When the “new king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph” enslaved the Hebrews, he issued an anti-toxic-masculinity post-partum abortion mandate. In response, several faithful women refused to comply.

Shiphrah and Puah were midwives who “feared God and did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but let the male children live.” Jochebed was the mother of Moses who “hid him three months” in defiance of the order before putting him in an ark and casting upon the waters. Miriam is the name of Moses’s sister who was also a conspirator who initiated the deal with Pharaoh’s daughter (who adopted the baby) for Jochebed to nurse Moses.

Pharaoh’s daughter is arguably a co-conspirator as well, but her name remains unknown, or at least unnamed in the Holy Scriptures.

We do not know the names of the great and mighty imperial Pharaohs whose stories are central to the narrative of Exodus - at least not conclusively, as the Word of God is silent as to their identities. Though they considered themselves to be gods, the memory of their names in the best-selling book of all time is not recorded, in contrast to the lowly women who stood up to his tyranny.

The Rev. Wilhelm Löhe observes a similar pattern in the New Testament:

The Lord Jesus was followed by a number of women whose names have come down to us. Kings are forgotten, emperors have fallen into the dust, and there is no one to remember them; the names of these women, however, are still being mentioned. There are only a few things we know about them, and what is said seems insignificant to us. They made offerings to the Son of Man from what they had… provided such little services, as He deserved before all others. But because the common has become the uncommon, thus these names are written in the Book of books.”

The Poem Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley was written around 1817 in response to an exhibit of a piece of a statue of the Egyptian pharaoh Rameses II (who incidentally is assumed to be the Pharaoh whom Moses challenged according to the iconic 1956 Cecil B. DeMille movie The Ten Commandments, as famously portrayed by the Russian actor Yul Brenner).

Ozymandias has the feel of King Solomon’s lament about vanity in Ecclesiastes.

Here is a well-done reading of the poem:

Let us honor the names, the deeds, and the memories of the faithful women of dissent, whom the Holy Spirit caused to be brought to our remembrance; let us “follow their faith and good works.” And let us also reflect on the vanity of the most powerful tyrants and enemies of God in world history:

The lone and level sands stretch far away.