Exodus 2:10

King James Version (KJV)

And the child grew, and she brought him unto Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. And she called his name Moses: and she said, Because I drew him out of the water.

Adam Clarke
Bible Commentary

And he became her son - From this time of his being brought home by his nurse his education commenced, and he was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, Acts 7:22, who in the knowledge of nature probably exceeded all the nations then on the face of the earth.

And she called his name - משה mosheh, because המים מן min hammayim, out of the waters משיתהו meshithihu, have I drawn him. משה mashah signifies to draw out; and mosheh is the person drawn out; the word is used in the same sense Psalm 18:16, and 2 Samuel 22:17. What name he had from his parents we know not; but whatever it might be it was ever after lost in the name given to him by the princess of Egypt. Abul Farajius says that Thermuthis delivered him to the wise men Janees and Jimbrees to be instructed in wisdom.

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Albert Barnes
Notes on the Whole Bible

He became her son - See the margin reference. His training and education was, humanly speaking, all but indispensable to the efficient accomplishment of his work as the predestined leader and instructor of his countrymen. Moses probably passed the early years of his life in Lower Egypt, where the princess resided. However, there may be substantial grounds for the tradition in Josephus that he was engaged in a campaign against the Ethiopians, thus showing himself, as Stephen says, “mighty in word and deed.”

Moses - The Egyptian origin of this word is generally admitted. The name itself is not uncommon in ancient documents. The exact meaning is “son,” but the verbal root of the word signifies “produce,” “draw forth.” The whole sentence in Egyptian would exactly correspond to our King James Version. She called his name Moses, i. e. “son,” or “brought forth,” because she brought him forth out of the water.

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Matthew Henry
Concise Bible Commentary

Come, see the place where that great man, Moses, lay, when he was a little child; it was in a bulrush basket by the river's side. Had he been left there long, he must have perished. But Providence brings Pharaoh's daughter to the place where this poor forlorn infant lay, and inclines her heart to pity it, which she dares do, when none else durst. God's care of us in our infancy ought to be often mentioned by us to his praise. Pharaoh cruelly sought to destroy Israel, but his own daughter had pity on a Hebrew child, and not only so, but, without knowing it, preserved Israel's deliverer, and provided Moses with a good nurse, even his own mother. That he should have a Hebrew nurse, the sister of Moses brought the mother into the place of a nurse. Moses was treated as the son of Pharoah's daughter. Many who, by their birth, are obscure and poor, by surprising events of Providence, are raised high in the world, to make men know that God rules.

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SDA Bible Commentary (limited)
Volume 1-7

10. The child grew. Jochebed had saved her son’s life by transferring her rights as mother to Pharaoh’s daughter. Now she received him back, on loan as it were, and merely as a nurse hired for his years of infancy. She gave him up that she might keep him, lost him that she might find him again, stooped that she might conquer. The time the child was with its mother, not stated in the Bible but given as 2 or 3 years by most commentators, was actually about 12 years (PP 244). During these years of childhood the foundations of character and later religious experience were laid. Instruction neglected now could not be made up later. Moses’ afterlife shows clearly that his parents used well the years allotted them for bringing him up in the way in which he should go.

She brought him. Many commentators have expressed the view that Moses’ mother took her son to the palace of her own volition as soon as he was weaned, at the age of perhaps two or three years. As noted above, this actually occurred at about the age of 12. The idea that she surrendered him voluntarily is based on the absence of any indication that she was forced to give him up. Unless she took him to the palace at a time previously agreed upon, to do so on her own initiative would seem to show a strange lack of motherly affection. Would Jochebed have given up a son she loved so dearly without being required to do so? She must have kept him as long as she could. Her surrender of Moses at the age of 12 would imply that her term of service as “nurse” was to expire with the close of what was generally considered the period of childhood (see PP 244).

Moses. Mosheh is comparable to the Egyptian mes or mesu, meaning “child,” “son,” “the one born of.” During the Eighteenth Dynasty, under which Moses was born and brought up, it was customary to select for members of the royal family, names designating them as offspring of the gods. Names such as Ahmose, “The one born of [the moon-god] Ah”; Kamose, “The one born of the [deified soul, the] Ka”; Thutmose, “The one born of [the god] Thoth”; and the common name Ramose (later Ramses), “The one born of [the sun-god] Ra”; were in everyday life often abbreviated to “Mose.” Students of Egyptology would say that Pharaoh’s daughter gave the child she adopted a name similar to Thutmose or Ahmose, of which that part referring to a heathen deity was dropped by Moses when he “refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter” (Heb. 11:24). Again, she may have omitted the title of any god and instead given him only the abbreviated name “Mose,” since she neither knew his earthly parentage nor could claim that, as a Hebrew, he was the son of an Egyptian god. However, it is probable that the name she gave the child was Egyptian, though the form in which we know it today is Hebrew.

Drew him out. The name Mosheh means, literally, “one drawn out.” It is the participial form of, and has the same consonants as, the verb mashah, “to draw out.” Since the Egyptian name Mose and the Hebrew verb mashah were similar in sound and related in meaning, the Hebrews may have transliterated Mose as Mosheh. Thus it would conform to the statement of the Egyptian princess, “Because I drew him out of the water.” This statement implies that she accepted him as a gift to her from the river god, the Nile. In the Egyptian pantheon the Nile was deified as Hapi, though the stream itself was known as ’Itru, later simply as ’Iru. This the Hebrews transliterated as Yeor, and with one exception (Dan. 12:5-7) Bible writers use it exclusively (49 times) in referring to the Nile and its tributaries (see Gen. 41:1; Isa. 7:18; Eze. 29:3; Nahum 3:8; etc.). Originally, Moses’ name in Egyptian may thus have been Hapmose or ’Irumose, meaning, “The one born of [Heb., “drawn out of”] the Nile.” In refusing “to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter” (Heb. 11:24), he would naturally drop the reference to an Egyptian deity.

Translators of the LXX rendered his name Mouses. In explanation of this name, Josephus (Antiquities ii. 9. 6) explains Mo as an Egyptian name for the Nile, and uses as Egyptian for anyone “drawn” or “saved” out of it. According to this explanation, then, Moses would mean, “The one saved out of the Nile,” a most appropriate name for one destined to save his people from the land of the Nile. It is not clear, however, whether Josephus’ explanation is based on fact or on wishful thinking.

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Ellen G. White
Education, 61-2

The lesson is for all. None can know what may be God's purpose in His discipline; but all may be certain that faithfulness in little things is the evidence of fitness for greater responsibilities. Every act of life is a revelation of character, and he only who in small duties proves himself “a workman that needeth not to be ashamed” (2 Timothy 2:15) will be honored by God with weightier trusts. Ed 61.1

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Ellen G. White
Fundamentals of Christian Education, 96

Such was the training of Moses in the lowly cabin home in Goshen; of Samuel, by the faithful Hannah; of David, in the hill-dwelling at Bethlehem; of Daniel, before the scenes of the captivity separated him from the home of his fathers. Such, too, was the early life of Christ, in the humble home at Nazareth; such the training by which the child Timothy learned from the lips of his mother Eunice, and his grandmother Lois, the truths of Holy Writ. FE 96.1

Further provision was made for the instruction of the young, by the establishment of the “school of the prophets.” If a youth was eager to obtain a better knowledge of the Scriptures, to search deeper into the mysteries of the kingdom of God, and to seek wisdom from above, that he might become a teacher in Israel, this school was open to him. FE 96.2

By Samuel the schools of the prophets were established to serve as a barrier against the widespread corruption resulting from the iniquitous course of Eli's sons, and to promote the moral and spiritual welfare of the people. These schools proved a great blessing to Israel, promoting that righteousness which exalteth a nation, and furnishing it with men qualified to act, in the fear of God, as leaders and counselors. In the accomplishment of this object, Samuel gathered companies of young men who were pious, intelligent and studious. These were called the sons of the prophets. The instructors were men not only versed in divine truth, but those who had themselves enjoyed communion with God, and had received the special endowment of His Spirit. They enjoyed the respect and confidence of the people, both for learning and piety. FE 96.3

In Samuel's day there were two of these schools,—one at Ramah, the home of the prophet, and the other at Kirjath-jearim, where the ark then was. Two were added in Elijah's time, at Jericho and Bethel, and others were afterward established at Samaria and Gilgal. FE 96.4

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Ellen G. White
The Ministry of Healing, 372

Especially does responsibility rest upon the mother. She, by whose lifeblood the child is nourished and its physical frame built up, imparts to it also mental and spiritual influences that tend to the shaping of mind and character. It was Jochebed, the Hebrew mother, who, strong in faith, was “not afraid of the king's commandment” (Hebrews 11:23), of whom was born Moses, the deliverer of Israel. It was Hannah, the woman of prayer and self-sacrifice and heavenly inspiration, who gave birth to Samuel, the heaven-instructed child, the incorruptible judge, the founder of Israel's sacred schools. It was Elizabeth the kinswoman and kindred spirit of Mary of Nazareth, who was the mother of the Saviour's herald. MH 372.1

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Ellen G. White
Patriarchs and Prophets, 382

A strong wind blowing from the sea now brought flocks of quails, “about a day's journey on this side, and a day's journey on the other side, round about the camp, and about two cubits above the face of the earth.” Numbers 11:31, R.V. All that day and night, and the following day, the people labored in gathering the food miraculously provided. Immense quantities were secured. “He that gathered least gathered ten homers.” All that was not needed for present use was preserved by drying, so that the supply, as promised, was sufficient for a whole month. PP 382.1

God gave the people that which was not for their highest good, because they persisted in desiring it; they would not be satisfied with those things that would prove a benefit to them. Their rebellious desires were gratified, but they were left to suffer the result. They feasted without restraint, and their excesses were speedily punished. “The Lord smote the people with a very great plague.” Large numbers were cut down by burning fevers, while the most guilty among them were smitten as soon as they tasted the food for which they had lusted. PP 382.2

At Hazeroth, the next encampment after leaving Taberah, a still more bitter trial awaited Moses. Aaron and Miriam had occupied a position of high honor and leadership in Israel. Both were endowed with the prophetic gift, and both had been divinely associated with Moses in the deliverance of the Hebrews. “I sent before thee Moses, Aaron, and Miriam” (Micah 6:4), are the words of the Lord by the prophet Micah. Miriam's force of character had been early displayed when as a child she watched beside the Nile the little basket in which was hidden the infant Moses. Her self-control and tact God had made instrumental in preserving the deliverer of His people. Richly endowed with the gifts of poetry and music, Miriam had led the women of Israel in song and dance on the shore of the Red Sea. In the affections of the people and the honor of Heaven she stood second only to Moses and Aaron. But the same evil that first brought discord in heaven sprang up in the heart of this woman of Israel, and she did not fail to find a sympathizer in her dissatisfaction. PP 382.3

In the appointment of the seventy elders Miriam and Aaron had not been consulted, and their jealousy was excited against Moses. At the time of Jethro's visit, while the Israelites were on the way to Sinai, the ready acceptance by Moses of the counsel of his father-in-law had aroused in Aaron and Miriam a fear that his influence with the great leader exceeded theirs. In the organization of the council of elders they felt that their position and authority had been ignored. Miriam and Aaron had never known the weight of care and responsibility which had rested upon Moses; yet because they had been chosen to aid him they regarded themselves as sharing equally with him the burden of leadership, and they regarded the appointment of further assistants as uncalled for. PP 382.4

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Exodus 2:10