{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/002/0020316.htm","path":"chr/ecf/002/0020316.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/002/0020316.htm","text":"Moses, originally of a Chaldean 2098 family, was born in Egypt, his ancestors having migrated from Babylon into Egypt on account of a protracted famine. Born in the seventh generation, 2099 and having received a royal education, the following are the circumstances of his history. The Hebrews having increased in Egypt to a great multitude, and the king of the country being afraid of insurrection in consequence of their numbers, he ordered all the female children born to the Hebrews to be reared (woman being unfit for war), but the male to be destroyed, being suspicious of stalwart youth. But the child being goodly, his parents nursed him secretly three months, natural affection being too strong for the monarch\u2019s cruelty. But at last, dreading lest they should be destroyed along with the child, they made a basket of the papyrus that grew there, put the child in it, and laid it on the banks of the marshy river. The child\u2019s sister stood at a distance, and watched what would happen. In this emergency, the king\u2019s daughter, who for a long time had not been pregnant, and who longed for a child, came that day to the river to bathe and wash herself; and hearing the child cry, she ordered it to be brought to her; and touched with pity, sought a nurse. At that moment the child\u2019s sister ran up, and said that, if she wished, she could procure for her as nurse one of the Hebrew women who had recently had a child. And on her consenting and desiring her to do so, she brought the child\u2019s mother to be nurse for a stipulated fee, as if she had been some other person. Thereupon the queen gave the babe the name of Moses, with etymological propriety, from his being drawn out of \u201cthe water,\u201d 2100 \u2014for the Egyptians call water \u201cmou,\u201d\u2014in which he had been exposed to die. For they call Moses one who \u201cwho breathed [on being taken] from the water.\u201d It is clear that previously the parents gave a name to the child on his circumcision; and he was called Joachim. And he had a third name in heaven, after his ascension, 2101 as the mystics say\u2014Melchi. Having reached the proper age, he was taught arithmetic, geometry, poetry, harmony, and besides, medicine and music, by those that excelled in these arts among the Egyptians; and besides, the philosophy which is conveyed by symbols, which they point out in the hieroglyphical inscriptions. The rest of the usual course of instruction, Greeks taught him in Egypt as a royal child, as Philo says in his life of Moses. He learned, besides, the literature of the Egyptians, and the knowledge of the heavenly bodies from the Chaldeans and the Egyptians; whence in the Acts 2102 he is said \u201cto have been instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians.\u201d And Eupolemus, in his book On the Kings in Judea, says that \u201cMoses was the first wise man, and the first that imparted grammar to the Jews, that the Ph\u0153nicians received it from the Jews, and the Greeks from the Ph\u0153nicians.\u201d And betaking himself to their philosophy, 2103 he increased his wisdom, being ardently attached to the training received from his kindred and ancestors, till he struck and slew the Egyptian who wrongfully attacked the Hebrew. And the mystics say that he slew the Egyptian by a word only; as, certainly, Peter in the Acts is related to have slain by speech those who appropriated part of the price of the field, and lied. 2104 And so Artapanus, in his work On the Jews, relates \u201cthat Moses, being shut up in custody by Chenephres, king of the Egyptians, on account of the people demanding to be let go from Egypt, the prison being opened by night, by the interposition of God, went forth, and reaching the palace, stood before the king as he slept, and aroused him; and that the latter, struck with what had taken place, bade Moses tell him the name of the God who had sent him; and that he, bending forward, told him in his ear; and that the king on hearing it fell speechless, but being supported by Moses, revived again.\u201d And respecting the education of Moses, we shall find a harmonious account in Ezekiel, 2105 the composer of Jewish tragedies in the drama entitled The Exodus. He thus writes in the person of Moses:\u2014\n \u201cFor, seeing our race abundantly increase,\nHis treacherous snares King Pharaoh \u2019gainst us laid,\nAnd cruelly in brick-kilns some of us,\nAnd some, in toilsome works of building, plagued.\nAnd towns and towers by toil of ill-starred men\nHe raised. Then to the Hebrew race proclaimed,\nThat each male child should in deep-flowing Nile\nBe drowned. My mother bore and hid me then\nThree months (so afterwards she told). Then took,\nAnd me adorned with fair array, and placed\nOn the deep sedgy marsh by Nilus bank,\nWhile Miriam, my sister, watched afar.\nThen, with her maids, the daughter of the king,\nTo bathe her beauty in the cleansing stream,\np. 336 Came near, straight saw, and took and raised me up;\nAnd knew me for a Hebrew. Miriam\nMy sister to the princess ran, and said,\n\u2018Is it thy pleasure, that I haste and find\nA nurse for thee to rear this child\nAmong the Hebrew women?\u2019 The princess\nGave assent. The maiden to her mother sped,\nAnd told, who quick appeared. My own\nDear mother took me in her arms. Then said\nThe daughter of the king: \u2018Nurse me this child,\nAnd I will give thee wages.\u2019And my name\nMoses she called, because she drew and saved\nMe from the waters on the river\u2019s bank.\nAnd when the days of childhood had flown by,\nMy mother brought me to the palace where\nThe princess dwelt, after disclosing all\nAbout my ancestry, and God\u2019s great gifts.\nIn boyhood\u2019s years I royal nurture had,\nAnd in all princely exercise was trained,\nAs if the princess\u2019s very son. But when\nThe circling days had run their course,\nI left the royal palace.\u201d\nThen, after relating the combat between the Hebrew and the Egyptian, and the burying of the Egyptian in the sand, he says of the other contest:\u2014\n \u201cWhy strike one feebler than thyself?\nAnd he rejoined: Who made thee judge o\u2019er us,\nOr ruler? Wilt thou slay me, as thou didst\nHim yesterday? And I in terror said,\nHow is this known?\u201d\nThen he fled from Egypt and fed sheep, being thus trained beforehand for pastoral rule. For the shepherd\u2019s life is a preparation for sovereignty in the case of him who is destined to rule over the peaceful flock of men, as the chase for those who are by nature warlike. Thence God brought him to lead the Hebrews. Then the Egyptians, oft admonished, continued unwise; and the Hebrews were spectators of the calamities that others suffered, learning in safety the power of God. And when the Egyptians gave no heed to the effects of that power, through their foolish infatuation disbelieving, then, as is said, \u201cthe children knew\u201d what was done; and the Hebrews afterwards going forth, departed carrying much spoil from the Egyptians, not for avarice, as the cavillers say, for God did not persuade them to covet what belonged to others. But, in the first place, they took wages for the services they had rendered the Egyptians all the time; and then in a way recompensed the Egyptians, by afflicting them in requital as avaricious, by the abstraction of the booty, as they had done the Hebrews by enslaving them. Whether, then, as may be alleged is done in war, they thought it proper, in the exercise of the rights of conquerors, to take away the property of their enemies, as those who have gained the day do from those who are worsted (and there was just cause of hostilities. The Hebrews came as suppliants to the Egyptians on account of famine; and they, reducing their guests to slavery, compelled them to serve them after the manner of captives, giving them no recompense); or as in peace, took the spoil as wages against the will of those who for a long period had given them no recompense, but rather had robbed them, [it is all one.]\nThis is the account given by Philo, of whose book on the life of Moses this chapter is an epitome, for the most part in Philo\u2019s words.\n335:2099\n\u201cHe was the seventh in descent from the first, who, being a foreigner, was the founder of the whole Jewish race.\u201d\u2014Philo.\n335:2100\n[See Ex. ii. 10.]\n335:2101\n[Concerning this, see Deut. xxxiii. 5. And as to \u201cmystics,\u201d with caution, may be read advantageously, the article \u201cMysteries,\u201d Encyclop. Britann., vol. xxiii. p. 124.]\n335:2102 335:2103\nAdopting the reading \u03c6\u03b9\u03bb\u03bf\u03c3\u03bf\u03c6\u03af\u03b1\u03bd \u1f00\u0390\u00b4\u03be\u03b1\u03c2 instead of \u03c6\u03cd\u03c3\u03b9\u03bd \u1f04\u03be\u03b1\u03c2.\n335:2104 335:2105\n[Eusebius, Pr\u00e6p Evang., ix. 4.]","title":"Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol II: CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA: Chapter XXIII.\u2014The Age, Birth, and Life of Moses.","type":"page"}