(Exodus 9:13 - 10:29)
Jehovah said to Moses, "Get up early in the morning and confront the Pharaoh. Tell him that Jehovah, the god of the Hebrews, tells you, 'Allow my people to make a sacrifice to me, or else I will bring to bear all my power against you, your servants and your subjects in order to convince you that there none like me on earth. I could have used the power at my disposal to inflict such disasters upon you that you would all be wiped off the face of the earth. But I have spared you for this purpose: to impress you with my power and to spread my fame throughout the world. --- You still lord over my people and refuse to let them go? Beware! Tomorrow at this time I will bring a devastating hailstorm, such has not been seen in Egypt from its establishment as a nation until now. Therefore, send word at once that all your livestock and everything belonging to you in the fields must be taken inside, for men and animals, everything remaining outside and not under cover, will be killed when the hail falls.’”
Those among the Pharaoh's subjects who believed and heeded Jehovah's warning sought shelter for their workers and farm animals inside. Those who disbelieved and ignored it, left their workers and animals outside in the fields.
Jehovah said to Moses, "Stretch out your arm toward the sky and bring down hail upon man and beast, upon every plant and tree in the land of Egypt." Moses reached his staff up into the sky and, lo, Jehovah sent a storm of hail with thunder and lightning strikes upon the ground. Jehovah made it hail all across the land of Egypt, and the the hail fell amidst flashes of lightning. It was very severe -- nothing like it in all of Egypt from the time it had been founded. Throughout the country the hail struck all that was left outside, killing both men and animals, beating down the grain in the fields and stripping of leaves every tree in the land. Only in Goshen, where the Israelites lived, did the hail not fall.
The Pharaoh sent for Moses and Aaron and confessed to them, "I was in error concerning this matter. Jehovah is in the right. I and my people are in the wrong. All I ask is that you pray to Jehovah that he may put a stop to all this thunder and hail. I will let your people go and you need not stay in this country any longer."
Moses responded, "As soon as I have left the city, I will reach my hands up to Jehovah, the thunder will cease and the hail will fall no more, so that you will know that earthly events are controlled by Jehovah. --- But as for you and your court, I know that you still do not respect the god Jehovah.”
(The flax and the barley crops were destroyed, for the flax was in the bud and barley was in the ear, but the winter wheat and the emmer wheat were not damaged, for they had not yet come up.)
Moses departed from the Pharaoh's capital and raised his hands up to Jehovah, thereupon the hail and the thunder ceased and no more rain fell. But once he saw that the rain, the hail, and the thunder had stopped, the Pharaoh lapsed back into his evil ways, and he and his court became more obdurate than ever, fully determined to prevent the Israelites from going -- just as Jehovah had told Moses he would.
Jehovah said to Moses, "Go, see the Pharaoh. I have made him and his court obstinate so that I could manifest my divine power before them and so that you will be able to recount to your children and grandchildren how I have humbled the Egyptians and miraculously inflicted upon them these plagues, and you will thus remember the reason that I am your god."
When Moses and Aaron went to see the Pharaoh, they said to him, "Jehovah, the god of the Hebrews says to you, 'How long will you refuse to yield to me? Let my people go so they can sacrifice to me. If you refuse and won't let them go, then tomorrow I will bring locusts into your country. They will completely cover the surface of the earth and will devour all that was left by the hail. They will eat every green thing that grows up in the fields. They will invade your palaces, the residencies of your officials, and the homes of your subjects, and in numbers such as men have not seen since your ancestors began living in Egypt.’” Moses then turned away from the Pharaoh and departed from his presence.
The officials of Pharaoh's court said to him, "How long must this man continue to be our undoing? Let his people go so they can worship their god. Can't you see that the country has already been destroyed?" And so the Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron back to his court and told them, "Go and worship Jehovah, your god. But who is it among you that must go?"
Moses explained, "We will take along the old and the young, our sons and daughters, and our flocks and herds as well, for we must hold a feast honoring Jehovah."
The Pharaoh answered, “Jehovah will be with you indeed, if I let you take your children with you. Who can doubt that you have some ulterior motive, some evil intent? No, just the men may go and sacrifice to Jehovah -- that's what you wanted all along, wasn't it?" Immediately after, Aaron and Moses were forcible ejected from the palace.
Jehovah said to Moses, "Extend your arm over the land of Egypt so that the locust will appear, sweep over the country, and devour all that remains of the crops after the hailstorm." Moses stretched out his staff over the land of Egypt. Jehovah stirred up a hot east wind that blew across the land all day and night, and in the morning, the wind brought hordes of locusts. They spread over the entire land of Egypt, from one border to another, and their numbers were greater than had ever been or will ever be. They covered the entire surface of the land so that the earth was darkened with them. They consumed every bit of vegetation, the grain and whatever fruits that were spared by the hailstorm. Indeed, nothing green, either the leaves on the trees or the plants on the ground, was left in the entire country of Egypt.
The Pharaoh urgently summoned Moses and Aaron back to his palace and apologized to them, "I have done wrong to your god Jehovah and to you. Just this once forgive me and pray to your god Jehovah that he may spare me this deadly catastrophe."
After leaving the Pharaoh, Moses called upon Jehovah, who evoked a mighty wind from the west that blew all the locusts to drown in the Red Sea -- there remained not a single locust from one end of Egypt to the other.
But Jehovah made the Pharaoh hard headed and unbending, and he still refused to let the Israelites go.
Jehovah told Moses, "Extend your arm to the sky and there will settle over the land of Egypt a darkness so thick that men will grope their way in blindness.” And Moses did stretch his arm to the sky and there came a terrifying darkness throughout the land for Egypt for three days. No man could see his fellow, no one ventured abroad for three days. However, wherever the Israelites lived, there was light.
The Pharaoh sent for Moses and Aaron and told them, "You may go and sacrifice to your god. Your children may go with you, but you must leave behind your herds and flocks."
Moses replied, "But you must allow us to make animal sacrifices to our god Jehovah. All our livestock must go with us with nary a hoof left behind. For they are necessary for our religious ceremonies, and we don't know exactly what will be needed for the sacrifice until we get there."
But again Jehovah made the Pharaoh obstinate, and he refused to let them go. Moreover, Pharaoh warned Moses, "Be gone from my sight and make sure you don't show your face here again, for if you do, you will be put to death."
Moses responded, "So be it, you will not see my face anymore!"
Notes
1. Jehovah's primary concern does not seem to be the welfare of the Israelites, except as it impinges upon their ability to make sacrifices to him. He lets the Israelites suffer for generations under Egyptian bondage, but his primary beef is that he is not allowed to receive the devotion he is due. The Pharaoh's obstinacy, which Jehovah continually nurtures, seems an excuse for Jehovah to flaunt his god-like powers, to assert his dominance over the Egyptian gods (who after the first couple of plagues are absent from the field of contest), and to wreak as much havoc as he can, which seems to be his way of getting kicks. The Jehovah of Moses, even more than the Jehovah of Abraham, uses his power almost exclusively in a destructive way. He doesn't build or teach and do anything to improve the character or living conditions of his people. He may protect his people from the disasters and pestilences he creates, but when he gives something to his people it always something he has taken from someone else. And he certainly doesn't mind if he kills and punishes thousands and thousands of innocent people, just because he can't get his own way. The land and people of Egypt are all but destroyed because of the stubbornness of the Pharaoh. Why doesn't he just punish the Pharaoh, give him a migraine or a case of the shingles? And why does he make him so pig-headed, why not, if has the ability, make the Pharaoh compliant so that he will let the Israelites go? It is his stated goal to make the liberation of the Israelites something spectacular and unforgettable, so that his people will always remember him and be obligated to him.
2. Hail, needless to say, is exceedingly uncommon in Egypt, but not entirely unknown. A hailstorm so severe that it kills anyone caught out in it is, however, a bit of a stretch. Some translations interpret lightning as being fire, in which case it sounds more like volcanic activity -- perhaps a memory of the Thera eruption. It seems more likely, though, that lightning is meant here and not fire.
3. When Moses is summoned by the Pharaoh, who falsely promises to let the Israelites go if Moses will bring the hailstorm to an end, the storm is still going on, the hail is still falling. How does Moses protect himself from the lethal hail?
4. The wheat, unlike the flax and the barley, are not destroyed by the hail since they have not yet come up. Since winter wheat and emmer wheat (a variety cultivated at that time in the Middle East -- some translations incorrectly refer to spelt or rye) would have matured in March or April, this would place the hailstorm during the harvest time for flax and barley, in February.
5. The locust invasion is the archetypal Biblical plague, but such infestations are far from rare and have occurred in modern times. Beating the insects into the sea was a technique used by settlers in early Massachusetts, and luring them into Lake Michigan with high-pitched calls was effectively employed against giant grasshoppers in the 50's sci-fi film Beginning of the End.
6. The threat of locusts is the last straw for members of the Pharaoh's court, who finally protest and urge the Pharaoh to give in to Moses. The Pharaoh thus recalls Moses and seems willing to concede to his demands, but they bicker about terms. Moses has never asked for freedom for his people, only the right for them to take a little time off so they can go into the desert and hold some religious ceremonies, with the assumption that they will then return to the former conditions of their servitude. That Moses wants to bring along the children and all the livestock seems suspicious to the Pharaoh, who, believing they will not return, will allow only the men to go. This is unacceptable to Moses, so the deal falls through and the Eighth Plague, that of locusts, goes into effect. Then, after the Ninth Plague, that of darkness, the Pharaoh is willing to let all the people go, as long as they leave behind their livestock, which, Moses insists, are necessary. Why the Israelites, who will have to slaughter some of their animals to feed Jehovah's bloodlust, need all of their livestock with them does not seem reasonable. The Pharaoh, for once, does have a point. Fed up, he gets mad at Moses and boots him out of the palace and tells him he will be killed if he ever returns. (Extraordinary this took so long to happen: one would think that any ruthless despot worth his salt would have had Moses impaled after the first plague -- but then that would have ruined the story.)
7. The plague of darkness, lasting three days, might have been due to a sandstorm, even a result of that stiff west wind that blew the locusts into the Red Sea.
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