¹⁹ He dealt craftily with our people and forced our ancestors to abandon their infants so that they would die.^(A)

⁹ He said to his people, “Look, the Israelite people are more numerous and more powerful than we.^{(A) 10} Come, let us deal shrewdly with them, or they will increase and, in the event of war, join our enemies and fight against us and escape from the land.” ¹¹ Therefore they set taskmasters over them to oppress them with forced labor. They built supply cities, Pithom and Rameses, for Pharaoh.^{(B) 12} But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and spread, so that the Egyptians came to dread the Israelites. ¹³ The Egyptians subjected the Israelites to hard servitude ¹⁴ and made their lives bitter with hard servitude in mortar and bricks and in every kind of field labor. They were ruthless in all the tasks that they imposed on them.^(C)

¹⁵ The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was named Shiphrah and the other Puah, ¹⁶ “When you act as midwives to the Hebrew women and see them on the birthstool, if it is a son, kill him, but if it is a daughter, she shall live.”^{(D) 17} But the midwives feared God; they did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but they let the boys live.^{(E) 18} So the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and said to them, “Why have you done this and allowed the boys to live?” ¹⁹ The midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women, for they are vigorous and give birth before the midwife comes to them.” ²⁰ So God dealt well with the midwives, and the people multiplied and became very strong.^{(F) 21} And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families.^{(G) 22} Then Pharaoh commanded all his people, “Every son that is born to the Hebrews^[a] you shall throw into the Nile, but you shall let every daughter live.”^(H)

⁴ His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth. Then the dragon stood before the woman who was about to deliver a child, so that he might devour her child as soon as it was born.^{(A) 5} And she gave birth to a son, a male child, who is to rule^[a] all the nations with a scepter of iron. But her child was snatched away and taken to God and to his throne,^(B)

Psalm 129

Prayer for the Downfall of Israel’s Enemies

A Song of Ascents.