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Page 23
The princess felt kind toward the little one, and loved it at once. She
said: "This is one of the Hebrews' children." You have heard how the
children of Israel came to be called Hebrews. Pharaoh's daughter
thought that it would be cruel to let such a lovely baby as this die out
on the water. And just then a little girl came running up to her, as if
by accident, and she looked at the baby also, and she said: "Shall I go
and find some woman of the Hebrews to be a nurse to the child for you
and take care of it?"
"Yes," said the princess. "Go and find a nurse for me."
The little girl--who was Miriam, the baby's sister--ran as quickly as
she could and brought the baby's own mother to the princess. Miriam
showed in this act that she was a wise and thoughtful little girl. The
princess said to the little baby's mother: "Take this child to your home
and nurse it for me, and I will pay you wages for it."
How glad the Hebrew mother was to take her child home! No one could harm
her boy now, for he was protected by the princess of Egypt, the daughter
of the king.
When the child was large enough to leave his mother Pharaoh's daughter
took him into her own house in the palace. She named him "Moses," a word
that means "drawn out," because he was drawn out of the water.
So Moses, the Hebrew boy, lived in the palace among the nobles of the
land, as the son of the princess. There he learned much more than he
could have learned among his own people; for there were very wise
teachers. Moses gained all the knowledge that the Egyptians had to give.
There in the court of the cruel king who had made slaves of the
Israelites, God's people, was growing up our Israelite boy who should at
some time set his people free!
Although Moses grew up among the Egyptians, and gained their learning,
he loved his own people. They were poor and were hated, and were slaves,
but he loved them, because they were the people who served the Lord God,
while the Egyptians worshipped idols and animals. Strange it was that so
wise a people as these should bow down and pray to an ox, or to a cat,
or to a snake, as did the Egyptians.
When Moses became a man, he went among his own people, leaving the
riches and ease that he might have enjoyed among the Egyptians. He felt
a call from God to lift up the Israelites and set them free. But at that
time he found that he could do nothing to help them. They would not let
him lead them, and as the king of Egypt had now become his enemy, Moses
went away from Egypt into a country in Arabia, called Midian.
He was sitting by a well, in that land, tired from his long journey,
when he saw some young women come to draw water for their flocks of
sheep. But some rough men came, and drove the women away, and took the
water for their own flocks. Moses saw it, and helped the women and drew
the water for them.
These young women were sisters, the daughters of a man named Jethro, who
was a priest in the land of Midian. He asked Moses to live with him, and
to help him in the care of his flocks. Moses stayed with Jethro and
married one of his daughters. So from being a prince in the king's
palace in Egypt, Moses became a shepherd in the wilderness of Midian.
[Illustration: _Moses became a shepherd in the wilderness of
Midian_]
But Moses did not remain a shepherd. While he was tending his sheep God
appeared to him in a burning bush and told him that he should return to
Egypt and become the leader of his people. The Lord told him that the
wicked Egyptians would be punished for the ill-treatment they were
giving the Israelites. In your Bible you will find in the book of Exodus
how God wonderfully fulfilled his promise. The Egyptians were punished
by many plagues, and finally allowed the Israelites to go. They crossed
the Red Sea in a wonderful way, and traveled for a long time through a
wilderness, where God fed them day by day with manna from heaven. God
also gave them rules as a guide for their daily living; these rules we
call the Ten Commandments; yet they forgot the Lord so far as to make
images and worship them.
[Illustration: _God fed them day by day with manna_]
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