Exodus 1:10–22

¹⁰We have to outsmart them, or they’ll increase in number. Then, if war breaks out, they will join our enemies, fight against us, and leave the country.” 

¹¹So the Egyptians put slave drivers in charge of them in order to oppress them through forced labor. They built Pithom and Rameses as supply cities for Pharaoh. ¹²But the more the Israelites were oppressed, the more they increased in number and spread out. The Egyptians couldn’t stand them ⸤any longer⸥. ¹³So they forced the Israelites to work hard as slaves. ¹⁴They made their lives bitter with back-breaking work in mortar and bricks and every kind of work in the fields. All the jobs the Egyptians gave them were brutally hard. 

Pharaoh Tells the Midwives to Kill All Hebrew Baby Boys

¹⁵Then the king of Egypt told the Hebrew midwives, whose names were Shiphrah and Puah, ¹⁶“When you help the Hebrew women in childbirth, look at the child when you deliver it. If it’s a boy, kill it, but if it’s a girl, let it live.” 

¹⁷However, the midwives feared God and didn’t obey the king of Egypt’s orders. They let the boys live. ¹⁸So the king of Egypt called for the midwives. He asked them, “Why have you done this? Why have you let the boys live?” 

¹⁹The midwives answered Pharaoh, “Hebrew women are not like Egyptian women. They are so healthy that they have their babies before a midwife arrives.” 

²⁰God was good to the midwives. So the people increased in number and became very strong. ²¹Because the midwives feared God, he gave them families of their own. 

²²Then Pharaoh commanded all his people to throw into the Nile every ⸤Hebrew⸥ boy that was born, but to let every girl live.