Exodus 2:3
Read Exodus 2:3 Using Other Translations
What does Exodus 2:3 mean?
And when she could no longer hide him
Because of her neighbours, who might hear the crying of the
child, or because of the diligent search made by Pharaoh's
officers, which some think was made every three months: the Jews
F1 have a notion that his mother was
delivered of him at six months' end, and therefore when the other
three months were up women usually go with child, she could hide
him no longer, a birth of a child being then expected, and would
be inquired about:
she took for him an ark of bulrushes;
the word, according to Kimchi {b}, signifies a kind of wood
exceeding light, so Gersom and Ben Melech; an Arabic writer
F3 calls it an ark of wood; it is
generally taken to be the "papyrus" or reed of Egypt, which grew
upon the banks of the Nile, and of which, many writers say, small
vessels or little ships were made, (See Gill on Isaiah
18:2)
and daubed it with slime and with pitch;
with pitch without and slime within, as Jarchi observes; which
being of a glutinous nature, made the rushes or reeds stick close
together, and so kept out the water:
and put the child therein;
committing it to the care and providence of God, hoping and
believing that by some means or another it would be preserved;
for this, no doubt, was done in faith, as was the hiding him
three months, to which the apostle ascribes that, ( Hebrews
11:23 )
and she laid it in the flags by the river's
brink;
among the sedge, weeds, and rushes, that grew upon the banks of
the river Nile; there she laid it, that it might not be carried
away with the stream of the river, and that it might be seen and
taken up by somebody that would have compassion on it, and take
care of it: the Arabic writers F4 say, that Jochebed made an
ark of the papyrus, though in the law it is said to be of cork,
and pitched within and without, and put the child into it, and
laid it on the bank of the Nile, where the water was not so deep,
by the city Tzan (or Zoan, that is, Tanis), which was the
metropolis of the Tanitic nome; but very wrongly adds, that it
might be killed by the dashing of the waves, and she might not
see its death.
F1 Targum Jon. & Jarchi in loc.
F2 Sepher Shorash. rad. (amg) .
F3 Elmacius apud Hottinger. p. 402.
F4 Patricides, p. 25. Elmacinus, p. 46. apud Hottinger. Smegma, c. 8. p. 400.
