A small textual puzzle in the book of Exodus reveals something important about Moses' family. The verse states (Exodus 18:5): "And Yithro, Moses' father-in-law, and his sons and his wife came to Moses." But just one verse later, the text says "and your wife and her two sons with her." Why the apparent repetition?
The rabbis noticed that the second verse says "her two sons" — using the possessive "her," which could imply these were Zipporah's children from a different husband. After all, Moses had been away in Egypt for a long time. Perhaps she had remarried, and these were someone else's sons?
The Mekhilta rejects this reading decisively. The first verse deliberately says "his sons and his wife came to Moses" — making clear that the sons belonged to Moses. The Torah placed this clarification first precisely to prevent any misunderstanding. These were Moses' own children, Gershom and Eliezer, and no one else's.
This kind of close reading — where the order of verses and the choice of pronouns carry legal and narrative weight — is characteristic of how the Mekhilta approaches Scripture. Every word placement is intentional. The Torah could have mentioned the wife and sons in a single verse, but it split the information across two verses so that the first would clarify what the second might obscure.