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would prevail over them. Then Joshua “discomfited Amalek and his
people with the edge of the sword. And the Lord said unto Moses,
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Write this for a memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the ears of
Joshua; for I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from
under heaven. And Moses built an altar, and called the name of it
Jehovah-nissi, for he said, Because the Lord hath sworn that the Lord
will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.” If the
children of Israel had not murmured against the Lord, he would not
have suffered their enemies to make war with them.
Before Moses had left Egypt he sent back his wife and children to
his father-in-law. And after Jethro heard of the wonderful deliverance
of the Israelites from Egypt, he visited Moses in the wilderness, and
brought his wife and children to him. “And Moses went out to meet his
father-in-law, and did obeisance, and kissed him; and they asked each
other of their welfare, and they came into the tent. And Moses told
his father-in-law all that the Lord had done unto Pharaoh, and to the
Egyptians for Israel’s sake, and all the travail that had come upon them
by the way, and how the Lord delivered them. And Jethro rejoiced
for all the goodness which the Lord had done to Israel, whom he had
delivered out of the hand of the Egyptians. And Jethro said, Blessed be
the Lord, who hath delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians, and
out of the hand of Pharaoh, who hath delivered the people from under
the hand of the Egyptians. Now I know that the Lord is greater than all
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gods; for in the thing wherein they dealt proudly, he was above them.
And Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, took a burnt-offering and sacrifices
for God. And Aaron came, and all the elders of Israel, to eat bread
with Moses’ father-in-law, before God.”
Jethro’s discerning eye soon saw that the burdens upon Moses
were very great, as the people brought all their matters of difficulty
to him, and he instructed them in regard to the statutes and law of
God. He said to Moses, “Hearken now unto my voice. I will give
thee counsel, and God shall be with thee. Be thou for the people to
God-ward, that thou mayest bring the causes unto God. And thou
shalt teach them ordinances and laws, and shalt show them the way
wherein they must walk, and the work that they must do. Moreover,
thou shalt provide out of all the people able men, such as fear God,
men of truth, hating covetousness, and place such over them, to be
rulers of thousands, and rulers of hundreds, and rulers of fifties, and