Exode 1:15

This is the language of those who give birth, but there is a heavy word [with a dagesh in the lamed] and a light word [without a dagesh in the lamed], like the words 'shober' and 'meshaber', 'dover' and 'medaber', so too 'moleed' and 'meyaled'.

This is Yocheved, due to her beautifying the newborn.

This is Miriam, due to her crying and cooing to the newborn, in the manner of women who appease crying children.

The language of screaming, like "now I will cry like a travailing woman" (Isaiah 42:14).

And Pharoh told that he, being asleep, had seen in his dream, and, behold, all the land of Mizraim was placed in one scale of a balance, and a lamb, the young of a sheep, was ill the other scale; and the scale with the lamb in it overweighed. Forthwith he sent and called all the magicians of Mizraim, and imparted to them his dream. Immediately Jannis and Jambres, the chief of the magicians, opened their mouth and answered Pharoh,?A certain child is about to be born in the congregation of Israel, by whose hand will be destruc-tion to all the land of Mizraim. Therefore did Pharoh, king of Mizraim, give counsel to the Jehudith midwives, the name of one of whom was Shifra, who is Jokeved, and the name of the other Puvah, who is Miriam her daughter.

To the midwives. Shifrah and Puah were administrators in charge of all the other midwives, for there were undoubtedly more than five hundred midwives for the entire population. Therefore, it must be that these two were administrators who were responsible for collecting taxes from the midwives’ earnings for Pharaoh; and so have I seen today in many locales. According to the tradition from our Sages they were a mother and daughter, and this is correct.

למילדות העבריות; the ones who were Jewish.

למילדות העבריות, to the midwives resident in the capital. It was obviously impossible for such a large number of people residing in so many different parts of Egypt, to all be serviced by only two midwives. However, after the midwives in the capital, though Egyptian, betrayed the instructions by their king and explained to their king why they had done so, the king did not bother to rely on midwives anywhere else either, and the scheme was abandoned.

למילדת “to the midwife;” there is a disagreement in the Talmud regarding the identity of these two women. According to one opinion they were Yocheved and her daughter Miriam. According to the second opinion, they were mother-in- law Yocheved, and her daughter-in-law. Elisheva, wife of Aaron. (Talmud Sotah, folio 11) An alternate interpretation: this interpretation takes its cue from the fact that the Torah spelled the word מילדת in the singular mode instead of with the letter ו, seeing that there were two women. According to the spelling there was only a single midwife, Yocheved. Miriam was a teenager not capable yet of acting as a midwife, rather she acted as a bleater, to help the infant cry while still inside its mother’s womb encouraging it to emerge from the womb as fast as possible.