Jochebed

Also known as: Shiphrah · Family: Jacob's Family · Role: mother of Moses · First appears: Jacob Arrives In Egypt

Jochebed was born in Egypt when Jacob’s family arrived, bringing their number to seventy. In Levi’s testament, Levi named her as his daughter, born when he was sixty-three. In his ninety-fourth year, Amram, who was born on the same day as Jochebed, took her as his wife; she was also his aunt.

When Pharaoh ordered the Hebrew midwives to kill newborn boys, Jochebed and Miriam helped care for the infants, and the children they attended were born without blemish. Jochebed became the mother of Miriam, Aaron, and Moses. After Amram separated from her because of the edict against Hebrew boys, he publicly married her again. Jochebed became pregnant, and Moses was born amid radiance; she and Amram concealed him for three months.

On the twenty-first of Nisan, Jochebed exposed Moses in an ark on the shore of the Red Sea. Miriam brought her to nurse him, and Thermutis entrusted the child to her care. Moses stayed with his parents and kindred for two years before Jochebed took him to the palace, where Thermutis named him Moses.