Exodus Chapter 1

1) Now these are the names of the children of Israel who came to Egypt each man and his household came with Jacob.

This is the family of Jacob, not Israel. At this point they were only known as the house of Jacob or the Hebrews. They were not a nation, but a family/tribe. This family was all decedents of Noah's son Shem, while the Egyptians were descendants of Ham.

2) Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah, 3) Issachar, Zebulan, and Benjamin, 4) Dan, Naphtali, Gad, and Asher, 5) All those who were descendants of Jacob were seventy persons (For Joseph was in Egypt already).

Is seventy and accurate number? Yes and no. In order to be hermetically correct we must look at the Hebrew mindset when it comes to numbers and census customs of the time. When they counted people at this time in history they concentrated on the number of men that could go to battle and this would exclude women children and the elderly.

Statistically speaking, at this time in history, there were almost always more females than males in any given population due to war and work related deaths. The other considerations,is the meaning of numbers in Hebrew. Seventy is a number of completeness, which here would indicate that no one in the house of Jacob was left behind in Canaan. Then entirety of Jacob's tribe took up residence in Egypt. This is most likely the meaning of this number in this passage.

The central city in Goshen was known Avaris, the Hyksos capital of Egypt located northeast of the Nile delta. This city has been found and it is huge. It is now known as Tell el-daba, and is where Joseph had his palace. It is huge and would have accommodated hundreds of thousands of people. Archaeology has revealed that it was Hebrew and Canaanite in its architecture. It is important to know that many in secular universities, teach that there is no evidence of a place that would have accommodated such a large number of people in Egypt in there attempt to say that the Exodus never happened and that it is just legend. As we disused before , ancient Egyptian history is sketchy at best when recording defeat. Current day statements from the Egyptian government about this time period is to neither confirm or deny the Exodus. But, archaeology does not lie.

6) And Joseph died, all his brothers, and all that generation.

Most scholarship believe these deaths happened over a span of only seventeen years. We know through archaeology that the Hyksos were removed from power around 1496BC by Ahmose I, and there is evidence that the Hyksos Dynasty ended around 1530BC. This leaves us with a 27 year period after the death of the sons of Jacob/Israel.

This is a very realistic time period for the children of Israel to fall from grace of the new Egyptian dynasty.

7) But the children of Israel were fruitful and increased abundantly, Multiplied and grew exceedingly mighty, and the land was filled with them.

This is a fulfillment of prophecy: Genesis 22:17 YHVH speaking to Avrahm “blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply your descendants as the stars of the heaven and the sand that is on the seashore, and your descendants shall possess the gate of their enemies."

The children of Israel were given the land of Goshen to live in, however there was the perception that the Hebrew people were everywhere. Today this perception is still prevalent in the media today. By one look at a map of the middle east it is plane to see that in the entire middle east, the land of Israel is little more than a tiny parcel of land about the size of New Jersey. The Arab population in the middle east is approximately 473 Million people while the Jewish population in Israel is just a little over 7 million. The total square mileage of the state of Israel is 8,630 while in comparison the Arab states sit on 5.2 million square miles.

8) Now there arose a new king over Egypt who did not know Joseph. This verse summarizes the human condition of ingratitude.

Joseph literally saved Egypt a mere 17 years before and yet the new pharaoh didn't even know who he was. Ingratitude is something that we all experience in our lives, and we can not let it make us bitter. We must keep in mind that good work we do is for YHVH and every good and perfect gift comes from him.

This Pharaoh was most likely Amenhotep II. Lazy research will lead people to say it was Raamses II (1279-1213BC) because one of the cities built was named Raamses. However, if you follow the archaeology, and time lines, the evidence is greater for Amenhotep II. Research on Amenhotep's tomb reveals some very interesting facts. The mummy of Amenhotep II is covered with scaring that would be consistent with boils. His first born son is in the tomb with him and appears to be around 15 years old and the cause of his death was sudden with no apparent explanation while his second born son assumed the throne after Amenhotep II's death. A great resource for more detailed information on this subjuct is "Exodus Pharaohs Explained" by Expedition Bible.  They have made this video free on Youtube.

Jewish scholarship believes the 400 year span given to Abraham about his decendents being enslaved is broken up into two parts parts. Approximately 200 in Canaan, and 200 years in Egypt. This is supported by the dates of the dynasties that ruled during this time period given *the challenges of gaining accurate records during this time in Egyptian History We need to understand that Egypt was conquered from within and was ruled by a People called the *Hyksos, who were a Semitic people with numerous Hyksos Pharaohs during their Dynasty (1638-1530BC). This was not a military conquest, but a infiltration of a foreign people that slowly migrated into Egypt over a span of 500 years. Egypt has always been a melting pot of people from all over the Near East. The main reason is the Nile River.

*Lower Egypt though it got very little rain, almost always had food and fresh water. If there were no Nile River, there would be no Egypt. The Nile would flood annually bringing rich sediment from the confluance of the White Nile and the Blue Nile at modern day Khartoun Sudan. This water would fill huge man made cisterns, canals, and reservoirs, which archiological eedence sugestes Joseph began building to prepare for the seven years of famine, that would provide fresh water for the nation through the dry seasons.

The Nile was so important and so dependable, that it had a god representation called *Hapi who is one of the oldest of the Egyptian gods. Egyptian rule was always in flux and the Pharaohs in charge were often not Egyptian at all. The Hyksos were the first foreign rulers, but certainly not the last. Some of the names that people we are most familiar with that filled the roll as Pharaoh were:

Alexander the Great 332 -323BC

Greek Ptolemy I 305-285BC Greek, one of Alexander the Great's most trusted generals. Ptolemy I, filled the vacuum left in Egypt After the death of Alexander The Great. He also sanctioned the writing of the *Septuagint. The Ptolemaic dynasty lasted nearly 300 years and his impact is still felt today.

Cleopatra VII 51 -30BC Greek installed as ruler, not Pharaoh, by Julius Cesar. Females could not be Pharaoh in Egypt.

Octavian Augustus 30BC to 14AD Roman. Took control of Egypt as Pharaoh after Cleopatra committed suicide with her lover Mark Anthony.

Archaeological science known as *Strontium Isotope Analysis(STA), shows us a great deal about the Hyksos people. One of the findings is that the Hyksos people were not local to the Nile delta. We will be looking at other findings with STA as we continue this study.

9) And he said to his people, “Look the people of the children of Israel are more and mightier than we.

Could it be that Pharaoh could see history repeating itself? Like there Hyksos cousins, the Hebrews were multiplying greatly. STA revealed something else about the Hyksos people. The population ratio was heavily skewed female. It is a proven fact that a larger female population, will translate into a larger amount of births and a steadily growing population. It stands to reason that the Hebrew people would have this same trait and reproduce very quickly.

10) Come let us deal shrewdly with them, lest they multiply, and it happen, in the event of war, that they also join our enemies and fight against us, and so go up out of the land.

Egypt was never very interested in expanding their territory and though they had a very powerful military, their primary focus was defense and not affluence.  Egypt had everything it needed in the provision and recources that the Nile River brought including transportation and commerce.

11) Therefore, they set taskmasters over them to afflict them with their burdens. And they built Pharaoh supply cities, Pithom and Raamses.

The Torah emphasizes the collective guilt of the Egyptians. Even though it was Pharaoh who initiates the oppression of the Hebrews, the Egyptian people were complicit in the execution of these orders.

We see this in recent history as well. Though Adolf Hitler initiated the poor treatment and the eventual mass murder of the Jewish people, by and large the German people did very little to stand up against it and actually perpetuated it.

12) But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and they were in dread of the children of Israel.

This has been proven throughout history even as recent as October seventh 2023.  When Israel was attacked, it woke up the nation of Israel to the fact that they needed to turn back to YHVH and behave like HIS people should.  Israels collective concience began to return to YHVH.  There are many video images of Israely people colectivly saying the *Shema as the Torah comands.  Is this awakening goint to last?  Time will tell but it does go to show that when people are under diress, oppressed, or even pursecuted,  they do return to their faith in a large way.  Even if it is temporary.

13) So the Egyptians made the children of Israel serve with rigor.

Children of Israel, not nation of Israel. Remember, at this point, the Hebrew population in Egypt had come from 70 members of one family. (Exodus 1:5)

Most Egyptians were not as evil as Pharaoh. However, you do not need a great number of truly evil people to carry out mass evil. Good people can be indoctrinated. We as believers, must not think we are immune to indoctrination based on belief alone. Psalm 1:1-2 Blessed is the man who will follow ADONIA, he will not stand in the path of the sinner nor sit in the seat of the scoffer, for the law of YHVH is his delight.

Matthew 6:22-23 The lamp of the body is the eye. If your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness, If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!

These versesare telling us “Garbage in Garbage out”. People are easily indoctrinated when they allow themselves to be. Today we have millions of people scrolling on the internet for multiple hours a day. There is very little wisdom in this. Indoctrination is easy if you have a population that is voluntarily allowing themselves to be brainwashed.

"If you tell a lie loud enough and long enough, people will believe it"  -Joseph Goebbels, Nazi propaganda minister-

We must know what we believe and why we believe it.  The only way to accomplish this is to "Meditate on the word day and night".

 Proverbs 6:23 The commandment is a lamp and the law a light; Reproofs of instruction are the way of life.

Psalm 119:105 YOUR word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.

2 Timothy 2:15 Be diligent to present yourself approved to YHVH, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

14) And they made their lives bitter with hard bondage in mortar, in brick and in all manor of service in the field. All there service in which they made them serve was with rigor.

History will repeat itself almost 3000 years later in the work camps of Nazi Germany, and the gulags of Russia and the Soviet Union.

History also shows us that people will look the other way if oppressing a people group will benefit themselves. Not only were millions of Jews killed in the Holocaust, but their assets were stolen and given to those who would help to oppress them.

15) Then the king of Egypt spoke to the Hebrew midwives, of whom the name of one was Shiphrah, and the name of the other Puah.

16) and he said, “When you do the duties of a midwife for he Hebrew women, and see them on the birth stools, if it is a son, then you shall kill him. But if it is a daughter, then she shall live.

There is a lot to unpack to this strategy. First of all, men are the backbone of society. I know this is not a popular thing to say but it doesn't make it any less true. Men are stronger than women and infrastructure in every society is built on the backbone, blood, sweat, and tears of men. That is a fact. Men, especially in this time period, were who would also rise up and fight a war. Take away the masculinity of a people group, you make that people weak, and easy to keep under control. In a patriarchal such as this, females would not be able to cause as much trouble males.

Secondly, if you decrease the amount of men in one people group, women are still going to want to have children. In ancient times, if a women didn't have children, she felt disgraced and useless. Making babies was a woman's primary function. If there were no Hebrew men that could procreate, women would eventually find other men, mostly Egyptian to re-produce with.

Another valid point is Pharaoh's strategy is also going to feminize the Hebrew population leaving the culture completely opposite of the way YHVH created it. We can see through our modern culture what happens when there is a loss of healthy masculinity in a society.

To be fair, to loose femininity in a culture is equally destructive. GOD created us to fulfill certain roles to create an environment in which HE can reside with us. When we re-design YHVH's creation, the imbalance it creates is doomed to fail.

In this account of Pharaoh's attempt to control the population of the Hebrew people, it is not a stretch to see a precursor to the idea of producing a master race.

Pharaoh's plan was very short sighted because he was essentially trying to destroy his future workforce.  This is a leason on letting your hatred overide your rational thought.

17) But the midwives feared ELOHIM, and did not do as Pharaoh commanded them, but saved the male children alive.

There are many kind and honest people in the world. However, people who will stand up to evil, and refuse to participate in it, are very rare. These two midwifes are a fine example of courageous behavior at risk of their own peril.  All good and noble traits in the world amount to little when not accompanied by courage.

The original Hebrew word for midwives makes it difficult to discern if these are Hebrew midwives, or Egyptian midwives that were assigned for the Hebrew women. If we look deeper into the original Hebrew we get even more clues to their identity.

In the Hebrew text the word used for, feared “GOD”, is "Elohim". If these women were Hebrew the name for GOD would have been recorded by the scribes as “YHVH”. Elohim, which means GOD ALMIGHTY or GOD of gods, was a word found in a wider language family used in the ancient middle east. It eventually became part of the Hebrew language just as Moshe became known as a Hebrew name.

The ambiguity in this passage as to the ethnic identification of these two women is a lesson in itself. Fear of YHVH knows no ethnicity. “Fear of YHVH is the beginning of wisdom” this is universal truth. YHVH gives his laws of morality to the world and gives us all the free will to choose to obey man, or to obey YHVH.

“If there is no GOD there is no truth, only power.” - Frederich Neitzsche, German Philosipher 1844-1900

18) So Pharaoh called for the midwives and said to them, “Why have you done this thing, and saved the male children alive?

19) And the midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women, for they are lively and give birth before the midwives come to them.”

This is consistent from the research from *Stontiom Isotope Analysis that was mentioned in notes from verse 8, that found that the Hebrew female genome were very virile.

It is obvious that even if it was a lie, Pharaoh believed them. However it is likely that this testimony from the midwives was at least a partial lie.

So would this lie be considered moral? We can infer from this episode that one is not obligated to speak truthfully to murderers and die, or have other innocent people die, as a result. Rather we are not only permitted, but morally obligated, to lie in order to save not only ourselves, but others.

Many Jews were saved in the holocaust because people hid them from the evil and lied about their where a bouts. If telling a lie to uphold the universal moral truth that life is sacred, I would tell a lie. The fact that YHVH blessed the midwives for their disobedience and lying to Pharaoh in this situation is evidence that the lie they told was morally correct. This is an example of situational ethics.

20) Therefore YHVH dealt well with the midwives, and the people multiplied and grew very mighty.

21) And so it was, because the midwives feared YHVH that HE provided households for them.

The bible states time and time again that if “You walk in MY ways and do what is right in MY eyes, I will be with you and bless you”. This is also consistent with another one of YHVH's characteristics that He is no respecter of persons and shows no partiality regarding ethnicity or gender. 

22) So Pharaoh commanded all his people, saying, “Every son who is born you shall cast into the river, and every daughter you shall save alive.”

Once again, this is a possible attempt at eliminating the Hebrew people. Pharaoh likely presumed if the Hebrew males were eliminated, despite any racial misgivings he had, the girls would eventually marry Egyptian or other non-Hebrew men and assimilate, and the Hebrew people would disappear.

We see that King Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylonian attempted to assimilate Israel into Persia in the dispersion of them throughout his kingdom in an attempt to have them assimilate and loose their identity. An attempt that nearly, and for the most part actually did work. Many feasts and festivals were adapted in to Judaism that came form Babylon. The names of all of the Hebrew months are Babylonian names.