¹And these are the names of the children of Israel who came into Egypt with Jacob; each man and his household came.

²Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah;

³Issachar, Zebulun, and Benjamin;

⁴Dan and Naphtali, Gad and Asher.

⁵And all the beings who came out of the thigh of Jacob were seventy beings, and Joseph was in Egypt.

⁶And Joseph died, and all his brothers, and all that generation.

⁷And the children of Israel were fruitful, and swarmed, and multiplied, and became numerous, exceedingly, exceedingly; and the land was filled with them.

⁸A new king rose over Egypt, who did not know Joseph.

⁹He said to his people, Look, the people of the children of Israel are more numerous and mightier than we are.

¹⁰Come, let us deal wisely with it, lest it multiply; and it will be that when war meets us, it will also join those who hate us, and fight against us, and go up from the land.

¹¹So they set officials of slave gangs over it, so as to afflict it with their burdens; and it built storage cities for Pharaoh, Pithom and Rameses.

¹²But as much as they afflicted it, so it multiplied and so it burst open; and they felt dread before the face of the children of Israel.

¹³And the Egyptians made the children of Israel serve with crushing.

¹⁴They made their lives bitter with harsh service, in mortar and in bricks and in all service in the field; all their service which they made them serve was with crushing.

¹⁵And the king of Egypt said to the Eberite midwives, of whom the name of the one was Shiphrah and the name of the second was Puah,

¹⁶He said, When you help the Eberite women give birth, and you look upon the birthing stool: if it is a son, you shall put him to death; but if it is a daughter, she shall live.

¹⁷But the midwives feared God, and did not do as the king of Egypt had spoken to them, and they let the boys live.

¹⁸So the king of Egypt called the midwives and said to them, Why have you done this word, that you have let the boys live?

¹⁹And the midwives said to Pharaoh, Because the Eberite women are not like the Egyptian women, for they are vigorous; before the midwife comes to them, they have borne.

²⁰So God dealt well with the midwives, and the people multiplied and became exceedingly numerous.

²¹And it happened, because the midwives feared God, that he made houses for them.

²²Then Pharaoh commanded all his people, saying, Every son who is born you shall throw into the River, but every daughter you shall let live.