A Mother's Song

Just when we think we know a lot about Moses, a close reading of the Bible may show us just how much we don't know, and can't know.

The Bible simply does not present the information. We know that Moses' mother, Yocheved, did not put her son into the little ark until he was about three months old.

But what did she feel as she laid him into the ark. Did any words escape her lips? The bible does not tell us. And afterward, when she is fortunate to be hired as his wet nurse, did she say nothing of importance to him? And exactly when and how does Moses discover he was not Egyptian, but the son of slaves? Or did he somehow know all along? Some of us may think we have heard the answers to those questions. Didn't they come from the Bible?

Ah, we may remember, it was a midrash, a story told by the rabbis of old--or not so old, expanding on the Bible's text. But which midrash? Did we ever know?

The Prince of Egypt shows us that Yocheved sang a lullaby to her son as she set him into the basket. [0:05; five minutes into the film] Singing it (at least in part) in a language peculiar to the Hebrews--Hebrew. (We may come to realize that that tune has entered Moses' subconscious, for we hear him absentmindedly whistling it years later as a young man. That night, he is confronted by a slave woman who claims to be his sister, and when she sings her mother's lullaby, it strikes a familiar chord for Moses.

Rabbi Marc Gellman, created the foundation for this story in his popular book, Does God Have A Big Toe? In it, Yocheved sings her lullaby not in Hebrew but--in another language peculiar to some Jews--Yiddish! And when Moses hears it sung again in the slave quarters many years later, he begins to realize just who he is. Of course, the smell of the chicken soup wafting through the air doesn't hurt, either!