¹⁸ When the girls returned to Reuel^(A) their father, he asked them, “Why have you returned so early today?”

²⁴ At a lodging place on the way, the Lord met Moses^[a] and was about to kill^(A) him.

²⁵ But Zipporah^(A) took a flint knife, cut off her son’s foreskin^(B) and touched Moses’ feet with it.^[a] “Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me,” she said.

Jethro Visits Moses

18 Now Jethro,^(A) the priest of Midian^(B) and father-in-law of Moses, heard of everything God had done for Moses and for his people Israel, and how the Lord had brought Israel out of Egypt.^(C)

² After Moses had sent away his wife Zipporah,^(D) his father-in-law Jethro received her ³ and her two sons.^(E) One son was named Gershom,^[a] for Moses said, “I have become a foreigner in a foreign land”;^{(F) 4} and the other was named Eliezer,^[b](G) for he said, “My father’s God was my helper;^(H) he saved me from the sword of Pharaoh.”

⁵ Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, together with Moses’ sons and wife, came to him in the wilderness, where he was camped near the mountain^(I) of God. ⁶ Jethro had sent word to him, “I, your father-in-law Jethro, am coming to you with your wife and her two sons.”

²⁹ Now Moses said to Hobab^(A) son of Reuel^(B) the Midianite, Moses’ father-in-law,^(C) “We are setting out for the place about which the Lord said, ‘I will give it to you.’^(D) Come with us and we will treat you well, for the Lord has promised good things to Israel.”