. When they came to , their , he said, "How is it that you have returned so early today?" They said, "An us out of the hand of the , and moreover he drew water for us, and watered the flock." He said to his daughters, "Where is he? Why is it that you have left the man? Call him, that he may eat bread." was content to with the man. He gave Zipporah, his daughter. She bore a son, and he named him , for he said, "I have lived as a in a foreign land." In the course of those many days, the king of , and the sighed because of the bondage, and they cried, and their cry came up to because of the bondage. heard their groaning, and remembered his with , with , and with . saw the , and understood.
A public domain modern English translation, free to read and share. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Egypt and Sinai, 1450 BC to 1200 BC ›
Israel in and then out of Egypt, at a period when Egypt was an imperial power that also controlled Canaan. The nation is formed as a people with a law before it has any land.
- Egypt
- The New Kingdom at its imperial peak, with a professional army, a chariot corps, and control reaching up through Canaan. Ramesses II reigns for sixty-six years and covers the country in monuments to himself. Egyptian power in this period is the reason Canaan is garrisoned rather than free.
- The Hittites
- The other superpower, in what is now Turkey, and Egypt's rival for the Levant. The two fight the largest chariot battle of the ancient world at Kadesh, then sign a treaty whose text survives from both sides. Hittite treaty form, with its historical prologue, stipulations, witnesses, blessings, and curses, is the shape the Sinai covenant takes, which is one of the stronger arguments for the antiquity of that material.
- The Aegean
- Mycenaean Greece: warrior kings in stone citadels at Mycenae and Pylos, keeping palace accounts in Linear B. The world of the Trojan War stories, whatever lies behind them.
- Further afield
- The Shang dynasty in China is casting extraordinary bronzes and writing questions to its ancestors on ox bones. In Mesoamerica the Olmec are beginning the first civilisation of the Americas.