Exodus 2:11-25

Moses runs away to Midian

11 One day after Moses had become an adult, he went out among his people and he saw their forced labor. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his own people.
12 He looked around to make sure no one else was there. Then he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.
13 When Moses went out the next day, he saw two Hebrew men fighting with each other. Moses said to the one who had started the fight, "Why are you abusing your fellow Hebrew?"
14 He replied, "Who made you a boss or judge over us? Are you planning to kill me like you killed the Egyptian?" Then Moses was afraid when he realized: They obviously know what I did.
15 When Pharaoh heard about it, he tried to kill Moses. But Moses ran away from Pharaoh and settled down in the land of Midian. One day Moses was sitting by a well.
16 Now there was a Midianite priest who had seven daughters. The daughters came to draw water and fill the troughs so that their father's flock could drink.
17 But some shepherds came along and rudely chased them away. Moses got up, rescued the women, and gave their flock water to drink.
18 When they went back home to their father Reuel,[a] he asked, "How were you able to come back home so soon today?"
19 They replied, "An Egyptian man rescued us from a bunch of shepherds. Afterward, he even helped us draw water to let the flock drink."
20 Reuel said to his daughters, "So where is he? Why did you leave this man? Invite him to eat a meal with us."
21 Moses agreed to come and live with the man, who gave his daughter Zipporah to Moses as his wife.
22 She gave birth to a son, and Moses named him Gershom, "because," he said, "I've been an immigrant[b] living in a foreign land."
23 A long time passed, and the Egyptian king died. The Israelites were still groaning because of their hard work. They cried out, and their cry to be rescued from the hard work rose up to God.
24 God heard their cry of grief, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
25 God looked at the Israelites, and God understood.

Footnotes 2

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