וַיַּ֧רְא אֶת־עׇנְיֵ֛נוּ Vayar et Onyeinu “He saw our plight,” The sages have said that they didn’t allow the Israelite women to immerse themselves so that they wouldn’t be able to increase in number. He made the men shepherd the cattle in the mountains and valleys so that they were far from home and from their wives.

וְאֶת־עֲמָלֵנוּ. אֵלּוּ הַבָּנִים V’et amalainu - elu habanim,“And our toil - this refers to the sons.” First Pharaoh commanded the midwives, “look at the birthstool: if it is a boy, kill him…” (Ex.1:16) But the midwives feared God and did not do what the King of Egypt commanded. When Pharaoh saw this, he slaughtered many babies each day and bathed in their blood for his leprosy, because his doctors told him that the blood of the baby boys would help him. But doctors don’t work for nothing; they treat the sick with contradictory cures and apply what is generally helpful. We find Isaiah cured King Hizkiyahu, with a cake of figs which is generally helpful even on healthy flesh.¹²⁶ But the illness became worse in the way the doctors treated Pharaoh. When Pharaoh saw that the cure didn’t help, he still didn’t want to reject it without reaching his goal; he wanted to decrease the Israelite nation. Therefore he commanded that every male child be cast into the river. Then, “Catch us the foxes, the little foxes…” (Song 2:15) The Egyptians would enter the Israelite houses with their young children. They would then pinch them and make them cry so that the Israelite children who were hidden would hear the child crying and they would also begin crying - this is the way of infants. The Egyptians would then follow the sound of the children and take them against the parents will and throw them in the river.¹²⁷ When the Israelite women saw that it didn’t help to hide their children in their homes they would go out and give birth in the fields and hide them in the ground. They would then come and nurse them there. When the Egyptians figured this out, they would plow over the field, as Scripture states, “Plowmen plowed across my back; they made long furrows. ” (Ps. 129:3) God would cause the ones who were most worthy to be redeemed from Egypt were place deep enough until they were at the level of rocks and there they would nurse on honey and oil, as Scripture states, “He fed him honey from the crag and oil from the flinty rock,” (Deut. 32:13)¹²⁸

footnotes: ¹²⁶ Thus, he seems to be saying that doctors don’t really know what they are doing and simply give common sense cures that have nothing to do with the illness. ¹²⁷ BT Sota 12a ¹²⁸ See BT Sota 11b Much of this passage is drawn from Sota.