BBB, artist: ART EXPLOSION STUDIOS, 744 Alabama St., San Francisco, CA
SHEMOTH/Exodus 1:1-22
Translation: The Five Books of Moses, by Everett Fox Now these are the names of the Children of Israel coming to Egypt, with Yaakov, each-man and his household they came: 2. Re’uven, Shim’on, Levi and Yehuda, 3. Yissakhar, Zevulun and Binyamin, 4. Dan and Naftali, Gad and Asher. 5. So all the persons, those issuing from Yaakov’s loins, were seventy persons, —Yosef was (already) in Egypt. 6. And Yosef died, and all his brothers, and all that generation. 7. Yet the Children of Israel bore fruit, they swarmed, they became many, they grew mighty (in number)—exceedingly, yes, exceedingly; the land filled up with them. 8 Now a new king arose over Egypt, who had not known Yosef. 9 He said to his people: Here, (this) people, the Children of Israel, is many-more and mightier (in number) than we! 10 Come-now, let us use-our-wits against it, lest it become many-more, and then, if war should occur, it too be added to our enemies and make war upon us or go up away from the land! 11 So they set gang-captains over it, to afflict it with their burdens. It built storage-cities for Pharaoh—Pitom and Ra’amses. 12 But as they afflicted it, so did it become many, so did it burst forth. And they felt dread before the Children of Israel. 13 So they, Egypt, made the Children of Israel subservient with crushing-labor; 14 they embittered their lives with hard servitude in loam and in bricks and with all kinds of servitude in the field— all their service in which they made them subservient with crushing-labor. 15 Now the king of Egypt said to the midwives of the Hebrews—the name of the first one was Shifra, the name of the second was Pu’a— 16 he said: When you help the Hebrew women give birth, see the supporting-stones: if he be a son, put him to death, but if she be a daughter, she may live. 17 But the midwives held God in awe, and they did not do as the king of Egypt had spoken to them, they let the (male) children live. 18 The king of Egypt called for the midwives and said to them: Why have you done this thing, you have let the children live! 19 The midwives said to Pharaoh: Indeed, not like the Egyptian (women) are the Hebrew (women), indeed, they are lively: before the midwife comes to them, they have given birth! 20 God dealt well with the midwives. And the people became many and grew exceedingly mighty (in number). 21 It was, since the midwives held God in awe, that he made them households. 22 Now Pharaoh commanded all his people, saying: Every son that is born, throw him into the Nile, but let every daughter live.