THE FOURTH PLAGUE.
IT must be distinctly kept before our minds, that Jehovah in sending His plagues on Egypt was proving publicly throughout that idolatrous land, and to His people enslaved there, that He, Jehovah, is God alone. The wise men of Pharaoh had indeed owned the finger of a Mighty One in the third plague, but they had not confessed that this Mighty One, this God, was Jehovah. However, these words spoken to Moses at the first were to be verified, “The Egyptians shall know that I am Jehovah.”
It is difficult for us, who dwell in a country where idols are not worshipped, fully to enter into the awful state of the land of Egypt, with its worship of the sun, and of the Nile, of men and beasts, and of reptiles and insects. And perhaps it is still more difficult for us to conceive the terrible state of the world at large in the times of the plagues of Egypt. For some hundreds of years mankind generally had given up God, and had sunk down into idolatry. This world-wide sin happened shortly after the flood, and then it was that God called out Abraham to follow and to worship Him alone. God separated Abraham to Himself, taught him that He was Almighty, and blessed Abraham’s offspring. But now the family of Abraham was dwelling in the land of idols; where they had been for very many years. The little children had grown to be men and women, with idols around them on every side, and with the objects of nature continually worshipped. Could it be otherwise than that they too should be influenced by these things? We know ourselves how frequently when in foreign lands nominal Christians will conform to such customs as bowing before that which is not God, and surely Israel in Egypt was in danger of idolatry. Hence Jehovah, by His plagues, would teach His people how vain are idols, and prove to them that He is God alone.
Did the people of Egypt worship their river, then Jehovah would make their river to become blood. Did they hold as sacred frogs and beetles, then Jehovah would make these miserable gods, and gnats and flies, a torment to them. Moreover, Jehovah would show that by His word these creatures came and went—that they obeyed His bidding.
It will very considerably help you to the understanding of these plagues if you bear in mind the reason of their being sent. There was a deep meaning in them all. Each of them had a peculiar significance to the Egyptians, according to the time of the year when Jehovah sent it upon them, and it seems to us that Jehovah used natural things, such as reptiles and insects, thunder and darkness, with which they were well acquainted, wherewith to plague the Egyptians, in order the more emphatically to prove to them the vanity of their gods and the sin of their religion.
This was not only on account of the Egyptians, nor simply to deliver Israel from Egyptian slavery, but that God’s people should, throughout all their history, remember His hatred of idols, and how He had delivered them from idolatry. We have only to read the Word of God to discover His indignation against idols. The very first commandment expresses this truth— “I am Jehovah, Thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt. Thou shalt have none other gods than Me.” And those who are nominally Christian may do well to ponder the lesson taught Egypt, for idolatry is in the heart of man, and even in our own favored land we see the spirit of idolatry in the feeling that it is easier to worship God with a crucifix or a picture before the eye, and with beautiful music charming the ear, than in spirit and in truth. For what are these things save natural religion? And what is idolatry save natural religion, shaped out into the forms of natural things? The world at large is much nearer the worship of idols than men care to think.
The fourth plague is now before us.
The Lord once more sends a message to Pharaoh. The king was coming to the river.
Probably it was the solemn occasion of cutting open the heads of its channels. He would come, in such case, in the religious pomp which was connected with this event in the continued rising of the water.
It seems very probable that the occasion of Pharaoh’s visit to the Nile was similar to that in this present day, when the great canal of Cairo is opened by the pasha, accompanied by the authorities.
You should know that, as the Nile continues to rise, and the inundation to advance, the various mounds of earth which are raised at the entrance of the canals are cut open to let the welcome water farther inland, and thus fields far away from the Nile itself are covered with water.
This ceremony was the great feast of the ancient year, and we may justly picture Pharaoh, in his glory, upon the morning in question, about to superintend the cutting of the first bank or mound. He is surrounded by his grandees and priests, when suddenly Moses appears, and standing before him, cries aloud, “Thus saith Jehovah: Let My people go, that they may serve Me. Else if thou wilt not let My people go, behold, I will send swarms upon thee.”
Now what these swarms were in ordinary years Pharaoh knew; and what they could become as the miraculous judgment of Jehovah he had good good reason to dread from former experience. Surely he must have quailed under the terrific threat.
Travelers give us a description of the swarms of all kinds of flies which torment them in Egypt at the time of year when the water of the inundation drives these insects from their ordinary resorts into the habitations of man.
We read of these creatures, famished by reason of the advancing water covering their feeding grounds, rushing like hailstorms into houses, and settling in black masses upon the food; and when driven away, in their rage fastening themselves upon lips and eyelids, and tormenting the people almost to madness. Conceive, then, the character of this plague, when swarms upon swarms of these poisonous biting flies filled the houses and covered the narrow strips of earth which remained above the inundation.
These grievous swarms entered Pharaoh’s palace, and the houses of the Egyptians, and into all the land of Egypt. And so enormous were their numbers that they covered the ground, and as they died their masses corrupted the very soil. No courage nor ingenuity could stand before, or drive away, such an army. Jehovah had “hissed for the fly.” This was one of the most terrific of all the plagues.
Not only in mercy to His own people, but also to prove publicly that He alone was Jehovah in the midst of the earth, and thus that the gods of, Egypt were vain, did the Lord draw a line between that part of Egypt dwelt in by Pharaoh’s people and His own. In the land of Goshen there were no swarms at all.
This plague brought Pharaoh once more to humble himself, at least, partially. “Go ye,” Said he to Moses and Aaron, “sacrifice to your God (he did not say to Jehovah) in the land.”
Moses entreated for the removal of the plague, and on the morrow there “remained not one” —a miracle as astonishing as that which had called up the judgment.
Here we observe that Pharaoh wished to compromise the matter. He did not want Israel to go, which was the Lord’s demand, but expressed a willingness that Israel should serve the Lord in the land. But God’s ways are not of this kind.
His people must come clean out of Egypt. Even as now, when a soul is saved, it is delivered from the world and brought to God. No serving of God and mammon will suffice.
Worship of the true God in an idolatrous land would have only been like worshipping another god in the eyes of Egyptians, who frequently added gods to their numerous deities. Sometimes one of the gods of the nations with whom they had been to war. The absolutely distinct nature of Jehovah’s worship from any and every kind of idolatry required separation from Egypt, and to Himself.
The way, too, of Israel’s worship and that of the Egyptians was altogether different. Moses said “Lo, shall we sacrifice the abomination of the Egyptians before their eyes, and will they not stone us?” Israel had one mode of worship, Egypt another. And so is it now. There can be no compromise between the worship of the world and that of Christians. God permits nothing of the kind. Neither can the world have any liking for Christian worship. There is a gulf between the two which is not to be bridged over.
“We will go three days’ journey into the wilderness and sacrifice to Jehovah, our God, as He shall command us,” said Moses. H. F. W.