Reuel - Or, as in Numbers 10:29, "Raguel." The name means "friend of God." It appears to have been not uncommon among Hebrews and Edomites; e. g. Genesis 36:4, Genesis 36:10. If Reuel be identified with Jethro, a point open to grave objection (see Exodus 3:1), then Reuel was his proper name, and Jether or Jethro, which means "excellency," was his official designation.

Reuel, their father - In Numbers 10:29 this person is called Raguel, but the Hebrew is the same in both places. The reason of this difference is that the ע ain in רעואל is sometimes used merely as vowel, sometimes as g, ng, and gn, and this is occasioned by the difficulty of the sound, which scarcely any European organs can enunciate. As pronounced by the Arabs it strongly resembles the first effort made by the throat in gargling, or as Meninski says, Est vox vituli matrem vocantis, "It is like the sound made by a calf in seeking its dam." Raguel is the worst method of pronouncing it; Re-u-el, the first syllable strongly accented, is nearer to the true sound. A proper uniformity in pronouncing the same word wherever it may occur, either in the Old or New Testament, is greatly to be desired. The person in question appears to have several names. Here he is called Reuel; in Numbers 10:29, Raguel; in Exodus 3:1, Jethor; in Judges 4:11, Hobab; and in Judges 1:16 he is called קיני Keyni, which in Exodus 4 we translate Kenite. Some suppose that Re-u-el was father to Hobab, who was also called Jethro. This is the most likely; see Clarke's note on Exodus 3:1.

And when they came to Reuel their father,.... Or Ragouel, as the Septuagint; and so Artapanus (s) calls him. The Targum of Jonathan has it, their father's father; and so Aben Ezra says he was; and is the sense of others, induced thereto by Numbers 10:29, but it does not follow from thence: he said:

how is it that you are come so soon today? it being not only sooner than they were wont to come, but perhaps their business was done in so short a time; that it was marvellous to him that it could be done in it, so quick a dispatch had Moses made, and they through his assistance; and especially it might be more strange, if it was usual, as it seems it was, to be molested by the shepherds.

(s) Ut supra. (Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 27. p. 434.)

And when they came to Reuel their father, he said, How is it that ye are come so soon to day?

2:18 Reul or Raguel (see Num 10:29,) seems to have been their grandfather and father of Hobab or Jethro, their immediate father.

Reuel: called also Jethro, or, Jether

Margin Reuel

Called Raguel. Num 10:29.

2:16-22 Moses found shelter in Midian. He was ready to help Reuel's daughters to water their flocks, although bred in learning and at court. Moses loved to be doing justice, and to act in defence of such as he saw injured, which every man ought to do, as far as it is in his power. He loved to be doing good; wherever the providence of God casts us, we should desire and try to be useful; and when we cannot do the good we would, we must be ready to do the good we can. Moses commended himself to the prince of Midian; who married one of his daughters to Moses, by whom he had a son, called Gershom, a stranger there, that he might keep in remembrance the land in which he had been a stranger.