Shemot

Rabbi Miriam's sermon - delivered Kabbalat Shabbat 9th January 2026

Tomorrow we begin the book of Shemot, literally “names”. But names are strangely absent from the opening story, as our people’s enslavement in Egypt becomes established then embedded. Perhaps this is because slaves, along with the most oppressed people in human history, have not been dignified with names, sometimes as we know, being numbered instead. 

But onto this scene comes two figures with names. They are people whose station in life would not usually seem so remarkable as to merit being particularly named and singled out. The midwives, מְיַלְּדֹת הָעִבְרִיֹּת Shifra and Puah.

As the Tanakh teacher Judy Klitsner points out, rearrange the letters of their names and what do you get? פַּרְעֹה Pharoah - ironically himself a title rather than an individual name, for all of his status. 

These midwives are instructed by Pharoah to kill the Israelite baby boys on birth, but let the girls live. But they, fearing God, ignore Pharaoh’s orders. When Pharaoh confronts them, they make up an excuse, claiming that Hebrew women are “vigorous”, literally “animals,” חָיוֹת, and give birth before the midwives even show up. 

They showed immense bravery and non-violent resistance in the face of a violent dictatorship. Pharoah wanted the midwives to be the agents of an undercover genocide but they refused. Ultimately Pharoah changed tack, but their resistance forced Pharoah to be public and no longer hide his scheme - from then all the entire Egyptian people was charged with killing the baby boys, no longer in the privacy of the birth chamber, but in Egypt’s most public and iconic landmark - the Nile. 

By the way the midwives epitomise something that unites almost all women in Tanakh - they fight for life - for birth and flourishing - in adversity. 

Who were these midwives? What motivated them? What do we know about their stories? As with so much in parshanut, biblical interpretation, it is up for debate. There is an ambiguity in their very description - מְיַלְּדֹת הָעִבְרִיֹּת - does this mean that they are Hebrew midwives, or non-Israelite midwives to the Hebrews? The grammar is totally ambiguous.

Traditional commentators assume that the midwives are themselves Hebrews. Rashbam states this simply and emphatically,

למילדות העבריות

– to the midwives who are themselves Hebrews.

This is also the translation of three targumim, three translators into Aramaic. 

The Gemara goes further and identifies them with Hebrews we will soon meet -

"Shifra is Yocheved; Puah is Miriam" (Sotah 11a)

Rashi says their names are nicknames based on word play - Yocheved comes from her taking care (meshaperet) of the infant. And Puah – is Miriam who coos (puah) to calm a crying baby.

However does their identity as Israelites track with the pshat, the plain sense of the text? Would Pharaoh really ask Hebrews to kill their own? One medieval commentator, Yehudah HaChasid, makes this point and says they converted. Pharoah approached them as Egyptians but they had loyalty to the Israelites. 

In addition, the midwives words of “כִּי־חָיוֹת הֵנָּה” they are vigorous, or like animals, seems to play into Pharaoh’s own anti-semitic language suggesting that the Israelites are animal like, swarm like, and could עָלָה מִן־הָאָרֶץ - rise up from the land as enemies. 

Now there is a Jewish tradition beyond that the midwives were Egyptians, and not even converts to Judaism, but it is a buried one. 

A fragment of a midrash from the Cairo Genizah dating from around 1000 CE, lists righteous gentile women, or at least righteous women of gentile origin about whom something “was said.” The head of the column is missing, so its opening is unknown. The list includes Asenath (Joseph’s Egyptian wife), Shifra and Puah, Pharaoh’s daughter, Tziporah (Moses’ Midianite wife), Rahav, and Ruth. 

This text is a palimsest, a parchment that was previously used for another purpose by another community, the text of which was subsequently erased and rewritten upon. In other words, it was quite literally written over. 

Which tradition is true? Well the beauty of midrash (rabbinic interpretation of the text) is that two contradictory ideas can be true, each designed to convey a message from and to their particular time. I find it fascinating that at different points in our history, midrash has had such different perspectives on the non-Jewish characters in our texts, often - for better or worse - reflecting relationships with the non-Jews of that time and place. Take, for example, midrash on Vashti. Midrashim originating in Eretz Yisrael were overwhelmingly positive about Vashti, its writers looking at the text un biased by a dominant non-Jewish culture. However those in Babylon, living under the Persian descendents of Haman and Ahashverosh and Vashti, who were presumably pretty awful to their Jewish neighbours, were decidedly uncomplimentary about Vashti, painting her as a caricature of the worst of their own Persian neighbours - making non Jewish women work on Shabbat and eat non kosher food, so objectionable that she had a tail.

And so to our midwives, sadly the prevalent midrashic narrative is that they must have been Hebrews, because how could they not have been. And by the way there is even some halacha, Jewish law, from the Gemara in Avoda Zara, saying that Jewish women should not have gentile (in this context idolatrous) midwives for fear of what they might do. This is contradicted elsewhere.  

But then we have midrashim like this fragment from the Cairo Genizah, which harks back to a time, around 1000CE in Cairo, where righteous gentiles abounded. Where the righteous non-Jewish women around the writers were reflected in the many righteous non-Israelite women in Tanakh. 

We are at a time in history where I see our communities turn inwards. Where I hear in Jewish papers and sermons and social media channels, an increasing mistrust of the outside world. The midrashim our communities today would write are palimpsest-like erasing stories about righteous gentiles in favour of stories about Jewish heroism in the face of predominant hostility from outside. 

There is more hostility than previously, undoubtedly, but it’s not the whole story. I continue to believe that the majority of people in this world are good and loving, and interested in Jews and our thriving. One thing I know for certain because I have seen it with my own eyes, is that knowing each other leads to humanising and deeper understanding and care. 

To close, we see it in this week’s parasha too: 

וַיָּקׇם מֶלֶךְ־חָדָשׁ עַל־מִצְרָיִם אֲשֶׁר לֹא־יָדַע אֶת־יוֹסֵף

A new king arose over Egypt who did not know Joseph.

The new Pharaoh didn't know Joseph. He could dehumanise Joseph and his people because they were faceless and nameless (to bring us full circle) and therefore a perfect target for oppression and slavery. 

So next week, come to shul when we’ll be hosting the Reverend Tom Mumford from Ipswich Minster! He is a truly lovely man and leader and I look forward to you meeting him. And this week, perhaps get in touch with a non-Jewish friend. Have lunch with a non-Jewish colleague. Keep the connections alive. They might just be a modern day incarnation of the righteous Egyptian midwives, or Asenat, or Tzipporah, or Rahav or Ruth. 

Shabbat shalom