Charles Ellicott Commentary Exodus 2:12

"And he looked this way and that way, and when he saw that there was no man, he smote the Egyptian, and hid him in the sand." — Exodus 2:12 (ASV)

He looked this way and that way. —To see that no one observed him.

He slew the Egyptian. —Jewish commentators gloss over the act, or even eulogise it as patriotic and heroic. But it was clearly the deed of a hasty and undisciplined spirit. The offense did not deserve death, and if it had, Moses had neither legal office nor Divine call, justifying him in making himself an executioner. The result was that, by his one wrong act, Moses put it out of his power to do anything towards alleviating the sufferings of his people for forty years.

Hid him in the sand. —To the east of the Delta the sand creeps up close to the cultivated grounds. There are even patches of it within the Delta itself. Moses naturally remembered that he dug the grave “in the sand.” Any other writer would probably have said “in the ground.”