Exodus 2:2

2:2 The woman became pregnant ¹  and gave birth to a son. When ²  she saw that ³  he was a healthy ⁴  child, she hid him for three months.

Exodus 18:2

18:2 Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, took Moses’ wife Zipporah after he had sent her back,

Exodus 18:6

18:6 He said ⁵  to Moses, “I, your father-in-law Jethro, am coming to you, along with your wife and her two sons with her.”

Exodus 19:15

19:15 He said to the people, “Be ready for the third day. Do not go near your wives.” ⁶ 

Exodus 22:24

22:24 and my anger will burn and I will kill you with the sword, and your wives will be widows and your children will be fatherless. ⁷ 

Exodus 35:26

35:26 and all the women whose heart stirred them to action and who were skilled ⁸  spun goats’ hair.

¹ tn Or “conceived” (KJV, ASV, NAB, NASB, NRSV).

² tn A preterite form with the vav consecutive can be subordinated to a following clause. What she saw stands as a reason for what she did: “when she saw…she hid him three months.”

³ tn After verbs of perceiving or seeing there are frequently two objects, the formal accusative (“she saw him”) and then a noun clause that explains what it was about the child that she perceived (“that he was healthy”). See GKC 365 §117.h.

⁴ tn Or “fine” (טוֹב, tov). The construction is parallel to phrases in the creation narrative (“and God saw that it was good,” Gen 1:4, 10, 12, 17, 21, 25, 31). B. Jacob says, “She looked upon her child with a joy similar to that of God upon His creation (Gen 1.4ff.)” (Exodus, 25).

⁵ sn This verse may seem out of place, since the report has already been given that they came to the desert. It begins to provide details of the event that the previous verse summarizes. The announcement in verse 6 may have come in advance by means of a messenger or at the time of arrival, either of which would fit with the attention to formal greetings in verse 7. This would suit a meeting between two important men; the status of Moses has changed. The LXX solves the problem by taking the pronoun “I” as the particle “behold” and reads it this way: “one said to Moses, ‘Behold, your father-in-law has come….’”

⁹ tn Heb “do not go near a woman”; NIV “Abstain from sexual relations.”

¹³ sn The punishment will follow the form of talionic justice, an eye for an eye, in which the punishment matches the crime. God will use invading armies (“sword” is a metonymy of adjunct here) to destroy them, making their wives widows and their children orphans.

¹⁷ tn The text simply uses a prepositional phrase, “with/in wisdom.” It seems to be qualifying “the women” as the relative clause is.