Exodus 1:8-2:10 Commentary

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It matters a great deal where you place yourself in the Biblical narrative. Some of our worst theology comes from placing ourselves wrongly: always the hero, never the needy. Always the righteous, never the meanie. Erna Kim Hackett refers to this as “Disney Princess Theology.”

“As each individual reads Scripture, they see themselves as the princess in every story. They are Esther, never Xerxes or Haman. They are Peter, but never Judas. They are the woman anointing Jesus, never the Pharisees. They are the Jews escaping slavery, never Egypt. … And it means that as people in power, they have no lens for locating themselves rightly in Scripture or society — and it has made them blind and utterly ill-equipped to engage issues of power and injustice. It is some very weak Bible work.”

This text lends itself well to consider several vantage points of this text — the perspectives of Pharaoh and the midwives, of Moses’ birth and adoptive families.

Commentary

What can we see from the vantage point of Pharaoh’s throne? First, we need to set aside all the creative “othering” we naturally assume. Pharaoh is not a mustachioed villain, twirling the corner of his handlebar. That image places Pharaoh at a distance from the rest of us. As though we would never participate in systems that murder babies and tear families apart through oppression, ruthlessness and enslavement.

Over time, we’ll see Pharaoh’s heart become hardened, which means that, at some point and in some way, his heart was tender and open. How does a person like that come to the conclusion that having infants murdered and people enslaved and oppressed is a good idea? That seems to be a valuable question.

Before we continue in this story, take a minute to sit in Pharaoh’s seat of power and privilege. Consider the ways your job, your role in your family, your participation in the economy and shared civic life might place you in a position where you must regularly make choices that affect people, families and communities in real time. How can we sit in these positions well?

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Can you imagine what it must have been like for the Israelite Midwives to be summoned to the palace, given a direct order, called back in and rebuked for insubordination? These women have absolutely *no* positional power but they are bound and determined to obey God and preserve human life and flourishing. They lived out what was right, even when it was hard and even when it was, in a sense, wrong to do what was right.

So take a minute to kneel with these women — bowed before Pharaoh’s throne. Kneeling with them as they coach women to breathe and to push and to bring life into the world. No matter how broken the world is, there is no going back now. Talk to God about what it means to obey, to have integrity, to protect and preserve life even — ESPECIALLY — when there is immense risk involved.

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Moses’ mother must have looked at him with the tenderness of God reviewing the creation at the end of each day. She declares that he is good. Looking in his eyes with his tiny fingers wrapped around her pinky, she knows with just as much certainty that Pharaoh’s plan is not good and she will not let it break her family.

But what did they think was going to come of floating a baby basket in the bulrushes?! In a circumstance where Miriam may be young, awed by riches and a princess in her midst, she is not overwhelmed or overcome. She makes a brilliant adoption plan that holds her family together a little longer and secures a future for her brother in an otherwise uncertain world.

So this morning we sit with Moses’ birth family, rocking a sweet baby in our arms. Because their story creates a container that holds so many stories of broken families.

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This is — at its root — an adoption story. Moses has a birth family, with its own religion, language and culture. And, thanks to Pharaoh’s daughter, he will have an adopted family, with a religion, language and culture of its own. The tension of these two belongings will always be part of Moses’ story.

Pharaoh’s daughter shows us it is possible to be a part of a dominant and dominating culture without giving in to the structures around you. Although she stands to gain from the system as it is, she chooses to align herself with those who have no power. She seems to stand in solidarity with the oppressed. I say “seems to” because the Hebrew text leaves some holes in the plot. Rather than blaming shoddy storytelling, scholars of the text invite us to play in the not-knowing. In fact, Jewish scholars of these texts are often way more playful than we allow ourselves to be.

So let’s stand knee deep in the Nile with Pharaoh’s daughter a moment and wonder our way into the text. Does Pharaoh’s daughter take the baby because she assumes she can, given the comparative gap between her status and his? But surely they had nursemaids in Pharaoh’s household. Is it, perhaps, worth wondering why she allowed the child to go back to his people until he is weaned? Does she realize what’s happening in Miriam’s offer of “a Hebrew woman” to nurse the baby? Is she playing along? Or is she getting played?

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But there is one last non-speaking—or not-YET-speaking—character in all of this. God is acting in seen and named and unseen and unacknowledged ways all through this story.

• God is the one who will pull and tug at Pharaoh’s heart and who will accomplish the liberation of God’s people.
• God emboldens the Midwives with wisdom and courage to obey.
• God rewards their subversion of injustice, their manipulation of power. So they can stand in an unenviable position yet without regrets.
• God comforts the oppressed, in this case a family holding a beloved child, trying to decide how to keep him safe, how to let him go.
• God guides and directs Moses’ basket into the waiting arms of salvation, a rescue, a plan for his life but also the complication of a life lived between two worlds.

Although God is not yet speaking, God is acting in such a way that Moses’ story belongs to, reflects and participates in a greater story. And God continues to act in such a way that our stories belong to, reflect and participate in Jesus’ story. Everything that happens to us, everything that we accomplish, every heartbreak, failure or disappointment will make sense one day when all of our stories are fitted together in Christ.