What Does Exodus 2:16 Mean?

Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters, and they came and drew water and filled the troughs to water their father's flock. The priest of Midian introduces a new family that will become central to the Moses narrative: Jethro, also called Reuel (verse 18), whose daughter Zipporah will become Moses' wife and whose counsel will shape Israel's judicial organization in chapter 18. The seven daughters coming to the well and drawing water is an ordinary pastoral scene: shepherds maintaining their flocks through the daily water cycle. Into this ordinary scene, Moses will be introduced as both refugee and rescuer.

The Midianites are descendants of Abraham through his concubine Keturah (Genesis 25:2), making the Midianites distant relatives of Israel. Jethro's priestly role ("the priest of Midian") indicates he operates as the religious leader of the Midianite community, though the identity of the deity he serves is not specified. His later response to the Exodus account in chapter 18, "Now I know that the LORD is greater than all gods," suggests an openness to theological revision based on evidence: a priest who can hear new information about God and respond with genuine acknowledgment.

Moses arrives at the well as an exiled fugitive with nothing: no household, no community, no standing. What he encounters at the well is the beginning of a new social location. The refugee at the well is a type that recurs in the biblical narrative: Abraham's servant at the well of Nahor, Jacob at the well of Laban, Jesus at the well of Samaria. In each case, the well is where the stranger encounters the community that will incorporate him or be encountered by him. Moses' formation requires forty years of Midianite family life before he can return to lead Israel.