Exodus 1

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¹These be the names of the sons of Israel, that entered into Egypt with Jacob; all entered with their households;

²Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah,

³Issachar, Zebulun, and Benjamin,

⁴Dan, and Naphtali, Gad, and Asher.

⁵Therefore all the souls of them that went out of the hip of Jacob were seventy and five. Forsooth Joseph was in Egypt;

⁶and when he was dead, and all his brethren, and all his kindred,

⁷the sons of Israel increased, and were multiplied as burgeoning, and they were made strong greatly, and filled the land.

⁸A new king, that knew not Joseph, rose up in the meantime on Egypt,

⁹and said to his people, Lo! the people of the sons of Israel is much, and stronger than we;

¹⁰come ye, wisely oppress we it, lest peradventure it be multiplied; and lest, if battle riseth against us, it be added to our enemies, and go out of the land, when we be overcome.

¹¹And so he made masters of works sovereigns to them, that they should torment them with charges. And they made the cities of tabernacles, either of treasures, as it is in Hebrew, to Pharaoh, Pithom, and Raamses.

¹²And by how much they oppressed them, by so much they were multiplied, and increased the more.

¹³And the Egyptians hated the sons of Israel, and tormented, and scorned them;

¹⁴and they brought their life to bitterness, by hard works of clay and of tilestone, and by all servage, by which they were oppressed in the works of the earth.

¹⁵Forsooth the king of Egypt said to the midwives of Hebrews, of which one was called Shiphrah, and the tother Puah;

¹⁶and he commanded to them, When ye shall do the office of midwives to the Hebrew women, and the time of child-bearing shall come, if it is a knave child, slay ye him; if it is a woman child, keep ye it.

¹⁷But the midwives dreaded God, and did not by the commandment of the king of Egypt, but kept the knave children.

¹⁸To the which called to him, the king said, What is this thing that ye would do, that ye would keep the knave children?

¹⁹The which answered, Hebrew women be not as the women of Egypt, for they have knowing of the craft of midwifing, and childed before that we come to them.

²⁰Therefore God did well to the midwives; and the people increased, and was comforted greatly.

²¹And for the midwives dreaded God, God builded them houses.

²²Therefore Pharaoh commanded all his people, and said, Whatever thing of male kind is born to Hebrews, cast ye into the flood; whatever thing of women kind, keep ye.