Woman in Sacred History: A Series of Sketches Drawn from Scriptural, Historical, and Legendary SourcesStowe, Harriet Beecher
Religion
Woman in Sacred History: A Series of Sketches Drawn from Scriptural, Historical, and Legendary Sources
Stowe, Harriet Beecher
Bible -- Biography; Women in the Bible -- Biography
The tradition goes on to say that the boy was born without pain, and
that when he was born the whole house was filled with a light as of
bright sunshine. The mother's anxiety was increased when she saw the
beauty of the child, who was lovely as an angel of God. The parents
called him Tobias, "God is good," to express their thankfulness,
and Amram kissed Miriam on the brow and said: "Now know I that thy
prophecy is come true."
In contrast to this ornate narrative is the grave and chaste
simplicity of the Scripture story. It is all comprised in two or
three verses of the second chapter of Exodus. "And there went a man
of the house of Levi, and took to wife a daughter of Levi. And the
woman conceived, and bare a son: and when she saw him that he was a
goodly child she hid him three months. And when she could no longer
hide him, she took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with
slime and with pitch, and put the child therein and laid it in the
flags by the river's brink. And his sister stood afar off to see
what would be done to him. And the daughter of Pharaoh came down to
wash herself at the river; and her maidens walked along the river's
side: and when she saw the ark among the flags, she sent her maid
to fetch it. And when she had opened it, she saw the child: and
behold, the babe wept. And she had compassion on him and said: This
is one of the Hebrew children. Then said his sister to Pharaoh's
daughter, Shall I go and call to thee a nurse of the Hebrew women,
that she may nurse the child for thee? And Pharaoh's daughter said
unto her, Go. And the maid went and called the child's mother. And
Pharaoh's daughter said, Take this child away, and nurse it for me,
and I will give thee thy wages; and the woman took the child and
nursed it. And the child grew, and she brought him unto Pharaoh's
daughter, and she called his name Moses: and she said, Because I
drew him out of the water."
To this, we may add the account which St. Stephen gives when
standing before the Jewish council. "In which time Moses was born,
who was exceeding fair,[2] and nourished up in his father's house
three months. And when he was cast out, Pharaoh's daughter took him
up and nourished him for her own son. And Moses was learned in all
the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in words and deeds."
[2] The marginal translation reads "fair to God."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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