=== Exodus ===
These are the names of the sons of Israel who came to Egypt with Jacob, each coming with his household:
Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah;
Issachar, Zebulun, and Benjamin;
Dan and Naphtali, Gad and Asher.
The total number of persons that were of Jacob’s issue came to seventy, Joseph being already in Egypt.
Joseph died, and all his brothers, and all that generation.
But the Israelites were fertile and prolific; they multiplied and increased very greatly, so that the land was filled with them.
A new king arose over Egypt who did not know Joseph.
And he said to his people, “Look, the Israelite people are much too numerous for us.
Let us deal shrewdly with them, so that they may not increase; otherwise in the event of war they may join our enemies in fighting against us and rise from the ground.”
So they set taskmasters over them to oppress them with forced labor; and they built garrison cities for Pharaoh: Pithom and Raamses.
But the more they were oppressed, the more they increased and spread out, so that the [Egyptians] came to dread the Israelites.
The Egyptians ruthlessly imposed upon the Israelites
the various labors that they made them perform. Ruthlessly they made life bitter for them with harsh labor at mortar and bricks and with all sorts of tasks in the field.
The king of Egypt spoke to the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was named Shiphrah and the other Puah,
saying, “When you deliver the Hebrew women, look at the birthstool: if it is a boy, kill him; if it is a girl, let her live.”
The midwives, fearing God, did not do as the king of Egypt had told them; they let the boys live.
So the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and said to them, “Why have you done this thing, letting the boys live?”
The midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women: they are vigorous. Before the midwife can come to them, they have given birth.”
And God dealt well with the midwives; and the people multiplied and increased greatly.
And [God] established households for the midwives, because they feared God.
Then Pharaoh charged all his people, saying, “Every boy that is born you shall throw into the Nile, but let every girl live.”
A certain member of the house of Levi went and took [into his household as his wife] a woman of Levi.
The woman conceived and bore a son; and when she saw how beautiful he was, she hid him for three months.
When she could hide him no longer, she got a wicker basket for him and caulked it with bitumen and pitch. She put the child into it and placed it among the reeds by the bank of the Nile.
And his sister stationed herself at a distance, to learn what would befall him.
The daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe in the Nile, while her maidens walked along the Nile. She spied the basket among the reeds and sent her slave girl to fetch it.
When she opened it, she saw that it was a child, a boy crying. She took pity on it and said, “This must be a Hebrew child.”
Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and get you a Hebrew nurse to suckle the child for you?”
And Pharaoh’s daughter answered, “Yes.” So the girl went and called the child’s mother.
And Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child and nurse it for me, and I will pay your wages.” So the woman took the child and nursed it.
When the child grew up, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, who made him her son. She named him Moses, explaining, “I drew him out of the water.”
Some time after that, when Moses had grown up, he went out to his kinsfolk and witnessed their labors. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his kinsmen.
He turned this way and that and, seeing no one about, he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.
When he went out the next day, he found two Hebrews fighting; so he said to the offender, “Why do you strike your fellow?”
He retorted, “Who made you chief and ruler over us? Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?” Moses was frightened, and thought: Then the matter is known!
When Pharaoh learned of the matter, he sought to kill Moses; but Moses fled from Pharaoh. He arrived in the land of Midian, and sat down beside a well.
Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters. They came to draw water, and filled the troughs to water their father’s flock;
but shepherds came and drove them off. Moses rose to their defense, and he watered their flock.
When they returned to their father Reuel, he said, “How is it that you have come back so soon today?”
They answered, “An Egyptian rescued us from the shepherds; he even drew water for us and watered the flock.”
He said to his daughters, “Where is he then? Why did you leave the man? Ask him in to break bread.”
Moses consented to stay with the man, and he gave Moses his daughter Zipporah as wife.
She bore a son whom he named Gershom, for he said, “I have been a stranger in a foreign land.”
A long time after that, the king of Egypt died. The Israelites were groaning under the bondage and cried out; and their cry for help from the bondage rose up to God.
God heard their moaning, and God remembered the covenant with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob.
God looked upon the Israelites, and God took notice of them.