Numbers 26:57 These are those who were counted of the Levites after their families: of Gershon, the family of the Gershonites; of Kohath, the family of the Kohathites; of Merari, the family of the Merarites. 58 These are the families of Levi: the family of the Libnites, the family of the Hebronites, the family of the Mahlites, the family of the Mushites, and the family of the Korahites. Kohath became the father of Amram. 59 The name of Amram’s wife was Jochebed, the daughter of Levi, who was born to Levi in Egypt. She bore to Amram Aaron and Moses, and Miriam their sister.
Jochebed, the mother of Aaron, Miriam and Moses, hid Moses when he was a baby, and, eventually, put him into a floating basket, from which he was picked up by Pharaoh’s daughter, Jochebed also served as a wet nurse for Moses, who was raised among the Egyptian royalty, apparently, with Pharaoh’s daughter as his mother.
Jochebed illustrates a bible study challenge: Are the ages of people in Genesis and Exodus to be taken literally and are people left out of the geneaologies?
Numbers 26:58 These are the families of Levi: the family of the Libnites, the family of the Hebronites, the family of the Mahlites, the family of the Mushites, and the family of the Korahites. Kohath became the father of Amram. 59 The name of Amram’s wife was Jochebed, the daughter of Levi, who was born to Levi in Egypt. She bore to Amram Aaron and Moses, and Miriam their sister. 60 To Aaron were born Nadab and Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar.
So the apparent ancestors of Moses were Levi and his daughter Jochebed, who was the mother of Moses. But the Israelites were in Egypt for 430 years, according to Exodus 12:40-41. (See also Galatians 3:17), and there is no indication that Levi, Jochebed, or Moses lived nearly long enough to have accounted for this time. One or more generations must have been left out. The same thing is true of parts of the “begats” in 1 Chronicles. (See here.) The purpose of the genealogies in the Bible was not so that we could calculate how far in the past things happened.
Jochebed’s (and Moses’s sister, Miriam’s) saved Moses’s life. Jochebed built a little boat and put baby Moses in it, apparently out of desperation – the Egyptians were under orders to kill all Hebrew male babies. This did, indeed, save Moses’s life. He became the greatest leader in Hebrew history. The Bible does not tell us that his father took an active role in building the boat, and putting Moses in it. Perhaps he did, perhaps he didn’t.* But Jochebed certainly did.
See "Making sense of the numbers of Genesis," for more on the life spans of people in the Bible.
*July 6, 2023: I came across Hebrews 11:23, which says that Moses "was hidden for three months by his parents." (Emphasis added)
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