Exodus 18:17–23

Exodus 18:17 — "The thing that you do is not good." Jethro's opening verdict is blunt but not harsh — it is the frank speech of a wise elder who loves the man he addresses. The Hebrew phrase לֹא־טוֹב (lo-tov) echoes the evaluative language of Genesis 2:18 ("It is not good for man to be alone"), suggesting that isolation in one's calling — however noble — runs contrary to the created order of human community and interdependence. Moses, despite his singular vocation as mediator, is not exempt from this principle.

Exodus 18:18 — "You will surely wear away..." The verb נָבֹל תִּבֹּל (navol tibbol) carries the sense of wilting, fading, or withering — the image of a plant deprived of what it needs to thrive. This is not a rebuke of Moses' zeal but a diagnosis of structural unsustainability. Jethro identifies two victims of the present arrangement: Moses himself, and "this people that is with you." Unjust or impractical structures always ultimately harm those they are meant to serve, not only those who operate them.

Exodus 18:19 — "I will give you counsel, and God be with you." Jethro is careful to subordinate his advice to divine authority: his counsel is contingent on God's confirmation (see v. 23). He defines Moses' irreplaceable role — to "represent the people before God" and to "bring the causes to God." The Hebrew לִפְנֵי הָאֱלֹהִים (lifnei ha-Elohim, "before God") situates Moses at the intersection of the human community and the divine will. This is a priestly and prophetic function that cannot be delegated: the mediation of the covenant itself rests with Moses alone.

Exodus 18:20 — Teaching statutes and laws; showing "the way" Before any judicial architecture is established, Moses must first be the teacher. The verb וְהִזְהַרְתָּה (v'hizhartah, "you shall warn/teach") has an urgency that goes beyond instruction — it is closer to enlightening or illuminating. The phrase "the way in which they must walk" (הַדֶּרֶךְ, ha-derekh) anticipates the biblical theology of "the Way" that runs through Deuteronomy, the Psalms, and ultimately reaches its fulfilment in Christ, who declares Himself "the Way" (John 14:6). Teaching right living is Moses' primary preparatory task before justice can be administered.

Exodus 18:21 — The fourfold criteria for judges Jethro's criteria for selecting leaders are striking in their theological precision: (1) able men — competence is a prerequisite, not an afterthought; (2) who fear God — religious disposition is foundational, not incidental; (3) men of truth — personal integrity and fidelity to what is real; (4) hating unjust gain — the rejection of bribery and corruption, which Scripture consistently presents as the primary corruption of justice (cf. Deut 16:19; Isa 1:23). The hierarchical structure — thousands, hundreds, fifties, tens — reflects a principle of subsidiarity: the smallest competent unit handles each matter. This is not bureaucratic convenience but a theology of proportionate authority.

Exodus 18:22 — "They shall share the load with you." The verb וְנָשְׂאוּ (v'nas'u, "they shall bear/carry") is the same root used for the bearing of the Ark of the Covenant and for the carrying of burdens in Numbers 11. Authority, in the biblical vision, is always a weight to be borne on behalf of others — not a privilege claimed for oneself. The distinction between "great matters" and "small matters" is a practical application of proportionality in governance.

Exodus 18:23 — Conditionality and divine confirmation The closing conditional — "If you will do this thing, and God commands you so" — is theologically crucial. Jethro does not present his counsel as self-evidently authoritative. Human wisdom, however sound, must be ratified by God. The goal — "all these people will go to their place in peace" — uses the word שָׁלוֹם (shalom), evoking not merely the absence of conflict but wholeness, right order, and flourishing.

Typological sense: The entire passage foreshadows the ordered ministry of the Church. Moses as sole mediator is a type of Christ; the appointed judges are a type of the apostolic college and, by extension, the episcopate and presbyterate — those who share in the one priesthood of Christ and exercise authority in His name, proportionately and accountably.

Catholic tradition finds in this passage a remarkable Old Testament anticipation of the Church's theology of hierarchical communion, subsidiarity, and ordained ministry.

Subsidiarity: The Catechism teaches that "a community of a higher order should not interfere in the internal life of a community of a lower order, depriving the latter of its functions" (CCC 1883). Jethro's hierarchical structure of judges — tens, fifties, hundreds, thousands — is one of Scripture's earliest articulations of this principle. Pope Pius XI gave subsidiarity its definitive magisterial formulation in Quadragesimo Anno (1931, §79–80), but its biblical roots run directly through this text.

Shared governance and episcopal collegiality: St. Augustine, commenting on analogous structures in the New Testament, saw the appointment of the seventy-two disciples (Luke 10) as directly continuous with this Mosaic distribution of authority (Quaestiones in Heptateuchum, II.77). The Second Vatican Council's Lumen Gentium (§22) describes the college of bishops as sharing in the apostolic office so that "the burden of the universal Church" might be borne together — an explicit echo of Jethro's language.

Criteria for leadership: The fourfold qualifications — competence, fear of God, truthfulness, and incorruptibility — map precisely onto what the Church requires of candidates for Holy Orders. The Ratio Fundamentalis Institutionis Sacerdotalis (2016) speaks of human, spiritual, intellectual, and pastoral formation as the four pillars of priestly formation, each of which has its seed in Jethro's four criteria.

Moses as priestly type: Origen, in his Homilies on Exodus (Homily XI), reads Moses' intercessory role before God as a figure of Christ's perpetual intercession at the right hand of the Father (Heb 7:25), while the appointed judges prefigure the Church's ordained ministers who extend Christ's pastoral care through time and space.

For contemporary Catholics, this passage challenges the tendency — both in parish life and in personal spirituality — to concentrate all responsibility in one person, whether a pastor, a lay leader, or oneself. The burnout of generous people who cannot say no, and the paralysis of communities that will not empower others, are modern faces of the problem Jethro diagnosed three thousand years ago.

Parish renewal movements, small faith communities, and synodal processes all draw — whether consciously or not — on the structure Jethro recommended: subsidiarity in action. A pastor who asks capable, God-fearing, truthful parishioners to take on real authority in their domain is not abdicating — he is being faithful to a biblical model.

At the personal level, this passage is an invitation to examine whether our insistence on doing everything ourselves is really virtue, or whether it is a subtle form of pride — a refusal to trust God's work in others. Jethro's four criteria for selecting those to whom we delegate responsibility (competence, reverence for God, integrity, and freedom from self-interest) are equally useful for discerning whom to trust, whom to form, and what kind of person we ourselves aspire to become in our families, workplaces, and parishes.