Plagues of Egypt
233
longer.” The answer was, “As soon as I am gone out of the city, I will
spread abroad my hands unto the Lord; and the thunder shall cease,
neither shall there be any more hail; that thou mayest know how that
the earth is the Lord’s. But as for thee and thy servants, I know that ye
will not yet fear the Lord God.”
Moses knew that the contest was not ended. Pharaoh’s confessions
and promises were not the effect of any radical change in his mind
or heart, but were wrung from him by terror and anguish. Moses
promised, however, to grant his request; for he would give him no
occasion for further stubbornness. The prophet went forth, unheeding
the fury of the tempest, and Pharaoh and all his host were witnesses
to the power of Jehovah to preserve His messenger. Having passed
without the city, Moses “spread abroad his hands unto the Lord: and
the thunders and hail ceased, and the rain was not poured upon the
earth.” But no sooner had the king recovered from his fears than his
heart returned to its perversity.
Then the Lord said unto Moses, “Go in unto Pharaoh: for I have
hardened his heart, and the heart of his servants, that I might show
these My signs before him; and that thou mayest tell in the ears of thy
son, and of thy son’s son, what things I have wrought in Egypt, and
My signs which I have done among them; that ye may know how that
I am Jehovah.” The Lord was manifesting His power, to confirm the
faith of Israel in Him as the only true and living God. He would give
unmistakable evidence of the difference He placed between them and
the Egyptians, and would cause all nations to know that the Hebrews,
whom they had despised and oppressed, were under the protection of
the God of heaven.
Moses warned the monarch that if he still remained obstinate, a
plague of locusts would be sent, which would cover the face of the
earth and eat up every green thing that remained; they would fill the
houses, even the palace itself; such a scourge, he said, as “neither thy
fathers, nor thy fathers’ fathers have seen, since the day that they were
upon the earth unto this day.”
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The counselors of Pharaoh stood aghast. The nation had sustained
great loss in the death of their cattle. Many of the people had been
killed by the hail. The forests were broken down and the crops de-
stroyed. They were fast losing all that had been gained by the labor of
the Hebrews. The whole land was threatened with starvation. Princes