Exodus 2:6

6 She opened it, and seeing within it an infant crying, having compassion on it, she said: This is one of the babes of the Hebrews.

Exodus 2:6 Meaning and Commentary

Exodus 2:6

And when she had opened it
The ark, for it was shut or covered over, though doubtless there were some apertures for respiration:

she saw the child [in it], and, behold, the babe wept;
and which was a circumstance, it is highly probable, greatly affected the king's daughter, and moved her compassion to it; though an Arabic writer says {p}, she heard the crying of the child in the ark, and therefore sent for it:

and she had compassion on him, and said, this is one of the Hebrews'
children;
which she might conclude from its being thus exposed, knowing her father's edict, and partly from the form and beauty of it, Hebrew children not being swarthy and tawny as Egyptian ones: the Jewish writers ^F17 say, she knew it by its being circumcised, the Egyptians not yet using circumcision.

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FOOTNOTES:

F16 Patricides apud Hottinger. p 401.
F17 T. Bab. Sotah, fol. 12. 2. Aben Ezra in loc.

Exodus 2:6 In-Context

4 His sister standing afar off, and taking notice what would be done.

5 And behold the daughter of Pharao came down to wash herself in the river: and her maids walked by the river’s brink. And when she saw the basket in the sedges she sent one of her maids for it: and when it was brought,

6 She opened it, and seeing within it an infant crying, having compassion on it, she said: This is one of the babes of the Hebrews.

7 And the child’s sister said to her: Shall I go, and call to thee a Hebrew woman, to nurse the babe?

8 She answered: Go. The maid went and called her mother.