The Plagues
Set as a contest between the imagined
godlike abilities of Pharaoh and the truly Godlike nature of Yahweh, the
biblical plagues are firmly grounded in Near Eastern culture and spoke particularly
to the Egyptians or those familiar with their religion and culture. The plagues
intentionally created a showdown that illustrated the reality of Yahweh’s
delivering power. Yahweh began the plagues by directing Moses to see “what I
will do to Pharaoh” (Exodus 6:1) and ended them by saying that he would get
glory through Pharaoh (Exodus 14:4).
Because it was Pharaoh’s duty to
ensure that social, ecological, and cosmic order was maintained (the order
known as ma’at), the plagues can be seen as a direct challenge to his
primary duty and most necessary ability. Contaminated water, too many frogs,
various insect infestations, disease among humans and animals, storms, loss of
crops, the sun being darkened, and loss of human life are elements of disorder
that touched on every aspect of Egyptian life. These calamites as individual catastrophes
were just the sort of thing that the king was supposed to prevent, but their
arrival in an unrelenting sequence would be seen as nothing short of chaos
triumphing over order. Pharaoh failed both to maintain order and to destroy
Egypt’s enemies—his two main functions. The plagues really represent familiar
elements of the known world, and it is the whole of the known world that seemed
to be rising up against Egypt in a chaotic manner. From a contest between
snakes to the creation and then loss of dry land in the midst of water (clear
creation imagery), Yahweh drew on imagery that spoke specifically to Pharaoh’s inability
to perform divine acts while demonstrating powerfully that Yahweh could. (Kerry
M. Muhlestein, “The Exodus,” in A Bible Reader’s History of the Ancient
World, ed. Kent P. Jackson [Jerusalem Center for Near Eastern Studies,
Brigham Young University, 2016], 120)
