Now these are the names of the sons of Israel who came into Egypt; every man and his family came with Jacob.

All the offspring of Jacob were seventy persons: and Joseph had come to Egypt before them.

And the children of Israel were fertile, increasing very greatly in numbers and in power; and the land was full of them.

Now a new king came to power in Egypt, who had no knowledge of Joseph.

And he said to his people, See, the people of Israel are greater in number and in power than we are:

Let us take care for fear that their numbers may become even greater, and if there is a war, they may be joined with those who are against us, and make an attack on us, and go up out of the land.

So they put overseers of forced work over them, in order to make their strength less by the weight of their work. And they made store-towns for Pharaoh, Pithom and Raamses.

But the more cruel they were to them, the more their number increased, till all the land was full of them. And the children of Israel were hated by the Egyptians.

And they gave the children of Israel even harder work to do:

And made their lives bitter with hard work, making building-material and bricks, and doing all sorts of work in the fields under the hardest conditions.

And the king of Egypt said to the Hebrew women who gave help at the time of childbirth (the name of the one was Shiphrah and the name of the other Puah),

When you are looking after the Hebrew women in childbirth, if it is a son you are to put him to death; but if it is a daughter, she may go on living.

But the women had the fear of God, and did not do as the king of Egypt said, but let the male children go on living.

And the king of Egypt sent for the women, and said to them, Why have you done this, and let the male children go on living?

And the blessing of God was on these women: and the people were increased in number and became very strong.

And because the women who took care of the Hebrew mothers had the fear of God, he gave them families.

Now a man of the house of Levi took as his wife a daughter of Levi.

And when she was no longer able to keep him secret, she made him a basket out of the stems of water-plants, pasting sticky earth over it to keep the water out; and placing the baby in it she put it among the plants by the edge of the Nile.

And his sister took her place at a distance to see what would become of him.

And opening it, she saw the child, and he was crying. And she had pity on him, and said, This is one of the Hebrews' children.

Then his sister said to Pharaoh's daughter, May I go and get you one of the Hebrew women to give him the breast?

And when the child was older, she took him to Pharaoh's daughter and he became her son, and she gave him the name Moses, Because, she said, I took him out of the water.

Now when Moses had become a man, one day he went out to his people and saw how hard their work was; and he saw an Egyptian giving blows to a Hebrew, one of his people.

And he went out the day after and saw two of the Hebrews fighting: and he said to him who was in the wrong, Why are you fighting your brother?

Now when Pharaoh had news of this, he would have put Moses to death. But Moses went in flight from Pharaoh into the land of Midian: and he took his seat by a water-spring.

Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters: and they came to get water for their father's flock.

And the keepers of the sheep came up and were driving them away; but Moses got up and came to their help, watering their flock for them.

And they said, An Egyptian came to our help against the keepers of sheep and got water for us and gave it to the flock.

Now after a long time the king of Egypt came to his end: and the children of Israel were crying in their grief under the weight of their work, and their cry for help came to the ears of God.

And at the sound of their weeping the agreement which God had made with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob came to his mind.

And God's eyes were turned to the children of Israel and he gave them the knowledge of himself.

Now Moses was looking after the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, the priest of Midian: and he took the flock to the back of the waste land and came to Horeb, the mountain of God.

And the angel of the Lord was seen by him in a flame of fire coming out of a thorn-tree: and he saw that the tree was on fire, but it was not burned up.

And when the Lord saw him turning to one side to see, God said his name out of the tree, crying, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I.

And he said, Do not come near: take off your shoes from your feet, for the place where you are is holy.

And he said, I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. And Moses kept his face covered for fear of looking on God.

And God said, Truly, I have seen the grief of my people in Egypt, and their cry because of their cruel masters has come to my ears; for I have knowledge of their sorrows;

And I have come down to take them out of the hands of the Egyptians, guiding them out of that land into a good land and wide, into a land flowing with milk and honey; into the place of the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Amorite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite.

For now, truly, the cry of the children of Israel has come to me, and I have seen the cruel behaviour of the Egyptians to them.

Come, then, and I will send you to Pharaoh, so that you may take my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.

And Moses said to God, Who am I to go to Pharaoh and take the children of Israel out of Egypt?

And he said, Truly I will be with you; and this will be the sign to you that I have sent you: when you have taken the children of Israel out of Egypt, you will give worship to God on this mountain.

And Moses said to God, When I come to the children of Israel and say to them, The God of your fathers has sent me to you: and they say to me, What is his name? what am I to say to them?

And God said to him, I AM WHAT I AM: and he said, Say to the children of Israel, I AM has sent me to you.

And God went on to say to Moses, Say to the children of Israel, The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, has sent me to you: this is my name for ever, and this is my sign to all generations.

Go and get together the chiefs of the children of Israel, and say to them, The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, has been seen by me, and has said, Truly I have taken up your cause, because of what is done to you in Egypt;

And I have said, I will take you up out of the sorrows of Egypt into the land of the Canaanite and the Hittite and the Amorite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite, into a land flowing with milk and honey.

And they will give ear to your voice: and you, with the chiefs of Israel, will go to Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, and say to him, The Lord, the God of the Hebrews, has come to us: let us then go three days' journey into the waste land to make an offering to the Lord our God.

And I am certain that the king of Egypt will not let you go without being forced.

And I will give this people grace in the eyes of the Egyptians, so that when you go out you will go out with your hands full.

For every woman will get from her neighbour and from the woman living in her house, ornaments of silver and gold, and clothing; and you will put them on your sons and your daughters; you will take the best of their goods from the Egyptians.

And the Lord said to Moses, Put out your hand and take it by the tail: (and he put out his hand and took a grip of it and it became a rod in his hand:)

So that they may be certain that the Lord, the God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, has been seen by you.

Then the Lord said to him again, Put your hand inside your clothing. And he put his hand inside his robe: and when he took it out it was like the hand of a leper, as white as snow.

And if they do not have faith in you or give ear to the voice of the first sign, they will have faith in the second sign.

And if they have no faith even in these two signs and will not give ear to your voice, then you are to take the water of the Nile and put it on the dry land: and the water you take out of the river will become blood on the dry land.

And Moses said to the Lord, O Lord, I am not a man of words; I have never been so, and am not now, even after what you have said to your servant: for talking is hard for me, and I am slow of tongue.

And he said, O Lord, send, if you will, by the hand of anyone whom it seems good to you to send.

And Moses went back to Jethro, his father-in-law, and said to him, Let me go back now to my relations in Egypt and see if they are still living. And Jethro said to Moses, Go in peace.

And Moses took his wife and his sons and put them on an ass and went back to the land of Egypt: and he took the rod of God in his hand.

And you are to say to Pharaoh, The Lord says, Israel is the first of my sons:

And I said to you, Let my son go, so that he may give me worship; and you did not let him go: so now I will put the first of your sons to death.

Then Zipporah took a sharp stone, and cutting off the skin of her son's private parts, and touching his feet with it, she said, Truly you are a husband of blood to me.

So he let him go. Then she said, You are a husband of blood because of the circumcision.

And the Lord said to Aaron, Go into the waste land and you will see Moses. So he went and came across Moses at the mountain of God, and gave him a kiss.

And Moses gave Aaron an account of all the words of the Lord which he had sent him to say, and of all the signs which he had given him orders to do.

Then Moses and Aaron went and got together all the chiefs of the children of Israel:

And the people had faith in them; and hearing that the Lord had taken up the cause of the children of Israel and had seen their troubles, with bent heads they gave him worship.

And after that, Moses and Aaron came to Pharaoh, and said, The Lord, the God of Israel, says, Let my people go so that they may keep a feast to me in the waste land.

And Pharaoh said, Who is the Lord, to whose voice I am to give ear and let Israel go? I have no knowledge of the Lord and I will not let Israel go.

And they said, The God of the Hebrews has come to us: let us then go three days' journey into the waste land to make an offering to the Lord our God, so that he may not send death on us by disease or the sword.

And the king of Egypt said to them, Why do you, Moses and Aaron, take the people away from their work? get back to your work.

And Pharaoh said, Truly, the people of the land are increasing in number, and you are keeping them back from their work.

But see that they make the same number of bricks as before, and no less: for they have no love for work; and so they are crying out and saying, Let us go and make an offering to our God.

And the overseers of the people and their responsible men went out and said to the people, Pharaoh says, I will give you no more dry stems.

So the people were sent in all directions through the land of Egypt to get dry grass for stems.

And the responsible men of the children of Israel, whom Pharaoh's overseers had put over them, were given blows, and they said to them, Why have you not done your regular work, in making bricks as before?

Then the responsible men of the children of Israel came to Pharaoh, protesting and saying, Why are you acting in this way to your servants?

Go now, get back to your work; no dry stems will be given to you, but you are to make the full number of bricks.

Then the responsible men of the children of Israel saw that they were purposing evil when they said, The number of bricks which you have to make every day will be no less than before.

And they said to them, May the Lord take note of you and be your judge; for you have given Pharaoh and his servants a bad opinion of us, putting a sword in their hands for our destruction.

And the Lord said to Moses, Now you will see what I am about to do to Pharaoh; for by a strong hand he will be forced to let them go, driving them out of his land because of my outstretched arm.

I let myself be seen by Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as God, the Ruler of all; but they had no knowledge of my name Yahweh.

And I made an agreement with them, to give them the land of Canaan, the land of their wanderings.

And truly my ears are open to the cry of the children of Israel whom the Egyptians keep under their yoke; and I have kept in mind my agreement.

Say then to the children of Israel, I am Yahweh, and I will take you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians, and make you safe from their power, and will make you free by the strength of my arm after great punishments.

And I will take you to be my people and I will be your God; and you will be certain that I am the Lord your God, who takes you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians.

And Moses said these words to the children of Israel, but they gave no attention to him, because of the grief of their spirit and the cruel weight of their work.

Go in and say to Pharaoh, king of Egypt, that he is to let the children of Israel go out of his land.

And Moses, answering the Lord, said, See, the children of Israel will not give ear to me; how then will Pharaoh give ear to me, whose lips are unclean?

And the word of the Lord came to Moses and Aaron, with orders for the children of Israel and for Pharaoh, king of Egypt, to take the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt.

These are the heads of their fathers' families: the sons of Reuben the oldest son of Israel: Hanoch and Pallu, Hezron and Carmi: these are the families of Reuben.

And the sons of Simeon: Jemuel and Jamin and Ohad and Jachin and Zohar and Shaul, the son of a woman of Canaan: these are the families of Simeon.

And these are the names of the sons of Levi in the order of their generations: Gershon and Kohath and Merari: and the years of Levi's life were a hundred and thirty-seven.

The sons of Gershon: Libni and Shimei, in the order of their families.

And the sons of Kohath: Amram and Izhar and Hebron and Uzziel: and the years of Kohath's life were a hundred and thirty-three.

And the sons of Merari: Mahli and Mushi: these are the families of the Levites, in the order of their generations.

And Amram took Jochebed, his father's sister, as wife; and she gave birth to Aaron and Moses: and the years of Amram's life were a hundred and thirty-seven.

And the sons of Izhar: Korah and Nepheg and Zichri.

And the sons of Uzziel: Mishael and Elzaphan and Sithri.