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Now the real battle of Egypt be–
gan in earncst! Egypt is ca lled " the
gift of the Nile." And for good rea–
son. That longest of the world 's ri v–
ers makes Egypt habitable. Without
the Nile. there would be no Egypt!
Naturally the Nile became an object
of worship to the Egyptians.
lt
sup–
plied life. renewed each year as it
overftowed its banks. deposited the
fertilizer a nd provided the wa ter for
the crops. So the river Nile was the
greatest god in the en tire Egyptia n
pantheon.
By a miracle of vast proportions.
God.
through
Moses a nd Aaron.
turned the entire Nilc River- and a ll
other supplies of wa ter- into BLOOO!
Blood.
Don't pay a ny attention to
well -meaning commentaries that
tell you there was a coincide ntal red
mud slide that just ha ppened to spi ll
into the rive r upstream when Aa ron
touched the wa ter with his rod. This
was a
miracle.
not a mishap! God
says blood- God means blood. After
a ll. who made blood in the first
place? Cou ld not God have a
"blood bank" available with which
to fill the Nile? Or maybe. as He did
much later in changing water into
wine (a much nicer miracle). He just
changed
the water into blood. No
sma ll miracle. granted - but real
nonetheless.
The fish died. the river stank a nd
was no t potable. The most revered
god o f Egypt had been made to stink
and become evi l to its worshipers.
lmpressive!
Devastating National Dlsasters
Th is was not just a jug of H20 . but
the entire water supply ! One god
down. many ye t to go. But Pharaoh
was predictably ha rdhearted . His
sorcerers turned a pint of water into
blood a lso. and that was enough for
Pharaoh. "... He wouldn't liste n to
Moses and Aaron. just as the Lord
had predicted. and he returned to
his palace.
unimpressed"!
(Ex.
7:22-
23.)
Now it has always seemed to
me tha t it wou ld have been much
more practica! and impressive if
Ph a raoh 's boys had turned the
blood back to water to prove its im–
potence instead o f adding to the
plague. But that's no t the way Egyp–
tians thought in those days.
The power of that awesome first
plague had a good effect on Moses
The
PLAIN TRUTH April 1977
and he began to pursue his job more
willingly, began to become th c
Moses we all remember. Over a
period of about a year. God.
through
Moses a nd Aaron. punished
that great nation Egypt with such
devastating miracles that it looked
worse than Germany after World
Wa r
11.
In fact. it ceased to function
as a na tion for more than a genera–
tion!
All the gods Egypt worshiped
were turned into deadly enemies.
fearsome plagues. Frogs. fties.
beet les. bugs and !ice-a great list of
gods!- became in their turn hideous
national disasters. Most of the catt le
they worshiped died of a mys terious
disease wh ile the livestock of the
Israe l ites remained hea lt hy. An
unpreceden ted lightning storm com–
p lete with hundred-pound ha il–
s tones destroyed tree s. crops .
bui ldings and killed many inhabi–
tants. What the hail left was de–
stroyed by a later plague of locusts.
No crops in Egypt a t a ll tha t year!
Fo r three days God turned out a ll
the lights of heaven with a darkness
so thick no one could move. The
su n. the moon. the stars. all so
avidly worshiped by the Egyptians.
were all turned off like you might
turn off a light switch.
T he gods Egypt trusted in were
no t only no help to them. but they
became fright e nin g to rme ntors
causing pa in, dea th and destruction .
The great God
YHVH
showed who
was the rea l God by turning the
things they worshiped into tools of
evil and death.
All of Pharaoh's priests and
sorcerers admi tted defea t a nd beg–
ged Pharaoh to Jet Moses have his
way. The whole populace in panic–
st ricken terror besought their king
to let Israel go. All the treasures of
Egypt were pressed on the Israelites
in eager desire to have them gone.
Egypt lay in shambles. But Pharaoh
stubbornly resisted his advisers. his
people. Moses. Aaron and Goo un–
ti! h is own son died with a ll the rest
of the firstborn of Egypt. T hat was
the straw tha t broke the Pha raoh's
back!
The sord id slaves of Egypt led by
a jubi la nt Moses ·left shattered
Egypt in triumph. " Exodus" entered
th e languages of the world with all
its meaning. and remains with us to
this day. ("Exodus" is a later Greek
word meaning "exit" or "leaving.")
In that epic miracle of the cross–
ing of the Red Sea. God crushed the
last remaining vestige of Egyptian
power: her Pharaoh a nd a ll his ar–
mies drowned. Egypt was no thing:
no crops. few houses. sick people.
gold, silver a nd a ll treasures gone
with the lsraeli tes. no Pharaoh. no
a rmy. no government- no Egypt!
Moses' Troubles With the
People In Slnai
Yet in the face of this overwhelming
evidence o f power from heaven exe–
cu ted through Moses fo r the benefit
o f Israel , grumbling. griping. com–
pla ining a nd rebellion were the
milestones of the trek through
Sinai-and Moses took the brunt of
it a ll. Moses they could
see.
It was
through Moses
that God had done
a ll these miracles. And when there
were any problems it was Moses
who faced the public rage: Moses
who got the blame.
" Moses brought us ou t of Egypt."
they complained. "to die in the
desert !" They couldn't see God,
only Moses. " Moses' plagues,"
" Moses' exodus." and when God
Himself spoke
His
law to the whole
nation with His own voice they
called it " the law o f Moses"- and
people make that same mis take to
thi s very day! (We' ll get to the de-
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