The Sons of Jacob Become the Nation of Israel (1-7)

The early stages of the book of Exodus chronicle the threat of destruction to the promise-bearers of God’s creative blessing. The threat would not be a serpent or Cain, nor even the sons of God. Rather, it would come from an unnamed Pharaoh embodying oppression and the sworn enemy of blessing by divine provision. This Pharaoh would represent the world of securing imperial power and wealth by the subjugation of the human soul to ruthless toil.  

Exodus is a sequel to Genesis. The first six verses serve as a transition, first by naming Jacob’s children, next by defining the number who went to Egypt, and finally, by providing an end to the Genesis narrative by declaring Joseph and his brothers dead. God’s story would continue in Exodus, but the drama changed from a family to a family-nation (1-6). 

What we see happening next reads a bit like the Creation account: the sons of Jacob multiplied, grew strong, and then filled the land (7). The Egyptians’ response was to move the Israelites through four phases of bondage and oppression.

1. Israel Forced into Taking the Hard Jobs (8-12)

   There was a season when Joseph, his brothers, and likely their grandchildren would tell the story of how Yahweh saved the world through Joseph. Every time they would tell the Joseph story, Yahweh would be right in the middle of the telling. 

   Eventually, that generation died, and the telling of that Good News, at least to the Egyptians, diminished to the point that Joseph became a mere blip in Egyptian history. The Pharaohs of Egypt did not know Joseph, which is synonymous with saying they did not know Yahweh and were not intimately acquainted with how Yahweh had saved their nation (8). 

   Fearing the Israelites’ strength and multiplying power—not to mention their threat of becoming an allied fifth column with a northern invader—the Egyptians determined to make their lives more difficult. 

   Pharaoh appointed “taskmasters” over the Israelites. The word “taskmaster” is made up of two words—the first had the thought of a judge, and the other the thought of forced labor. The “taskmasters” were judges who, it would seem, through legal maneuvering, corrupted justice. The “taskmasters” began conscripting Israeli people to work more months on civic projects requiring them to do the more difficult work. 

   The “taskmasters” eventually became vile bosses. They made the Hebrews work in unreasonable working conditions, building shrines to Egyptian insecurity and erecting their store cities (9-11). 

   Oddly, God used the scheming of the Egyptians as they made anguishing slaves of the Israelites. The more the Israelites suffered, the more they pursued marital intimacy. Their heightened intimacy resulted in the multiplication of babies. 

   The net result: the Egyptians feared the Israelites even more (12).

2. Israel Forced into Slavery (13-14)

   The great fear of the Israelites ended up causing the Egyptian “taskmasters” to do more than assign them bad bosses and difficult work—they eventually turned them into slaves. They sought to make their lives bitter by making masons and farmers of them, working them ruthlessly as one would work pieces of property. Josephus, the historian, asserted that the Israelites even dug canals for irrigation (13-14). Israeli life became devoted to serving by the sweat of their brow and building the dream of a megalomaniac despot leader. 

3. Israel Forced into Population Control (15-21)

   Next, the Egyptians sought to compel the Hebrew midwives to slaughter the sons born to the Israelites (15-16). The God-fearing midwives disobeyed, and the male children survived (17). The king then interrogated the midwives as to why they allowed the children to live. They blamed the vigor of the Hebrew women to deliver quickly, a half-truth at best (18-19). The Israelites continued to multiply and grow strong (20). Yahweh took time to mention rewarding the midwives for their reverence; no doubt, the midwives were defying Pharaoh at great personal risk (21).

   It is important to mention three people here. First, Shiphrah and Puah were the midwives, representing Israel. God chose to align them against an unnamed Pharaoh who represented oppressive Egypt. The two midwives who feared God won the contest—through them, the blessing continued, and the nation flourished. All because they “feared God.” This does not mean they were afraid to disobey because of punishment. The fear of God meant they were aware and had discerned the power of God to keep His promise and cause them to flourish. They so honored and revered Yahweh’s power and word, even to the point of their own death, that they wanted to do nothing to disrupt the great creative work of God to bless and cause human flourishing. Pharaoh is never named, but Shiphrah and Puah are immortalized as women who stood against an empire and caused a nation to continue to thrive.

4. Israel Forced to Commit Infanticide (22-25)

   Pharaoh finally commanded every male child to be thrown into the Nile, likely at the threat of death to every parent who disobeyed. The males were to be slaughtered while the daughters would live. The insanity of the tyrant is most evident here as Pharaoh sought to keep the potential warrior numbers of the Hebrews weakened (22-25).