Sunday 19 April 2009 Exodus 7:8-25; Exodus 8:16-24
God Visits Egypt (2)
Continued....
What do these plagues do? Firstly, each plague in itself and all the plagues as unity show the gods of Egypt to be impotent.Various writers (but especially John Currid, Exodus and Ancient Egypt and the Old Testament) demonstrate how each plague struck at one of the gods of the Egyptian pantheon, with which the security and prosperity of Egypt was bound up. But even more, Pharaoh was the keeper of divine order in Egypt. He ruled so that ma’at might be maintained.The whole series of plagues indicates his power was insufficient to resist Yahweh’s visitation. Indeed, by the end of the series the nation would have been a shell of its former self. But even then Pharaoh did not repent (cf. Rev. 9:20; 16:9, 11).Secondly, the events from Exodus 8:22 onwards emphasize the separation between God’s people and the rest. Just as in the creation accounts God separates the entities of his handiwork (the light from the darkness; the dry land from the waters; etc.) so through this separation (cf. Ex. 9:4, 6, 26; 10:23; 11:7; 12:13) he brings about the creation of his people as a nation, in accordance with his covenant promises. Thirdly, all the events are that God’s name might be known in the earth (Ex. 7:5, 17; 8:22; 9:14; etc.), thus indicating that God’s glory is goal of all his work. Fourthly, the judgements prepare for the coming of the Passover. Pharaoh cannot be defeated finally by anything other than the spiritual deliverance that Passover is, and which it represents. The god of this age is finally cast out by the Cross, no matter how many works of power Jesus did before hand. These works in Egypt prepare for the Passover, but could never replace it.
The entire series of judgements is presaged by the encounter recorded in Exodus 7:8-13.The story is well known, but the more important element is its spiritual symbolism. The snake was embedded in Pharaoh’s crown (the royal/divine uraeus), as symbol of his rule in the name of Ra, whose divine eye was represented in the rearing cobra.The snake was a symbol for his power and (in wider biblical terms) his patron (Satan). In Exodus 4:3 Moses’ staff became a serpent, but in Exodus 7:9-12 a different word is used.The ‘serpent’ here was not mere snake, but a tanniym elsewhere translated as a monstrous snake/sea monster (e.g. Ps. 74:13; Ezk. 29:3). When Yawheh comes he does not come as one god among many! He is not like any of the gods of Egypt.And when he comes, he destroys the powers on which Pharaoh’s throne rests. This monstrous snake ‘swallowed up’ the others (Ex. 7:12).The vocabulary used here is powerfully poetic, and reflects other Old Testament passages (e.g. Gen 41:7, 24; Ex. 15:12; Numb. 16:30ff.; Ps. 35:25; Ps. 69:15; Jer. 51:34 and Is. 25:8). That the magician’s serpents are ‘swallowed up’ by the serpent-staff of the Divine presence means that they have been brought to judgement and utter defeat. Though Pharaoh refused to acknowledge it, the encounter with Moses and Aaron in his court prophesied his utter and complete annihilation at the hands of Yahweh, this god whom did not want to know.
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