Birth of Moshe In the eyes of The Pshat and Drash

A certain man of the house of Levi went and married a Levite woman. The woman conceived and bore a son; and when she saw how beautiful he was, she hid him for three months. When she could hide him no longer, she got a wicker basket for him and caulked it with bitumen and pitch. She put the child into it and placed it among the reeds by the bank of the Nile. And his sister stationed herself at a distance, to learn what would befall him.

And Moshe was eighty years old, and Aharon, eighty three years old, when they spoke to Par῾o.

על דרך הפשט שהיה זה תחלת הנשואין, אין מוקדם ומאוחר בפרשה, כי היה זה קודם גזירת פרעה, וילדה מרים ואהרן, ואחר כן גזר פרעה כל הבן הילוד היאורה תשליכוהו, ותלד הבן הטוב הזה ולא הזכיר הכתוב לדת מרים ואהרן, כי לא היה בלדתם חדוש דבר.

ולא יכלה עוד הצפינו AND SHE COULD NO LONGER CONCEAL HIM, because the Egyptians calculated the period from when he (Amram) took her back. She, however, bore him after a term of six months and one day — for a woman who gives birth to a child in the seventh month may do so in incomplete months (i. e. the seventh month of pregnancy may not be completed) (Niddah 38b) — and they (the Egyptians) made enquiry regarding her at the end of nine months (the normal term of pregnancy, but in this case three months after the child’s birth; therefore “she could no longer conceal him”).

The thoughts of God are deep; who can perceive His secret? To Him alone the plot is clear. Perhaps God caused it to come about that Moshe would grow up in the royal palace, that his soul might be habituated to be on the highest level, not lowly and accustomed to being in a house of slaves. For do we not see that he kills the Egyptian for performing an act of unjust violence? And he saves the Midianite daughters from the shepherds, for they (the shepherds) perform unjust violence in watering their flocks from the water drawn by them (the daughters of Re’uel). And moreover: had he grown up among his brethren, such that they had known him since his youth, they would not be in awe of him, for they would consider him as one of them.