comparison with other passages strengthens us in the inference that the magicians succeeded
merely by juggling. After this warning to Pharaoh, Aaron, at the word of Moses, waved his rod
over the Nile, and the river was turned into blood, with all its canals and reservoirs, and every
vessel of water drawn from them; the fish died, and the river stank. The Egyptians could not drink
of it, and digged around it for water. This plague was doubly humiliating to the religion of the
country, as the Nile was held sacred, as well as some kinds of its fish, not to speak of the crocodiles,
which probably were destroyed. (Exodus 7:16-25) Those who have endeavored to explain this
plague by natural causes have referred to the changes of color to which the Nile is subject, the
appearance of the Red Sea, and the so called rain and dew of blood of the middle ages; the last
two occasioned by small fungi of very rapid growth. But such theories do not explain why the
wonder happened at a time of year when the Nile is most clear nor why it killed the fish and made
the water unfit to he drunk.
•The plague of frogs .—When seven days had passed after the first plague, the river and all the
open waters of Egypt brought forth countless frogs, which not only covered the land but filled the
houses, even in their driest parts and vessels, for the ovens and kneading-troughs are specified.
This must have been an especially trying judgment to the Egyptians, as frogs were included among
the sacred animals. (Exodus 8:1-15)
•The plague of lice .—The dry land was now smitten by the rod, and very dust seemed turned into
minute noxious insects, so thickly did they swarm on man and beast, or rather “in” them. The
scrupulous cleanliness of the Egyptians would add intolerably to the bodily distress of this plague,
by which also they again incurred religious defilement. As to the species of the vermin, there
seems no reason to disturb the authorized translation of the word. The magicians, who had imitated
by their enchantments the two previous miracles, were now foiled. They struck the ground, as
Aaron did, and repeated their own incantations. but it was without effect. (Exodus 8:16-19)
•The plague of flies .—After the river and the land, the air was smitten, being filled with winged
insects, which swarmed in the houses and devoured the land, but Goshen was exempted from the
plague. The word translated “swarms of flies” most probably denotes the great Egyptian beetle,
Scarabaeus sacer, which is constantly represented in their sculptures. Besides the annoying and
destructive habits of its tribe, it was an object of worship, and thus the Egyptians were again
scourged by their own superstitions. (Exodus 8:20-32)
•The plague of the murrain of beasts .—Still coming closer and closer to the Egyptians, God sent
a disease upon the cattle, which were not only their property but their deities. At the precise time
of which Moses forewarned Pharaoh, all the cattle of the Egyptians were smitten with a murrain
and died, but not one of the cattle of the Israelites suffered. (Exodus 9:1-7)
•The plague of boils—From the cattle the hand of God was extended to the persons of the Egyptians.
Moses and Aaron were commanded to take ashes of the furnace, and to “sprinkle it toward the
heaven in the sight of Pharaoh.” It was to become “small dust” throughout Egypt, and “be a boil
breaking forth [with] blains upon man and upon beast.” (Exodus 9:8-12) This accordingly came
to pass. The plague seems to have been the leprosy, a fearful kind of elephantiasis which was long
remembered as “the botch of Egypt.” (28:27,35)
•The plague of hail .—The account of the seventh plague is preceded by a warning which Moses
was commanded to deliver to Pharaoh, respecting the terrible nature of the plagues that were to
ensue if he remained obstinate. Man and beast were smitten, and the herbs and every tree broken,
save in the land of Goshen. The ruin caused by the hail was evidently far greater than that effected
frankie
(Frankie)
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