In Exodus 1:15-20, do you think this was a lie told by the midwives to Pharaoh or was it really true that the Hebrew women gave birth before the midwives came to them?<\/p>\n\t
“Then the king of Egypt spoke to the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was named Shiphrah and the other was named Puah; and he said, “When you are helping the Hebrew women to give birth and see them upon the birthstool, if it is a son, then you shall put him to death; but if it is a daughter, then she shall live.” But the midwives feared God, and did not do as the king of Egypt had commanded them, but let the boys live. So the king of Egypt called for the midwives and said to them, “Why have you done this thing, and let the boys live?” The midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women are not as the Egyptian women; for they are vigorous and give birth before the midwife can get to them.” So God was good to the midwives, and the people multiplied, and became very mighty<\/em>” (Exodus 1:15-20).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I can easily see the midwives arranging matters such that they just\u00a0happened<\/em> to not be around at the moment of birth, such as taking extra long to pack their supplies, sending a young assistant to watch until they get there, and then “hurrying” in just after the baby is born.<\/p>\n
It may also be that the Israelites didn’t use midwives often and commonly gave birth without one. After all, there appear to have been only two midwives for a nation of about two million. Thus, the midwives are simply stating the truth. It is likely that the hard labor of slavery created a healthy population of women among the Hebrews.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Question: In Exodus 1:15-20, do you think this was a lie told by the midwives to Pharaoh or was it really true that the Hebrew women gave birth before the midwives came to them? Answer: “Then the king of Egypt spoke to the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was named Shiphrah and the other was…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[793,392],"class_list":["post-51378","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-answer","tag-apparent-contradictions","tag-lying"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":87525,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/shiphrah-and-puah\/","url_meta":{"origin":51378,"position":0},"title":"Shiphrah and Puah","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 6, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"by Jason Hardin Their names were Shiphrah and Puah. They were Hebrew midwives, living in ancient Egypt during an era when a new Pharaoh was determined to slow the numerical growth of the descendants of Abraham. By any means necessary. Indeed, so intense was his determination to curb the Hebrew\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":28657,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/why-did-god-kill-all-the-firstborn-sons-of-the-egyptians-when-it-was-pharaoh-who-sinned\/","url_meta":{"origin":51378,"position":1},"title":"Why did God kill all the firstborn sons of the Egyptians when it was Pharaoh who sinned?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 30, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: In Exodus when the firstborn sons of all Egyptians die because of Pharaoh, why did God kill all the Egyptian sons for the sin of Pharaoh? Answer: It is easy to blame the leader and forget he wasn't the only one involved. He was by far the most prominent,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":57296,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/types-and-their-abuse\/","url_meta":{"origin":51378,"position":2},"title":"Types and Their Abuse","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"December 24, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"by Jerry C. Ray The Gospel Guardian, 5 January 1961 and 12 January 1961 Webster's Dictionary defines type as \"a person or thing regarded as the symbol of someone or something that is yet to appear.\" The word \"type\" (Greek - tupos) is from the Greek word, tuptein - to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":28388,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/are-firstborns-only-male\/","url_meta":{"origin":51378,"position":3},"title":"Are firstborns only male?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 11, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: in Exodus 11:5 it says that every firstborn son in Egypt will die, does that mean if the firstborn is a daughter and the second born is a son, then the son would die but not the daughter even though she's really the firstborn?\u00a0 Also in Exodus 34:19, it\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":28480,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/was-the-new-testament-written-in-greek-or-aramaic\/","url_meta":{"origin":51378,"position":4},"title":"Was the New Testament written in Greek or Aramaic?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 17, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: In what language was the New Testament written: Greek or Aramaic? Answer: The New Testament was written in Greek. All the earliest manuscripts are in Greek. The style of writing is in the Greek style, though some of the writers, such as Matthew, wrote with a Hebrew \"accent,\" if\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":52548,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/if-you-fear-god-how-can-you-trust-him\/","url_meta":{"origin":51378,"position":5},"title":"If you fear God, how can you trust Him?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"February 5, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I have conflicting thoughts about Cornelius (Acts 10).\u00a0 It says he feared God and was always praying to Him. If he feared God, how could Cornelius trust in God? Answer: I think you may be using the wrong definition of fear.\u00a0 Fearing God has always been a requirement for\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51378","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51378"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51378\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51378"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51378"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51378"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}