Solitary Discipline
Exodus 2:16-22
Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters: and they came and drew water, and filled the troughs to water their father's flock.…


There was much in the solitude of his shepherd life that would stimulate him to devout meditation. Here amidst "the sleep that is among the lovely hills," he communed with himself, with nature, and with God; facing for himself those "obstinate questionings" which continually arise when one seeks to fathom the mysteries of being. A very different university was this from that at which he studied among the worshippers of the sun at Heliopolis; yet more helpful to him even than the education which he had received in Egypt, would be his musings upon the mountain sides, as he rose from the thunder-riven peaks to Him who before the mountains were brought forth is, from everlasting to everlasting, God. Like the Scottish boy, who in the intervals of his shepherd life mapped out for himself with beads the distances of the stars, and designated himself "God Almighty's scholar," Moses was now under the special tuition of the Lord. His books were the silent stars and giant hills; the shrubs that grew at his feet, and the flocks that went on beside him, browsing on the grass; and often and often would he pore lovingly over the pages of man's first Bible — Nature. But most frequently, perhaps, he would look within and try to read himself; and after awhile there was to come to him the vision which would open to him as a scroll "the marvel of the everlasting will."

(William M. Taylor, D. D.)



Parallel Verses
KJV: Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters: and they came and drew water, and filled the troughs to water their father's flock.

WEB: Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters. They came and drew water, and filled the troughs to water their father's flock.




Moses in Midian
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