Bible History of the Old Testament

No. 37

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Moses and Aaron Deliver Message to Pharaoh

Increased Oppression for Israel

A great trial was soon to come for the Israelites that would measure their strength against the strength of a living God.  This would establish two facts for all ages and to all mankind:

1.  that God was and still is Jehovah, the only true and living God, and that He was and is far above all power of men and of gods

2.  that He was and still is the faithful Covenant-God, who remembers His promises and always keeps them

These are the eternal truths which underlay Israel's deliverance from Egypt, and which still hold true for every person today. 

Israel must have understood these and taught them to their children, because they appear in many passages in the Bible.  Also, they are perfectly suited to our wants and needs today.  They will never change because if they did, God would not be God. 

Accomplished in Two Parts

The narrative between Moses and Pharaoh consisted of two parts:  one preparing all parties concerned for what was to happen; and the other describing the successive "signs" in which Jehovah manifested Himself and His power, and by which He achieved both the deliverance of Israel and His judgments upon Pharaoh and Egypt. 

Moses and Aaron appeared before Pharaoh twice before the plagues actually started.  The first time they just gave him a warning (Exodus 5:1-5); the second time they gave him a warning with both a message and a sign to attest to their mission (Exodus 6:10-13. 

After the second time they were there, it must have been obvious to Pharaoh that their God was much more powerful than his god.  He called his magicians to see if they could equal the power of Aaron and Moses.  They were able to make their rods turn into snakes, but Aaron's rod ate all of their rods.  The inferiority of Pharaoh's god's power was challenged the very second time that Moses and Aaron went before him. 

What happened might have been sufficient enough to sway his heart, had it not already been so hard. 

Between the first and second interviews with Pharaoh, however, important events occurred.  These will briefly be recorded again in their order of occurrence.

List of Events

• Pharaoh had pled ignorance of the true Jehovah, and after the first interview he claimed that their demand was just a pretence to procure a series of holidays for the Israelites. 

• Pharaoh also knew that he would stand to lose a lot of money and labor if he let all these many people leave at the same time.   So he came up with a plan to try to keep them so busy and exhausted that he hoped they wouldn't have time to think about this thing that Moses was talking about.

• They were ordered to make the same amount of bricks that they had normally been making, but straw would no longer be provided for them like it had been before. 

• Of course, there was no way that they could keep up making the same amount of bricks and furnish the straw themselves, so they fell behind.  When this happened, the Egyptians turned against the Israelite taskmasters who had been set over the ordinary workers.  They were told that they would be responsible for making up the excess bricks somehow or they would be severely punished. 

• They went before Pharaoh and tried to explain the situation, hoping that somehow he would understand. 

• When he seemed to mock them and their God, and it looked like there was no way out of this dreary situation, they turned against Moses  and Aaron for getting them into this awful mess to start with. 

A faith which comes only by the hearing of the ear gives way quickly in the face of discouragement. 

Moses' Severe Trial

For Moses, it was probably the hour of his most severe trial.  To human eyes, it looked like he had trusted God and God had just abandoned him; it also must have looked like he had made it worse for the Israelites and now there was no way to turn things around for them so that they could even be in the lousy situation they had been in before all this had happened.

The only thing that Moses knew to do was to fall on his face before God and pray for an answer.  He was not angry, but was asking God why this had happened when he felt like he had done everything that God had told him to do. 

It might be that God was trying to make Egypt look as terrible as possible to the people.  We read in later passages how the heart of the people still yearned for Egypt, even after they had seen and lived through miracle after miracle and tasted the heavenly manna. 

God was doing something both in Israel and in Egypt.  The lower Israel's condition and the more tyrannical Pharaoh's oppression, then the more glorious would be the triumph of Jehovah, and the more complete the destruction of the enemy. 

During this terrible time, Moses asked God one more time about his fitness for the work that lay ahead.  When Satan cannot otherwise oppose, he will try to make us doubt that we were really called to that work in the first place.  He will call before us all our inadequacies and try to get us to quit in that way. 

After Moses cried out to God, the direction he now received from Him applies, in principle to all similar cases.  God told him with a fresh assurance that He would most certainly accomplish His purposes in Exodus 6: 2-8.  He also gave a fuller revelation of His character as Jehovah, with the special promises that it implied.  It also renewed the commission to Moses to undertake the work, accompanied by just the encouragement and assurance that he would need to completely undertake the enormous work that lay ahead of him. 

Describing the Plagues of Egypt

1.  They were miraculous, but not so much so that they were totally unheard of in Egypt.  Each of them had visited the land at some time previously and in some measure.  As God often does, he used ordinary natural events. 

Their 'supernaturalness' consisted of their severity, the successive occurrence, and their coming and going at the word of Moses.  They also occurred during unusual seasons and manners that the people were accustomed to. 

2.  They had a regular arrangement and steady progress.  Really, there were only nine plagues, with the tenth one being the commencement of judgment by Jehovah Himself.  Also, they extended over the whole country. 

The first three had connections with the Nile and soil around it.  It was the object of worship in Egypt, and the people were proud of the river.  The other six were rendered exclusively against the Egyptians, because God had said that He would put a division between the people of Egypt and the Israelites, who were His chosen people. 

The first three plagues showed that Egypt was powerless against them, and the next six proved that Jehovah reigned even in the midst of a heathen land.  Also, the last three plagues were far more terrible than any of the others.  This was to show Pharaoh that there was none other like Jehovah in all the earth, and that He was the one true living God. 

3.  This is in regards to the duration of the plagues and the time interval that was between each.  We know that the first plague lasted seven days.  Taking into account the details that are given in the Bible, it is thought that the first plague might have started about the middle of June.  It is also thought that there was an interval of about 10 months between the first plague and that of the slaying of the firstborn.  There probably would have been a 2 - 3 week interval between each of the plagues, with some probably happening sooner and some later than this average. 

All this time God was dealing with Pharaoh.  God had shown that every thing that Egypt had exalted herself over, He had laid it low. 

In the next text, we will cover each of the plagues more in detail.

For more information from this text, go to the Archives Page on my site    www.cathydeaton.com     There are other articles of interest there also.

This text is taken from the book Bible History Old Testament written by Alfred Edersheim.  This book has been used by permission.