Exodus Story, Abridged
READER: “A new king arose over Egypt who did not know Joseph” (Exodus 1:8). Pharaoh subjected the people Israel to hard labor and bitter bondage—yet, the more they were oppressed, the more they increased and spread out.
READER: And so Pharaoh ordered Shifra and Puah, the Hebrew midwives, to drown all male Hebrew children in the waters of the Nile. But these brave women defied Pharaoh’s edict, and Pharaoh turned instead to his subjects, declaring that all male Hebrew babies be killed.
READER: To save her son from this edict, Yocheved hid him in a basket among the reeds of the Nile, where his sister stood silently watching over as Pharaoh’s own daughter took the child in, naming him Moses and raising him as her own. When he had grown up, he killed an Egyptian taskmaster who had beaten an Israelite slave, and he fled to the desert.
READER: There in the desert Moses encountered a bush that burned, but was not consumed by the flames. “I am the God of your ancestors—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob,” said a Voice (Exodus 3:6). And Moses heeded the Eternal’s command, returning to Egypt and demanding of the Pharaoh to let God’s people go.
READER: But Pharaoh would not listen, stiffening his heart against the cries of a people enslaved and against the pleas of Moses. God hardened Pharaoh’s heart. Again and again, Pharaoh refused to let the people go, until God performed such signs and wonders as had never been experienced before, bringing plague after plague upon Pharaoh and his people.
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