Many people – perhaps most – have heard of the Ten Commandments or the Law of Moses.
We learn about the life of Moses in the Old Testament of the Bible, since he was born about 1,500 years before Jesus. However, the name of Moses was still known by everybody who
lived in or around Israel in Jesus’ day, and the New Testament contains many references to the law which God gave through him.
So where did Moses come from and why was he so famous?
To understand Moses’ part in the history of Israel, we have to start with Abraham, who was told by God to leave Ur – an ancient city in
modern-day Iraq – and go to a country that God would show him. Abraham obeyed and God led him to modern-day Israel, telling him after his arrival that he and his descendants would later own the land.
God also told him that there would be a 400-year delay before his descendants received the land, and this is just what happened. At the time of Abraham’s death, the only land he owned was a field he
had bought as a burial place for his wife Sarah.
Some time later, his grandson Jacob took the entire family to Egypt to escape a famine, and they stayed there until the 400 years were completed. Initially the Egyptians welcomed Jacob’s family and showed them great kindness, but over time they reduced the Israelites to slavery and forced them to build store cities for their hosts. Not only so, but
around the time Moses was born, Pharaoh the king decreed that any Hebrew baby boys were to be killed.
Despite Pharaoh’s cruel decree, Moses’ parents did their best to save his life, and for three months they hid him successfully. At that time, however, they felt compelled to take desperate measures to keep him alive. Making a small basket of bulrushes, waterproofed with bitumen and pitch, they put
the basket in the river with baby Moses inside. They appear to have chosen the location carefully so that Pharaoh’s daughter would see the basket. Presumably they had some reason to believe that the princess would notice the basket and be unable to resist saving the baby boy inside. The plan worked. Pharaoh’s daughter saw the basket and sent her maids to fetch it. Although she quickly recognised the baby as a Hebrew boy, she was eager to keep him as her own.
Moses’ older sister Miriam had been watching and now approached the princess, suggesting that she knew a Hebrew woman who could feed the baby for her. Incredibly, the princess agreed, so Moses was cared for by his own mother until he was weaned. At that time he went to live with Pharaoh’s daughter as her son, and she gave him the name ‘Moses’.
It seems very likely that Pharaoh’s daughter
would have put two and two together and immediately understood the parentage of this cute little foundling. Despite this, she was willing to flout her father’s command and adopt a Hebrew boy.
We know nothing more about Moses’ childhood, but when he was about 40, he decided to renew his association with his own people, Israel. At that time he probably got to know his sister Miriam and his brother
Aaron, and possibly others in the family. His time in Egypt came to an end at this point when he stood up for one of his countrymen and had to flee Pharaoh’s retribution.
He escaped to Midian and there married a wife Zipporah and they had two sons. When he was 80 years old and working as a shepherd, he saw a bush burning without being consumed. God spoke to him from this burning bush and told
him to return to Egypt, meeting his brother Aaron on the way, and then lead the Israelites out of Egypt to the promised land.
Moses obeyed, but Pharaoh refused to let the Israelites go until forced to do so by ten terrible plagues, culminating in the death of all the firstborn sons of Egypt.
The people of Israel then left
Egypt, crossed the Red Sea and went to Mount Sinai, where God gave them the Ten Commandments and what is known as the Law of Moses. Most family trees have unexpected branches and mixups between generations, and Moses’ family tree was no exception. His mother was a granddaughter of Jacob and his father a great-grandson of Jacob, both through Jacob’s son Levi. Moses’ older brother Aaron was appointed High Priest for the nation, and his sons and later descendants were to inherit
the priesthood throughout their generations. Some of these details are included in Aaron’s family tree, shown below.