Midrashic Monologues

I should have known that my sister would be the one to usher me through this moment of danger, possibility, and divine intervention. After all, at the beginning of my life, it was Miriam who watched over me as I floated down the Nile and then courageously suggested to Batyah, Pharaoh's daughter, that she could find a nursemaid for the baby (me) that had been drawn from the water. And now, as I once again found myself floating in uncertain waters, it was Miriam who kept me fro

The ceremony that gave Aaron and his sons the responsibilities and power of the priesthood required each man to wear an elaborate garment. In this #MidrashicMonologue, we join Miriam, the sister of Aaron and Moses, as she sits with her mother (Yocheved), sister-in-law (Elisheva), and cousins (Nepheg and Elzaphan), as they prepare the priests’ decorative clothing. We explore what Miriam, who is so often described as exuberant and confident, might have been thinking as she help

Yocheved: Have you ever stood outside of a moment? Have you ever experienced something so viscerally, with so many of your senses, that you found yourself turning it over and over again as if to study every facet of the experience? That is the way I feel standing a short distance behind my youngest son, my baby, my Moses, as he looks out at the Red Sea. I am close enough to see that his arm is shaking as he lifts it. When I notice his trembling, I start forward, hoping to o

Moses, some say, had three mothers: Yocheved, who gave birth to him, raised him for three months, and placed him in the ark on the river; Batyah, Pharaoh's daughter, who drew him out of the river and raised him as her son; and the river Nile herself, whose life-giving waters defied Pharaoh's decree to “throw all the Israelite sons into the river,” and who was the bond between Yocheved and Batyah. In these Midrashic Monologues, we imagine the whispered thoughts of two of Moses