Sermon 8/23/20: In Her Own Words (Pr. Ben Adams)

Pr. Ben Adams

Lectionary 21a

August 23, 2020 

In Her Own Words 

Today we heard the remarkable beginnings of the Exodus story, and what a beautiful story of resistant women, Shiphrah and Puah, who kicked it all off. You know, as I read our text early this week, I mused, if only the women of this story told it for themselves, now that would be a good story! So then I thought to myself, well you can rewrite this text from their perspective, but then I checked myself because it would kinda defeat the purpose for me, a man to rewrite these women’s story for them. So luckily at my bible study on Wednesday morning, my fabulous colleague Rev. Stacy Alan from Brent House Episcopal Campus Ministry at the University of Chicago says, you know, I think I had preached a sermon some time ago from the perspective of Puah, let me see if I can dig that up for you. And surely she had. Back in 2014 she rewrote this story from the perspective of Puah and with Stacy’s permission, I share her story with you today.

There were always rumors coming from the Pharaoh’s palace. Rumors of a Hebrew among his grandchildren. Which proves the point I’ve always made. People have always said they can tell the difference between a true Egyptian and one of the Hebrews, something in the texture of the hair, or the way they walk, or a certain tone in their speech, something that proved they were untrustworthy, dangerous, not one of us. When I was attending their women in labor, however, there was no difference: the moans were just as guttural, their legs trembled in the same way as they began to push, the heads of their babies were just as damp and misshapen as any of my own people. So it didn’t surprise me in the least that one of their children could pass undetected in the Pharaoh’s household.

They did have slight strangeness about them, though, those Hebrews, just not in appearance, nor in their language. They had odd stories, tales from the time before they had come to live here. They told stories of a solitary God, one who had no consort, who appeared to their patriarchs and made outlandish promises about a land far away and descendants as numerous as the stars.

I can’t remember a time when the Hebrews weren’t our builders, our maids, our field hands, but when I was small my grandmother would tell stories of their forefather, Joseph, the Pharaoh’s vizier, who saved us all from famine, and of his brothers, who came and settled here with him. But that was a long time ago, and the Hebrews made themselves at home.

When I was younger, I had attended births with my mother, but it wasn’t until after my own children were grown that I began to be called on my own. It was a good living after my husband died. Shiphrah and I both lived right on the border between our people and the areas where the Hebrews lived, so between us we attended nearly all of the Hebrew births. We had seen our share of blood, both the kind that accompanies a new life and the kind that overflows to death, and we had climbed down from the roof or come in from the garden birthing tent with bad news to more than one father and husband sitting, somehow both tense and limp, in his house.

As busy as we were, it was hard to ignore the growing differences between the Hebrews and our own people. Even our poor managed to have a room for each family in the house, and food to offer the laboring mother, but among the Hebrews the lines of fatigue deepened around their eyes, and the quarters were more and more cramped as they tried to find room for one more family in a tiny dwelling, and often they had not much more than barley water to offer the exhausted mother.

And more and more my neighbors would look at me suspiciously as I returned at dawn from a birth in the Hebrew quarter. More and more I would hear about “those people.” Fear was growing and the old stories of Joseph evoked the specter of famine. But these stories reminded us that it was Joseph who imposed the one fifth tax on all we produce, and, in that odd human way, the story of his people turned from thankfulness to distrust and suspicion. There were whispers of plots and uprisings. How, I wondered, were the Hebrews to plot against us when I saw their men, day after day, rising bleary-eyed and trudging toward the quarries, or the brickworks, or the construction sites, and returning feet dragging, only to eat a meager supper and fall into bed?

I was just returning from the birth of my cousin’s granddaughter, the midday sun blazing, to find Shiphrah waiting at my door. A messenger, she said, had come to her house, telling her that she and I had been summoned to the court. I was dubious: no one from the courts had ever walked down our street, much less spoken to any of us. Unless some plague killed more than the normal number of babies, no one paid much attention to Shiphrah and me. What we did didn’t even have its own name. We were simply the “aunties,” consulted for fertility, pregnancy, and birth, but not consulted for much else.

I changed out of my blood-stained garments, splashed water on my face, quickly ate some bread and dates, and Shiphrah and I made our way to the palace. When we reached the gate of the courts, the guard looked at us disdainfully until we told him our names. His eyes widened and we were ushered within without another word. 

After being led through courtyards and down corridors, there he was, seated in a gilded chair, an expression of tedium on his face as he looked up from maps and diagrams scattered on a table in front of him. He motioned for the others to move away, leaving only one man standing attentively at his right shoulder.

“Ah, you’ve come,” he said, impatiently motioning us to rise from our knees. “You attend the births of the Hebrews,” he continued, a statement rather than a question.

He paused for a moment. “I need you to help me with the Hebrew problem.” Our eyes still on the ground, as was proper, we waited for him to continue. “There are too many of them. They need to be controlled. When you attend to their births, when you see the child is a boy, you will take care of them. If it is a girl, leave them alone.”

“’Take care of them’?” I stammered, unable to keep from speaking, although it was strictly prohibited to speak out of turn to the Pharaoh. He sighed impatiently. “Kill them,” he said. “Kill the boys. But I want you to make it look like a stillbirth. If the baby is already born when you get there, do nothing. No one is to know. I don’t want riots.”

Shiphrah and I stood silent, unable to comprehend what we had just heard. We were to do what? Choke them? Break their necks? Smother them? The horror of it washed over me. I had already seen plenty of children die in that hazardous journey to birth, even more amid the poverty of the Hebrews. How could I cause more?

Pharaoh, being Pharaoh, expected no answer from us, merely obedience. He had already turned back to the building plans before him.

Shiphrah and I walked slowly back, taking, by silent agreement, the longer route home, through the Hebrew neighborhoods. Some of the women, women whose children we had helped to birth, women whose lives we had saved, greeted us as we went. I knew they were not like us—that’s what I’d always been taught—yet I also knew the lie of it. These women were strong and tenacious, wanting what any mother wants for her children: a safe entry into the world, food, shelter, good work, a chance to bear children of their own. Suddenly I laughed. I turned to Shiphrah and said: “If the Pharaoh thinks that the problem of too many Hebrews is because of the men, he doesn’t know women very well, does he?” Shiphrah stared at me, confused for a moment, then she, too, laughed.

Here ends today’s story, but alas, it was only the beginning. Through this subversive, joyous rebellion of Shiphrah and Puah God begins to make a way out of no way, and as we will continue to see in the coming weeks, it was these courageous women of resistance that set in motion the Exodus. Amen, Thanks be to God!