Exodus 2:11-22

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

Moses Flees to Midian

¹¹ One day after Moses had grown up, he went out to his people and saw their forced labor. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his own people.^{(A) 12} He looked this way and that, and seeing no one he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. ¹³ When he went out the next day, he saw two Hebrews fighting, and he said to the one who was in the wrong, “Why do you strike your fellow Hebrew?”^{(B) 14} He answered, “Who made you a ruler and judge over us? Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid and thought, “Surely the thing is known.”^{(C) 15} When Pharaoh heard of it, he sought to kill Moses.

So Moses fled from Pharaoh. He settled in the land of Midian and sat down by a well.^{(D) 16} The priest of Midian had seven daughters. They came to draw water and filled the troughs to water their father’s flock. ¹⁷ But some shepherds came and drove them away. Moses got up and came to their defense and watered their flock.^{(E) 18} When they returned to their father Reuel, he said, “How is it that you have come back so soon today?”^{(F) 19} They said, “An Egyptian helped us against the shepherds; he even drew water for us and watered the flock.” ²⁰ He said to his daughters, “Where is he? Why did you leave the man? Invite him to share a meal.”^{(G) 21} Moses agreed to stay with the man, and he gave Moses his daughter Zipporah in marriage.^{(H) 22} She bore a son, and he named him Gershom,^[a] for he said, “I have been an alien residing in a foreign land.”^(I)