Exodus 1:15-22
When earthly power commands what God forbids, faithfulness begins with fearing God more than man, and God preserves His people even through hidden acts of costly obedience.
15 The king of Egypt spoke to the Hebrew midwives, of whom the name of the one was Shiphrah, and the name of the other Puah,
16 and he said, “When you perform the duty of a midwife to the Hebrew women, and see them on the birth stool, if it is a son, then you shall kill him; but if it is a daughter, then she shall live.”
17 But the midwives feared God, and didn’t do what the king of Egypt commanded them, but saved the baby boys alive.
18 The king of Egypt called for the midwives, and said to them, “Why have you done this thing and saved the boys alive?”
19 The midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women aren’t like the Egyptian women; for they are vigorous and give birth before the midwife comes to them.”
20 God dealt well with the midwives, and the people multiplied, and grew very mighty.
21 Because the midwives feared God, he gave them families.
22 Pharaoh commanded all his people, saying, “You shall cast every son who is born into the river, and every daughter you shall save alive.”
When earthly power commands what God forbids, faithfulness begins with fearing God more than man, and God preserves his people even through hidden acts of costly obedience.
To show that Pharaoh’s fear-driven oppression escalates into commanded murder, yet God preserves Israel through ordinary women whose fear of God outweighs fear of the king.
Exodus 1:1-7 recalled the sons of Israel entering Egypt and the Lord’s blessing in their multiplication. Exodus 1:8-14 introduced a new king who did not know Joseph and who responded to Israel’s growth with fear-driven oppression. Exodus 1:15-22 intensifies the conflict. Pharaoh moves from economic subjugation to infanticide, first through private commands to the midwives and then by public decree to all his people. This unit prepares for Exodus 2 by creating the crisis into which Moses is born and preserved.
The passage belongs to Israel’s pre-exodus bondage in Egypt. Pharaoh’s policy moves from forced labor to covert infanticide through Hebrew midwives, then to public command that male Hebrew children be thrown into the Nile. The text does not name this Pharaoh; its theological focus is on the contest between royal power and the God who guards his covenant people.
Israel Multiplies Under Oppression
God's covenant promise multiplies under pressure, while the fear of God gives courage to preserve life against the demands of oppressive power.