Exodus 1:16-18

New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised Catholic Edition

¹⁶ ‘When you act as midwives to the Hebrew women, and see them on the birthstool, if it is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, she shall live.’ ¹⁷ But the midwives feared God; they did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but they let the boys live. ¹⁸ So the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and said to them, ‘Why have you done this, and allowed the boys to live?’