Tag Archives: Book of Exodus

Commentary on Exodus 12 (The Passover)

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

In chapter 12 of the Book of Exodus, we come to the final plague that God will visit upon Egypt. Unlike the other plagues, this one requires preparation by the Israelites, and that preparation will be memorialized by the Israelites forever. Chapter 12 combines the instructions to the Israelites on how to memorialize the events surrounding their salvation from the final plague and God’s rescuing them from Egypt, along with the narrative explaining what actually occurred.

In verses 1-11, God tells Moses and Aaron how the nation of Israel is to commemorate the Passover in the future. We have a break in the narrative and won’t pick it back up again until verses 12-13, and then again at verse 21. The instructions are simple:

  1. On the tenth day of the first month of the religious calendar (Nisan or March/April) each man is to select a lamb or goat for his family. The animal must be a year-old male without defect.
  2. Four days later, all the people of Israel must slaughter the animals at twilight.
  3. Then they are to take some of the blood and put it on the sides and tops of the doorframes of the houses where they eat.
  4. That same night they are to eat the meat roasted over the fire, along with bitter herbs, and bread made without yeast. Anything left over must be burned by morning.
  5. They are to eat with traveling clothes on.

In verses 12-13, God explains what will happen the night of Passover. “On that same night I will pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn—both men and animals—and I will bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt. I am the Lord. The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are; and when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike Egypt.”

Notice that the blood of the lambs who were sacrificed and placed on the doorframes will save the Israelites from God’s judgment. In like manner, Jesus Christ’s sacrifice saves those who believe in him from God’s judgment. This is why the New Testament writers refer to Jesus as the Passover Lamb (see 1 Cor 5:7-8; 1 Pet 1:19-20; Rev 5:12).

Additionally, the biblical authors remind us several times that key events occur during subsequent Passover celebrations. In Num 9, the Israelites celebrate the Passover in the wilderness. Joshua celebrates Passover after bringing the Israelites into the Promised Land (Josh 5). Passover celebrations are recorded during the reigns of reformers King Hezekiah and King Josiah in 2 Chron 30 and 35. When Israel returns from Babylonian captivity, the Passover is celebrated in Ezra 6. And finally, Jesus shared the Passover meal with his disciples before being arrested and crucified.

In verses 14-20, God commands the Israelites to also celebrate the week after the Passover. This is known as the Feast of Unleavened Bread. “For seven days you are to eat bread made without yeast.” On the first day and seventh of this Feast there is to be an assembly of all Israel. The penalty for eating anything with yeast during this seven days is death or banishment. God explains the importance of the Feast of Unleavened Bread: “It was on this very day that I brought your divisions out of Egypt.”

To recap, two new ordinances are commanded by God in chapter 12: the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread. The Passover is to commemorate God’s passing over the Israelites for judgment, and the Feast of Unleavened Bread is to commemorate God’s rescuing the Israelites from Egypt. God saves and God redeems his people.

In verses 21-23, the narrative picks up again with explicit instructions to the Israelites for the night of the final plague – the killing of the firstborns of Egypt. The elders of Israel are told to select and slaughter the animals for Passover sacrifice and then use hyssop (a plant) to spread blood around the doorframes of their homes. If the Israelites obey God, “he will not permit the destroyer to enter [their] houses and strike [them] down.”

In verses 24-28, God reminds the Israelites of the significance of the Passover and the author notes that on the occasion of the first Passover night, the “Israelites did just what the Lord commanded Moses and Aaron.”

The narrative continues through verse 40 and describes the events of the evening, next morning, and days following. First, God does indeed strike the firstborn of Egypt, including Pharaoh’s own son. The Egyptians are so devastated that Pharaoh calls Moses and Aaron to him during the night and commands them to leave Egypt, no strings attached. In verses 33-36, the Egyptians are so eager to get rid of the Israelites that they willingly turn over gold, silver, and clothing to them. Everything happens just as God had foretold.

The Israelites leave the area of Goshen where they had lived for generations, and they journey to the southeast to a city named Succoth. We note that the Israelites number many thousands, and that foreigners also left Egypt with them, possibly due to seeing the power of the Hebrew God.

Finally, in verses 40-42, the author reminds us that the Israelites had lived in Egypt for 430 years, but that God brought them out of Egypt, just as he had promised.

Were the Ten Plagues Natural Occurrences or Miracles?

Post Author: Bill Pratt

Many scholars have noted that many, if not all, of the ten plagues in Exodus 7-12 can be explained by natural causes.

According to Robert Bergen in the Apologetics Study Bible,

Some have suggested that bacteria turned the waters red, and the poisoned waters killed the fish and forced the frogs to seek cool, moist places away from the Nile. When the frogs died their corpses were a breeding ground for two types of small insects. These, in turn, spread communicable diseases among both animals and humans, resulting in death to the livestock and boils upon the people. A well-timed locust plague followed by a spring hailstorm devastated Egypt’s crops. Shortly thereafter a desert sandstorm or dust cloud darkened most of Egypt. Finally a devastating plague, perhaps one caused by the insects, killed both humans and beasts among the non-Israelites.

If some or all of the plagues can be explained by natural causes, does it follow that these were not miracles? No. God may use natural or supernatural causes to perform a miracle. In cases where God uses natural causes, the timing, intensity, and redemptive purpose behind these events are indicative of God’s intervention.

The greatest skeptic in Egypt, Pharaoh, eventually became convinced that God was behind the plagues, and that they were not just natural occurrences. The people of Egypt came to the same conclusion.

Why? Moses and Aaron, prophets of God, were predicting the plagues in advance (timing) and describing their intensity and reach. They were also explaining that the plagues were meant to force Pharaoh to let the Israelites go, and this is exactly what happened. There was simply no doubt that the ten plagues were directed by God.

How Many Israelites Left Egypt? Part 2

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

Biblical scholar Douglas Stuart, in his Exodus: An Exegetical and Theological Exposition of Holy Scripture (New American Commentary), identifies 8 possible ways to translate the word ‘eleph from Hebrew to English. Each of these translations could be used in Exodus 12:37, with context being the determinant. The 8 possible translations are: 1) cattle, 2) clans, 3) divisions, 4) families, 5) oxen, 6) tribes, 7) military platoon or squad, and 8) thousand.

As you can see, this word ‘eleph has a tremendous semantic range. The NIV translators have decided to translate the word as “thousand” but Stuart believes this is a mistake. Since the word  ‘eleph is being used in the context of counting foot soldiers, then Stuart argues that option 7 is the most appropriate translation. Given this translation of platoon or squad, what number of soldiers would that indicate?

Mendenhall suggests that it was the number of men of fighting age (above age twenty; cf. Num 1:3) that a single tribal subset (extended family) or village or district of a larger town could produce. What we do not know is the actual numbers of these extended families or village districts. In the case of a larger family or district, the number might be as many as twenty. A small village or district might produce just a handful. For general purposes of calculation, it may be assumed that most ʾelephs were not larger than fifteen and perhaps averaged a dozen. . . .

Accordingly, six hundred ʾelephs, the number mentioned in Exod 12:37, probably would contain not more than 7,200 fighting men, at an average of a dozen fighting men per ʾeleph. If one assumes that many of these were single, but that most may have been married, that most who were married had children, and that there were many men who could not fight because they were either too old or too young or infirm, the total number of Israelites who left Egypt might in fact have been around 28,800–36,000 (assuming three or four nonfighters for every fighter). This is a large and formidable number but by no means the two million or so that a misleading calculation based on taking ʾeleph unjustifiably as “thousand” would yield.

Stuart concludes with the following:

Twenty or thirty thousand people is a number that easily can fit into many modern sorts of venues, from small sports stadiums to beaches to public gatherings and rallies, a fact that may help modern readers of the book visualize the entire Israelite contingent, who were often in one place at one time. It is a number that fits the facts of the book of Exodus well. Such a number of Israelites is large enough to require the miraculous provisions of food and water that the book describes; it is small enough for the whole nation to gather encamped around the tabernacle at the various places listed on the Israelite wilderness itinerary. For most occasions of listening to speeches, the men only would have gathered, several thousand or so in number, not too many to hear a speech shouted at them, especially if its words were relayed. Yet several thousand troops were formidable as a fighting force when directed at one place at a time.

We may never know the exact number of Israelites who traveled from Egypt, but Stuart’s analysis seems plausible to me. Because the word ‘eleph can be translated in so many different ways, we can’t be sure that it should be translated as “thousand” in Exodus 12:37.

How Many Israelites Left Egypt? Part 1

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

In Exodus 12:37, the NIV translation of the Bible says, referring to the Israelites leaving Egypt during the Exodus, “There were about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides women and children.” What has puzzled Bible scholars and archaeologists about this number is that it seems far too large. If we add the women and children, we are looking at over 2 million Israelites. Estimates of the total world population at that time are between 25 and 100 million people, and the Israelites are referred to, in the Bible, as small in numbers compared to other people groups in the ancient near east.

Now, it is not impossible that there were literally 2 million Israelites that left Egypt, but there are other ideas about how to translate Exodus 12:37. Biblical scholar Douglas Stuart offers a persuasive alternative explanation in his Exodus: An Exegetical and Theological Exposition of Holy Scripture (New American Commentary). According to Stuart,

The Hebrew of the Exod 12:37 says literally, “The Israelites traveled from Rameses to Succoth, about six hundred ‘elephs of foot-soldiers, besides women and children.” The NIV translation, like most English translations, contains two arguable assumptions on the part of the translators: that ʾeleph should be translated “thousand,” and that raḡlı̂ in the expression raḡlı̂ haggĕbārı̂m should be translated “men.” Both of these assumptions are, in our opinion, incorrect.

The second, which assumes that raḡlı̂ can mean “men,” is not supportable in any Old Testament context. Some lexicons go so far as to suggest that the term in the singular might mean a “man on foot,” but none could rightly suggest that it means simply “man.” In the grammar of the verse, the addition of the appositional noun haggĕbārı̂m (lit., “[the] young men”) simply clarifies the age of the man/men in question. Since raḡlı̂ always occurs in contexts describing soldiers, including the present context (note the wording “all the LORD’s divisions” in v. 41), and differs from any of the usual terms for “man” or “men,” there really can be little doubt that it should be rendered “foot soldier” or, as some do, “infantryman” wherever it occurs in the Old Testament. The full expression raḡlı̂ haggĕbārı̂m, then, means “young foot soldiers.”

Stuart’s first argument is that the NIV has mistranslated the text as “men on foot” when it should say “foot soldier” or “infantryman.” This is important because the Hebrew text seems to be counting the size of the Hebrew army, not the total population. But we are still left with how to translate the word ‘eleph.

Because the question of the meaning of ʾeleph, however, is so much greater an issue for people as it relates to the accuracy of the Scripture and the proper interpretation of various stories involving the Israelite exodus and conquest of Canaan, the discussion of this term requires a far more extensive review. The reader should bear in mind, however, that Moses did not refer to six hundred ʾelephs of “men” who left Egypt but to six hundred ʾelephs of foot soldiers. He was counting God’s army, not all the people of Israel . . . .

With this in mind, Stuart now takes up the challenge of translating the word ‘eleph. We’ll look at that in part 2.

Commentary on Exodus 5 (Bricks Without Straw)

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

After successfully convincing their fellow Israelites that the God of their ancestors had sent them, Moses and Aaron boldly approach Pharaoh and request that he let them go to the desert to worship. Pharaoh’s response frames the events that will take place in chapters 7 through 12 of Exodus.

Pharaoh’s response is, “Who is the LORD, that I should obey him and let Israel go? I do not know the LORD and I will not let Israel go.” The purpose of the 10 plagues that will follow is to demonstrate to Pharaoh, the people of Egypt, and the reader, who the God of Israel is.

Not only does Pharaoh reject their request, he acts to further punish the Israelites and turn them against Moses and Aaron. In verses 4-11, Pharaoh accuses Moses and Aaron of distracting the Israelites from their work, that of making bricks for Egyptian construction projects (see this link for more detail on brick-making).

Typically, when bricks were made, the Egyptians would supply the Israelite laborers with straw to mix with clay in order to mold the bricks. Instead, the Israelites would now be expected to gather their own straw to make the bricks, and the number of bricks they would have to make would not decrease, but stay the same.

In verses 12-14, the Israelites fail to make the required number of bricks, and the Israelite foremen are beaten. Disillusioned with the impossible task they’ve been given, the foremen go before Pharaoh to complain about their plight. Pharaoh, showing no mercy, responds, “Lazy, that’s what you are—lazy! That is why you keep saying, ‘Let us go and sacrifice to the LORD.’ Now get to work. You will not be given any straw, yet you must produce your full quota of bricks.”

The foremen now realize that Pharaoh is punishing them because of Moses and Aaron, so in verses 20-21 they confront the two men and ask that God judge them for inciting Pharaoh. What a turn of events! A short time earlier, the leaders of Israel were receiving Moses and Aaron with joy, and now they are cursing them. The fickleness of Israel toward God’s prophets will be a central theme of the Bible all the way up through the deaths of Jesus and his apostles.

Moses then questions God, saying, “O Lord, why have you brought trouble upon this people?” God, however, in chapter 6, verse 1, reassures Moses. He explains, “Now you will see what I will do to Pharaoh: Because of my mighty hand he will let them go; because of my mighty hand he will drive them out of his country.”

The focus, again, is put back on God. Moses and Aaron can do nothing for the Israelites, on their own. Only God, acting on behalf of Israel, can effect their release from bondage. Pharaoh has thrown down the gauntlet, so to speak. He has refused to even allow the Israelites to worship God for a measly three days. He has questioned the very existence of the God of Israel. In the following chapters, God will make himself known to Pharaoh and to all the people of Egypt.

Commentary on Exodus 4 (Moses Returns to Egypt)

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

Chapter 4 of Exodus can be split into 3 sections: Miraculous Signs for Moses, Moses’ Return to Egypt, and the Reunion of Moses and Aaron.

The first section (Miraculous Signs for Moses) starts at verse 1 and goes through verse 17. In verse 1, Moses expresses, for the third time, his reluctance to go back to Egypt. Moses asks, “What if they do not believe me or listen to me and say, ‘The LORD did not appear to you’?”

God then provides three miraculous signs that are to be given to the Israelites to prove that Moses is a true messenger from God. First, his shepherd’s staff would turn into a serpent and then back into a staff. Second, Moses’ hand would become leprous, and then return to normal. Third, water from the Nile would be transformed into blood.

Each of these miracles were meaningful to the Israelites. The staff/serpent miracle represented God’s power over Pharaoh, as Pharaoh was represented by a serpent. The leprous hand miracle symbolized God saving Israel from their suffering. The Nile River-becoming-blood miracle indicated God’s power over all of the Egyptian gods.

Even after these assurances, though, Moses still protested, this time saying that he was not eloquent of speech. God reminds Moses that He is the creator of the human mouth and that He will teach Moses what to say, but Moses continues to protest, angering God.

Because Moses refuses to speak for Him to Pharaoh and the Israelites, God suggests that Moses take along his brother, Aaron, to speak for Moses. This situation is illustrative of what happens when a child of God refuses to do what God wants done. Instead of God being thwarted, He simply brings in another person to complete the tasks. Man’s refusal to obey God does not prevent God’s plans from being accomplished.

The second section of Exodus 4 takes place in verses 18-26. God tells Moses in verse 19 that it is safe for him to return to Egypt because all of the people who wanted him for murder are dead. Moses then starts back toward Egypt with his wife and two sons, Gershom and Eliezer.

In verses 21-23, God tells Moses what to say to Pharaoh. God also tells him how Pharaoh will react to his words, and what the consequences of his reaction will be. After Moses shows the miraculous signs to Pharaoh, his heart will be hardened. In other words, Pharaoh will become more and more stubborn and refuse to give in to Moses’s requests. God warns Moses that Pharaoh’s stubbornness will eventually lead to Pharaoh losing his firstborn son.

In verses 24-26, there is a brief episode where Moses’s wife, Zipporah, circumcises their son in order to save his life. Even though the NIV translates verse 24 as Moses being the one God would kill, there is reason to believe from the Hebrew text that it was his son that would be killed. These verses remind us that God will hold his people accountable for obeying him. Moses, as the future leader of Israel, was disobeying a clear command from God to have his sons circumcised. Fortunately his wife acted quickly to resolve the crisis.

In the third section of chapter 4, Moses and Aaron reunite and together go back to Egypt to meet with the elders of the Israelites. Aaron tells the elders everything God commanded Moses to say, and he performs the miraculous signs that would prove they were true messengers of God. The Israelites were convinced and bowed down to worship God.

Commentary on Exodus 3 (Moses and the Burning Bush)

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

Chapter 3 of Exodus recounts one of the most famous passages in all of Scripture, the story of Moses and the Burning Bush. Moses is tending his father-in-law’s flocks near a mountain called Horeb. Some scholars believe that this mountain is identical with Mount Sinai, where Moses would later receive the Ten Commandments.

At the mountain, Moses sees the angel of the Lord appearing as flames burning in a bush, but the bush is not consumed by the fire. In verses 4-6, God calls out from the bush (“angel of the Lord” and “God” are sometimes used synonymously) and identifies himself as the “God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.”

God gets straight to the point with Moses and tells him, in verses 7-10, that he is to go back to Egypt and bring the Israelites out of captivity, and then take them “into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey.” This is the land that was promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, by God. After long years in Egypt, the descendants of Abraham would finally receive their inheritance.

Moses, however, had doubts about his own abilities, so he asks God exactly how He will get the people out of Egypt. God then reassures Moses over the next 10 verses by promising that He will be with him.

First, he assures Moses that the Israelites will be brought out of Egypt and travel back to this very mountain, to worship.

Second, God tells Moses to inform the elders of Israel that “I am who I am” is the God who sent Moses to them. This is the same God as the “God of your fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.” This name of God (“I am who I am”) can be paraphrased as “It is I who am with you.” Recall that to the ancient Hebrews, names conveyed the essence of who a person was. So God is reminding the Israelites that the one who promised to be with them sent Moses.

God is also called Yahweh, which means “he who is present” or “he who has promised to be present with his people.”

Third, Moses, after having identified God, is to tell the elders of Israel that God has heard their cries and is going to bring them out of Egypt and “into the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites—a land flowing with milk and honey,” or the Promised Land.

Fourth, God foretells that Moses will ask Pharaoh (king of the Egyptians) permission for the Israelites to go out into the desert and worship for three days, but Pharaoh will refuse. God will then strike the Egyptians with “wonders” and then Pharaoh will let them go.

Finally, God predicts that the Israelites will ask the Egyptians for “articles of silver and gold and for clothing,” and that they will give these things to them as the Israelites leave. Thus the Israelites will be paid back for the suffering they endured under Egyptian rule.

It is important to note that verses 18-22 are all predictions of what will happen in the future. The reader who studies the rest of the book of Exodus will see that all that God promised to Moses in Exodus 3 does come to pass. Again, the message to the reader is that God is in control. Nothing that Pharaoh can do will thwart God’s plans.

Commentary on Exodus 2 (Birth of Moses)

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

After Pharaoh’s previous failures, he tries yet another approach to break the will of the Hebrews. In verse 22 of chapter 1, he decrees that every male child of the Hebrews must be thrown into the Nile River.

One boy, however, is not immediately thrown into the Nile, but is hidden by his parents. We know that these Hebrew parents are descended from Levi, one of Jacob’s twelve sons. Once the boy is old enough so that he can no longer be hidden (3 months), his mother places him in a papyrus basket and sets him among some reeds along the edge of the Nile. The boy’s older sister (we learn her name is Miriam from Ex 15:20) is told to watch what happens to him.

None other than Pharaoh’s own daughter spots the basket and discovers that it contains a Hebrew infant. The baby’s sister, having watched this play out, then offers assistance to the Pharaoh’s daughter. The baby’s own mother is paid by Pharaoh’s daughter to nurse the child! After he is done nursing (somewhere between 2 and 5 years later), the boy is returned to the Pharaoh’s daughter, and she names the child Moses.

There is great irony in this narrative because Moses’s mother places Moses in the Nile River, just as Pharaoh decreed, and Moses is rescued from the Nile by Pharaoh’s own daughter. No matter what Pharaoh plans, he is always thwarted by God. God is in control of events, not Pharaoh.

Starting in verse 11, the remainder of Exodus 2 records several significant events in Moses’ life.  Acts 7:22 claims that “Moses was instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians and was powerful in his words and deeds,” but his peaceful and privileged upbringing would soon come to a tumultuous end.

In verses 11-14, we learn that Moses killed an Egyptian who was beating a fellow Hebrew. According to Acts 7:23, this happened when Moses was approaching 40 years old. There is definite foreshadowing here, as Moses will deliver Israel from oppression just as he delivered the Hebrew from being beaten. Moses subsequently learns that his crime has been discovered and Pharaoh attempts to kill him for it.

In order to save his life, Moses flees Egypt to a place called Midian. He comes to the aid of some women at a well, and the father of these women invites Moses to marry into his family, taking his daughter Zipporah as a wife. Moses and Zipporah have a son and name him Gershom, which means “I have become an alien in a foreign land.”

According to John Hannah in The Bible Knowledge Commentary, “For 40 years (Acts 7:30) Moses undertook the toilsome life of a sheepherder in the Sinai area, thus gaining valuable knowledge of the topography of the Sinai Peninsula which later was helpful as he led the Israelites in that wilderness land.”

Verses 23-25 remind the reader that many years pass and the Pharaoh who tried to kill Moses dies. More significantly, “God heard their groaning and he remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac and with Jacob.” God will not forget his promises to the Patriarchs.

Commentary on Exodus 1 (The Israelites Oppressed)

Post Author: Bill Pratt 

Verses 1-5 remind the reader that 70 people came down to settle in Goshen, which is a district of Egypt situated in the northeast corner of the nation. The twelve sons of Jacob (Israel) are listed and grouped according to their birth mothers. The numbering of 70 is a reference back to Gen 46:27 where all of the descendants of Jacob who entered Egypt are named.

In verses 6-7, we learn that after Joseph and all his brothers died, the Israelites experienced tremendous population growth. Note the similarity between Gen 1:28 and Ex 1:7. God had commanded Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply, and that is exactly what the Israelites have done.

Goshen was a land of great natural resources that allowed the Israelites to settle down and practice agriculture instead of being primarily nomadic, as their ancestors were. The stable food supply undoubtedly contributed greatly to their prosperity. Things were going so well for the Israelites, they had forgotten that they were strangers in a strange land. Their home was to be in Canaan, not Egypt.

Although the Israelites had lived in Goshen for hundreds of years, their life in Egypt was about to be massively disrupted.  Egypt, like any other nation, experienced political turmoil and changes in governance. The writer of Exodus announces that a new king (Pharaoh) came to power, and this king, evidently, either knew nothing or cared nothing about Joseph’s role in Egyptian history.

Some historians have speculated that the new king knew about Joseph, but because the king was bringing a new regime into power that was very different ethnically (non-Semitic) from the previous regimes, he no longer trusted the Hebrews (who were Semitic) to align themselves with his regime’s interests. Since Goshen bordered Canaan, where Egypt’s enemies were located, the Israelites could easily ally themselves with Canaanite nations who wanted an easy path into the heart of Egypt.

The new Pharaoh’s first plan to deal with the Israelites was to enslave them. They would be forced to build the store cities of Pithom and Rameses. However, contrary to his plans, the Israelites continued to increase in number. The clear message here is that the Gentile king of Egypt cannot thwart God’s plans for his people. The Pharaoh’s plans simply backfire on him.

Starting in verse 15, Pharaoh tries plan B to stop the multiplication of the Israelites. He calls two of the Hebrew midwives to him (they were probably leaders or representatives of a much larger number of midwives), and commands them to kill the boy babies when they are born. The midwives, Shiphrah and Puah, however, decline to obey Pharaoh, and let the boys live.

The reason given for the midwives disobeying Pharaoh is that they “feared God.” The message to the reader is that when a person in authority over us gives us a direct command that contradicts God’s unmistakable will, we are to disobey.

The midwives, when questioned by Pharaoh, tell him that Hebrew women give birth more quickly than Egyptian women, and so the midwives arrive too late to kill the baby boys. In the context of the narrative, the midwives are obviously lying to Pharaoh, but they are lying to save lives.

It is reasonable to assume that Pharaoh is counting on the midwives to surreptitiously kill the newborns without the mothers realizing what is going on. The plan counts on the skills and obedience of the midwives to carry it out. If the Hebrew mothers catch on, they will simply avoid using the midwives.

If Shiphrah and Puah refused to go along, it is reasonable to assume that Pharaoh would find other midwives to kill the Hebrew boys. By convincing Pharaoh that the plan simply won’t work because of how quickly Hebrew women gave birth, Pharoah abandoned the plan altogether instead of drafting more midwives.

Pharaoh’s plan B, to control the Israelites, backfires on him, just as his first plan did. The Israelites “became even more numerous” and because the midwives feared God and saved the lives of the baby boys, the midwives were also rewarded with families of their own.