Zipporah's father Jethro (also called Reuel), gratefully taking Moses in, gives the Hebrew both a job (as a shepherd) and Zipporah to marry. She bears Moses two sons, Gershom and Eliezer, still children when Yahweh calls Moses to go back to Egypt and tell the Pharoah to "let my people go." (On the Hebrew problem in Egypt, see ISRAEL.)
On Moses' way to Egypt there occurs one of the most mysterious episodes in the Bible. Yahweh, for some reason, tries to kill Moses, and it is Zipporah who comes to the rescue: with a sharp stone she circumcises "her son"--which one is not specified--and holds the severed foreskin to Moses' genitals (euphemistically called "feet") while saying, "Surely a bloody husband art thou to me." As a result, Yahweh spares Moses, with Zipporah reiterating, "A bloody husband thou art, because of the circumcision."
Scholars today can only guess at the meaning of this primitive passage. Is Yahweh angry enough to kill him because Moses--raised as an Egyptian--is uncircumcised, and does Zipporah therefore circumcise Moses vicariously? (See CIRCUMCISION: "SIGN OF THE COVENANT.") In any case Moses, thanks to Zipporah, escapes by the skin of his feet to fulfill his biblical mission.
Zipporah and her sons live with Jethro while Moses leads his people out of Egypt, then they rejoin Moses in the desert. But after that Zipporah is not mentioned again--unless complaints by Moses' brother Aaron and sister Miriam about his "Cushite woman" (RSV, NRSV) refer to Zipporah (Numbers 12). "Cushite" in its broad sense would include "Midianite"; only in its narrow sense does it mean "Ethiopian" (KJV). (If Moses has a black wife, and if that is why Miriam complains, there is irony in the way Miriam is punished by Yahweh: her skin is turned a leprous snow-white.)
Zipporah may be the Bible's most underrated woman. Were it not for the Midianite lady's swift action, saving the life of her husband Moses, the Pharoah might never have let those people go. (Ex. 2:11-22; 4:19-26; 18:1-6) (On to AARON AND THE GOLDEN CALF)
Sandro Botticelli
Scenes from the Life of Moses (detail)
Sistene Chapel, 1481-1482
