Ex. 8: Plagues: Frogs, Gnats and Flies

Chapter 8 reads like this:

The first plague, the bloody river, is followed a week later by the second plague: frogs.

And I'm like, frogs? Seriously? What about tigers or wasps or something? No, rather its something rather innocuous like frogs. But frogs are probably loud. Also, the Word says the frogs were in the palace, the bedrooms, and the bed. In the houses, and on the people. Into the ovens and in the kneading troughs.

These weren't frogs mildly going about their business. These were overly friendly fearless frogs.

Did the magicians do it too? You betcha. They always seem to compound a problem with their "powers." Pharaoh then asks Moses and Aaron to pray to God to remove the frogs, and then he'll let Israel slide. Moses is like, "Fine, it will be your honor." So they prayed to God, and God simply killed the frogs. All the frogs. All the frogs in the houses and ovens died, and were piled into heaps, and rotted away in the sun. Gross dude.

And Pharaoh saw some relief, and was like, "I ain't letting you go." He didn't keep his word.

So then, God doesn't even give Pharaoh a shot to refuse Moses and Aaron again, rather, He has Aaron strike the dust with his staff, and then all the dust in Egypt became gnats. Huge swarms of gnats. Pesky, tiny inhalable gnats all over the people, the cattle, in the food. Gnats. Upon gnats upon gnats. Gnasty.

And get this: The magicians couldn't duplicate this one. Why? Was it that they were not up to that level of power? I doubt it. If they could produce frogs, they could produce gnats. Verse 19 I think has our answer. "This is the finger of God," the magicians tell Pharaoh. God must have been letting them become sure of themselves. Then Pharaoh hardens his heart, and doesn't listen.

God again has them go confront Pharaoh by the river and tell him to let the people go. In verse 22, we see a little deviation. God says that He will deal differently with the land of Goshen, where Israel dwells. They will have no swarms of flies at all. God makes a distinction here. The plague that was upon everyone, will no longer be upon everyone. He is delivering these people.
I figured Israel was spared anyway from the plagues, but apparently they were not. I assume this didn't warm relations between them and Moses. No. Not one bit.

The fly plague cracks Pharaoh a little bit. Not wanting Israel to leave, he offers a sort of cop-out compromise. "You can worship, but you can't leave."

Moses pipes up. "We can't here. Our sacrifices are detestable to Egyptians. Your people will stone us." Moses is not willing to make a deal. He says they must go three days into the wilderness to do as God commands. Pharaoh agrees, and says he will let them go when Moses prays to God to call off the flies. But this is a lie. Pharaoh hardens his heart even though God completely got rid of the flies to the point that not one remained.