7:1 VA YOMER YHVH EL MOSHEH RE'EH NETATICHA ELOHIM LE PHAR'OH VE AHARON ACHIYCHA YIHEYEH NEVI'ECHA
וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוָה אֶל מֹשֶׁה רְאֵה נְתַתִּיךָ אֱלֹהִים לְפַרְעֹה וְאַהֲרֹן אָחִיךָ יִהְיֶה נְבִיאֶךָ
KJ (King James translation): And the LORD said unto
Moses, See, I have made thee a god to Pharaoh: and Aaron thy brother shall be
thy prophet.
BN (BibleNet translation): Then YHVH said to Mosheh: "See, I have set you in the place of Elohim before Pharaoh; and Aharon your brother shall be your Prophet...
BN (BibleNet translation): Then YHVH said to Mosheh: "See, I have set you in the place of Elohim before Pharaoh; and Aharon your brother shall be your Prophet...
One question: we have wondered whether Av-Raham and co were gods in human form, tribal sheikhs, sacred kings, or what exactly. Does this verse illuminate?
What is significant here, beyond the above, is the last statement: Aharon has higher authority than Mosheh. Aharon is the shamanistic priest. This statement will matter when we get to Sinai and build a Golden Calf. Traditionally Jewish commentary plays down Aharon's role, and plays up Mosheh's. Let us not make the same mistake.
But there is, out of the above, one residual question. YHVH sets up Mosheh "in the place of Elohim"; is this a crude method of synthesising two texts, each with a different name for the same deity, as we have described many times previously in these commentaries; or is YHVH in fact the Jove of a pantheon, and the concept of Elohim, and perhaps also of Ha Elohim, his way of describing his fellow-gods in this still pre-monotheistic era? The answer to that question issues a further challenge to the J-E hypothesis.
7:2 ATAH TEDABER ET KOL ASHER ATSAVECHA VE AHARON ACHIYCHA YEDABER EL PAR'OH VE SHILACH ET BENEY YISRA-EL ME ARTSO
אַתָּה תְדַבֵּר אֵת כָּל אֲשֶׁר אֲצַוֶּךָּ וְאַהֲרֹן אָחִיךָ יְדַבֵּר אֶל פַּרְעֹה וְשִׁלַּח אֶת בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל מֵאַרְצוֹ
KJ: Thou shalt speak all
that I command thee: and Aaron thy brother shall speak unto Pharaoh, that he
send the children of Israel out of his land.
This seems confused. You shall speak it, but Aharon shall speak it to Pharaoh. You, "in the place of Elohim", shall command it, but Aharon, as Prophet, will announce it. We are using the root verb DAVAR, with so many meanings, beyond the plain "to speak"; and in the intensive, Pi'el, form, so perhaps it is intended here as "communicate". You, as sacred king, shall desire it, but Aharon, as Prophet, will put the desire into words? Or, you will share with the people but Aharaon with Pharaoh? Or even, the former as an act of politics; the latter as an act of poetry?
7:3 VA ANI AKSHEH ET LEV PAR'OH VE HIRBEYTI ET OTOTAI VE ET MOPHTAI BE ERETS MITSRAYIM
וַאֲנִי אַקְשֶׁה אֶת לֵב פַּרְעֹה וְהִרְבֵּיתִי אֶת אֹתֹתַי וְאֶת מוֹפְתַי בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם
KJ: And I will harden
Pharaoh's heart, and multiply my signs and my wonders in the land of Egypt.
VA ANI: So a ritual process is established, and Mosheh knows it before it begins: petitions, agreements, retreats, plagues, further agreements, further retreats, further plagues, and eventually the joyful departure on pilgrimage, like Chaucer's Tabardists setting off from Southwark, and all the Miracle and Mystery Play-watchers who cannot accompany them dropping their coins in the collection plate as they set off (Exodus 12:35). This is not history unfolding, but a pre-scripted religious ritual being acted out. And presumably Pharaoh has his copy of the script as well, and has been rehearsing. The name of the play is "Ha Pesach, The Passover", and it has probably been an annual event in the Egyptian world for centuries.
LEV PHAROH: Given the way that LEV is used elsewhere (eg in the SHEMA), should we read this differently? The LEV is the seat of thought, which was regarded as subjective and not empirical; so hardening his heart is what we today would consider becoming more "intellectually adamant", which is to say pig-headed.
7:4 VE LO YISHMA AL'ECHEM PAR'OH VE NATATI ET YADI BE MITSRAYIM VE HOTSE'TI ET TSIV'OTAY ET AMI VENEY YISRA-EL ME ERETS MITSRAYIM BISHPHATIM GEDOLIM
וְלֹא יִשְׁמַע אֲלֵכֶם פַּרְעֹה וְנָתַתִּי אֶת יָדִי בְּמִצְרָיִם וְהוֹצֵאתִי אֶת צִבְאֹתַי אֶת עַמִּי בְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם בִּשְׁפָטִים גְּדֹלִים
KJ: But Pharaoh shall not
hearken unto you, that I may lay my hand upon Egypt, and bring forth mine
armies, and my people the
children of Israel, out of the land of Egypt by great judgments.
BISHPATIM: It is partly this word SHOPHTIM, which means "judgements" but is being used rather differently here - see my note to Exodus 6:6 - which makes this dubious as historical narrative, and partly the word TSIVOTAY, for which see my closing comment at Exodus 6:26: it would be nice to believe in all this as a historical narrative, but none of it adds up. The naming of the people as BENEY YISRA-EL or HABIRU is also significant. This reads increasingly like a cosmological story, a liturgical allegory to describe the passage of the constellations from one star sign to another, just as we saw the passage from Taurus to Aries in the Kayin-Shet story (Genesis 4). We know from Ya'akov's blessings in Genesis 49 that the BENEY YISRA-EL are a zodiacal confederation, equivalent to the Greek amphictyony; we know that ADONAY TSEVA'OT, as one of the names of the deity, refers to his role as the sun surrounded by his twelve "angels", who are again the zodiac - and we are familiar with the various mythological allegories which depict it, including Ya'akov and Yishma-El with their twelve sons, Jesus and his twelve disciples, Arthur and his twelve Round Table knights, Robin Hood with his Merry Men etc. Now YHVH has appointed a Prophet, whose role is always cosmological, and we will see shortly the introduction of conventional cosmological language (including OTOTAI, MOPHTAI AND SHOPHTIM), which will then lead to the 10 plagues (or were they really 7 or 12?) etc; and then, given that all of this is tied in to the Pesach rituals, which is the Egyptian spring equivalent of the Aztec/Mexican Day of the Dead, an early version of the Akeda of Christ at Easter, are we witnessing liturgically the cosmological narrative of the descent of Osher (Osiris) into the Underworld: Mosheh as David, Pharaoh as Sha'ul, Aharon as Samuel?
And then add it to the meteor showers that take place every year in the constellation Lyra, King David's star as well as Orpheus' and Arthur's (click here), and which the ancients watched closely because they always provided a cosmic "sign" of the end of Winter and the arrival of the Spring: are the "Ten Plagues" a poetical account of the meteors, in the same way that Ya'akov's "ladder" at Beit-El is a poetical account of the Milky Way? Quite probably.
7:5 VA YADU MITSRAYIM KI ANI YHVH BINTOTI ET YADI AL MITSRAYIM VE HOTSE'TI ET BENEY YISRA-EL MITOCHAM
וְיָדְעוּ מִצְרַיִם כִּי אֲנִי יְהוָה בִּנְטֹתִי אֶת יָדִי עַל-מִצְרָיִם וְהוֹצֵאתִי אֶת בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל מִתּוֹכָם
KJ: And the Egyptians
shall know that I am the LORD, when I
stretch forth mine hand upon Egypt, and bring out the children of Israel from
among them.
7:6 VA YA'AS MOSHEH VE AHARON KA ASHER TSIVAH YHVH OTAM KEN ASU
וַיַּעַשׂ מֹשֶׁה וְאַהֲרֹן כַּאֲשֶׁר צִוָּה יְהוָה אֹתָם כֵּן עָשׂוּ
KJ: And Moses and Aaron
did as the LORD commanded them, so did they.
7:7 U MOSHEH BEN SHEMONIM SHANAH VE AHARON BEN SHALOSH U SHEMONIM SHANAH BE DABRAM EL PAR'OH
וּמֹשֶׁה בֶּן שְׁמֹנִים שָׁנָה וְאַהֲרֹן בֶּן שָׁלֹשׁ וּשְׁמֹנִים שָׁנָה בְּדַבְּרָם אֶל פַּרְעֹה
KJ: And Moses was fourscore years old, and Aaron fourscore and three years
old, when they spake unto Pharaoh.
Wisdom and age are deemed to go hand in hand, which is why the word for a wise old man in Yehudit (Zaken - זקן) is also the same as the word for a beard. Age is always a problem in this text, because they clearly did not count by solar months the way we do. Mosheh was still a young man when he killed the overseer and fled to Midyan; he appears to have married fairly soon afterwards, and seen the burning bush not long after that. Yet suddenly he is fifty years older. Possibly because there are different versions?
AHARON: And Aharon is three years older, which, based on Exodus 1, should not be sufficiently older to have avoided the killing of the male Habiru children. And yet he managed to survive.
pey break
7:8 VA YOMER YHVH EL MOSHEH VE EL AHARON LEMOR
וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוָה אֶל מֹשֶׁה וְאֶל אַהֲרֹן לֵאמֹר
KJ: And the LORD spake
unto Moses and unto Aaron, saying,
7:9 KI YEDABER AL'ECHEM PAR'OH LEMOR TENU LACHEM MOPHET VE AMARTA EL AHARON KACH ET MAT'CHA VE HASHLECH LIPHNEY PHAR'OH YEHI LE TANIN
כִּי יְדַבֵּר אֲלֵכֶם פַּרְעֹה לֵאמֹר תְּנוּ לָכֶם מוֹפֵת וְאָמַרְתָּ אֶל אַהֲרֹן קַח אֶת מַטְּךָ וְהַשְׁלֵךְ לִפְנֵי פַרְעֹה יְהִי לְתַנִּין
KJ: When Pharaoh shall
speak unto you, saying, Shew a miracle for you: then thou shalt say unto Aaron,
Take thy rod, and cast it before Pharaoh, and it shall become a serpent.
MOPHET: Probably from the root YAPHAH, which means "beautiful", so this is less a "miracle", which comes from beyond the human realm, than a "wonder", which humans are capable of conjuring. The word is, however, mostly used for wondrous deeds performed by the deity (in Yisra-Eli theology, all deeds are performed by the deity, including those conjured by humans); cf Psalm 78:43 and 105:5 and 27, all of which use both OT and MOPHET, enabling us to see that distinction (see below for more on OT).
In the first version of this, Mosheh throws down the staff and it turns into a serpent (NACHASH - 4:3). On this occasion it is Aharon, and afterwards will mostly remain Aharon, and his definitely becomes a TANIN, not a NACHASH. Mosheh will later have Nechushtan, his serpent banner; the rod will become famous as Aaron's Rod. There are clearly two versions, and perhaps the line about Mosheh in place of Elohim and Aharon as his Prophet is just a way of trying (but failing) to clear up this confusion.
TANIN: And no, TANIN really is not "a serpent", it's a crocodile; and originally it probably wasn't a crocodile either, but a sea monster (Job 7:12), though not Lev-Yatan (Leviathan - Isaiah 27:1), a figuration of Tahamat, a primordial dragon (Deuteronomy 32:33, Jeremiah 51:34) - for all of which, see the commentaries to Genesis 1. If it became "a serpent" in later Yehudit, it was probably because the Beney Yisra-El had never encountered crocodiles, which live in the Nile, but are not seen anywhere else in the Middle East. The Egyptians worshipped the crocodile as a deity, named Sobek, and he was very much a fertility god. So having Aharon's rod turn into Sobek as the first of the Pesach rituals makes sense; this, after all, is the festival of the new-born Spring, when fertility returns to the Earth, and in the case of Egypt, fertility returns with the flood-waters of the Nile, replete wih crocodiles.
But the Tanin becomes a serpent in the later Yisra-Eli mythology, which uses the Egyptian for its starting-point, but superimposes its own theology. In Genesis 1 the first OT ("sign", and note that in the first Creation myth the stars are created specifically to serve as OTOT) is the creation by magic (the abracadabra of "Let there be") of the divine "serpent", the Tanin. See my notes to the TANIN, elsewhere but don't forget the state of the cosmos before Creation. It was ruled by TEHOM/TAHAMAT, the divine "serpent", the celestial Tanin. So, as we follow through the cosmological possibilities for understanding this story; yes, this first one is the one we would expect: the Ophic serpent (sometimes called the Orphic serpent), birfucated (cell division) to establish the biological methodology of the cosmos. See also my notes on the serpent, under Nachash, with its connections to Nechushtan, Mosheh's banner later on.
7:10 VA YAVO MOSHEH VE AHARON EL PAR'OH VA YA'ASU CHEN KA ASHER TSIVAH YHVH VA YASHLECH AHARON ET MAT'EHU LIPHNEY PHAR'OH VE LIPHNEY AVADAV VA YEHI LE TANIN
וַיָּבֹא מֹשֶׁה וְאַהֲרֹן אֶל פַּרְעֹה וַיַּעֲשׂוּ כֵן כַּאֲשֶׁר צִוָּה יְהוָה וַיַּשְׁלֵךְ אַהֲרֹן אֶת מַטֵּהוּ לִפְנֵי פַרְעֹה וְלִפְנֵי עֲבָדָיו וַיְהִי לְתַנִּין
KJ: And Moses and Aaron
went in unto Pharaoh, and they did so as the LORD had commanded: and Aaron cast
down his rod before Pharaoh, and before his servants, and it became a serpent.
Again, we have to wonder where this story originates. The impression is that it was iconographic: the attempt to read an ancient drawing or pattern of not-understood hieroglyphs: figure 1 showing some priestly figure with his staff of office, the traditional Caduceus Pole; figure 2 showing the Caduceus Pole lying on the ground, with serpents visible. It is just as likely to have been Yoseph as Aharon in the picture; and as sacred kings, Mosheh and the Pharaoh are interchangeable, either as the young Osher (Osiris) or the older Horus.
7:11 VA YIKRA GAM PAR'OH LA CHACHAMIM VE LA MECHASHPIM VA YA'ASU GAM HEM CHARTUMEY MITSRAYIM BE LAHATEYHEM KEN
וַיִּקְרָא גַּם פַּרְעֹה לַחֲכָמִים וְלַמְכַשְּׁפִים וַיַּעֲשׂוּ גַם הֵם חַרְטֻמֵּי מִצְרַיִם בְּלַהֲטֵיהֶם כֵּן
KJ: Then Pharaoh also
called the wise men and the sorcerers: now the magicians of Egypt, they also
did in like manner with their enchantments.
If it was intended to prove YHVH's might, then it failed. And YHVH would have known it would fail, because whatever the trick was, it was easy. So we have to read it differently. The place to go for an answer is the Arthurian legends, where we see the serpents themselves in battle, white dragon versus red dragon (though be warned; most explanations start with Geoffrey of Monmouth, who reduced the Celtic god-lore to pseudo-history in the same way that Ezra did in the Tanach).
LAHATEYHEM: The root means "a flame" and the verb is used for "burning" (Joel 1:19 and 2:3, Psalm 83:15 and 106:18), which leaves me wondering what else was going on in this ritual - had a serpent-mould been formed, in some sort of staff-shaped wooden casing, and then liquid gold or silver thrown in, and the whole thing set into the fire? The mould will burn, but the element will harden, and the "scientists" have now demonstrated to Pharaoh that the new smithing technique brought from Midyan by Mosheh is no better than the one they have been using for centuries in Mitsrayim. I merely speculate.
7:12 VA YASHLIYCHU ISH MAT'EHU VA YIHEYU LE TANIYNIM VA YIVLA MATEH AHARON ET MATOTAM
וַיַּשְׁלִיכוּ אִישׁ מַטֵּהוּ וַיִּהְיוּ לְתַנִּינִם וַיִּבְלַע מַטֵּה אַהֲרֹן אֶת-מַטֹּתָם
KJ: For they cast down
every man his rod, and they became serpents: but Aaron's rod swallowed up their
rods.
Is this not the same as saying "Aharon's serpents swallowed up their serpents"? So the "magic" of Mitsrayim here repeats that of the Yoseph story; here the serpents eat the serpents, there the cattle ate the cattle. Self-evidently we are in the realm of cultic ritual and mythology.
7:13 VA YECHEZAK LEV PAR'OH VE LO SHAMA AL'EHEM KA ASHER DIBER YHVH
וַיֶּחֱזַק לֵב פַּרְעֹה וְלֹא שָׁמַע אֲלֵהֶם כַּאֲשֶׁר דִּבֶּר יְהוָה
KJ: And he hardened
Pharaoh's heart, that he hearkened not unto them; as the LORD had said.
7:14 VA YOMER YHVH EL MOSHEH KAVED LEV PAR'OH ME'EN LESHALACH HA AM
וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוָה אֶל מֹשֶׁה כָּבֵד לֵב פַּרְעֹה מֵאֵן לְשַׁלַּח הָעָם
KJ: And the LORD said unto
Moses, Pharaoh's heart is hardened, he
refuseth to let the people go.
BN: Then YHVH said to Mosheh: "Pharaoh's heart is stubborn; he refuses to let the people go...
BN: Then YHVH said to Mosheh: "Pharaoh's heart is stubborn; he refuses to let the people go...
This is problematic both as literature and as theology. YHVH as Creator and ruler of the world, omniscient and omnipotent, is in control of all things, including the condition of the heart of Pharaoh, and he has told Mosheh that he intends to harden it, by having Mosheh and Aharon behave in a manner that will induce it. So YHVH now moaning to Mosheh that Pharaoh's heart is hard is difficult to sympathise with, and leads us to ask: why is he doing this? Is the intention to test out Mosheh and Aharon's resolve and faith and commitment? If so, foolhardy, at least in Mosheh's case, given that he was reluctant to do this in the first place. If, on the other hand, we read this through the lens of Yesha-Yahu (Isaiah), all events in the world are explained retroactively as being acts of the deity, and what we in fact have is Mosheh and Aharon acting on their own initiative, and attributing their failure to YHVH afterwards, a necessary theological preliminary to the giving of the Law, because once the Law is given no one ever needs act on their own initiative again.
7:15 LECH EL PAR'OH BA BOKER HINEH YOTS'E HA MAYEMAH VE NITSAVTA LIKRATO AL SEPHAT HA YE'OR VE HA MATEH ASHER NEH'PACH LE NACHASH TIKACH BE YADCHA
לֵךְ אֶל פַּרְעֹה בַּבֹּקֶר הִנֵּה יֹצֵא הַמַּיְמָה וְנִצַּבְתָּ לִקְרָאתוֹ עַל שְׂפַת הַיְאֹר וְהַמַּטֶּה אֲשֶׁר נֶהְפַּךְ לְנָחָשׁ תִּקַּח בְּיָדֶךָ
KJ: Get thee unto Pharaoh
in the morning; lo, he goeth out unto the water; and thou shalt stand by the
river's brink against he come; and the rod which was turned to a serpent shalt
thou take in thine hand.
Mosheh appears to be little more than a puppet of YHVH in this, to the degree that we can imagine the redactor taking a story of Mosheh as god, and reducing it to this in order to make Mosheh human and give YHVH a role; or not Mosheh as god, but whoever the original of Mosheh was; presumably Osher (Osiris).
Mosheh has already rehearsed these first two "wonders" - the serpent at Exodus 4:3, the turning of the waters into blood at 4:9.
Given the levels of security adopted by most rulers since time immemorial, it is hard to imagine anyone but a prince of the royal family being able to just wander down to the river at the time that Pharaoh bathes, and confront him with a snake. Would the royal bodyguards not cut down such a man without bothering to ask questions?
And why is he going there anyway? Pharaonic gym-swimming, for his physical fitness? I would suggest, much more likely, that he is heading for the mikveh, because he too has a sacred role in all this Pesach ritual.
7:16 VA AMARTA ELAV YHVH ELOHEY HA IVRIM SHELACHANI ELEYCHA LEMOR SHALACH ET AMI VE YA'AVDUNI BA MIDBAR VE HINEH LO SHAMA'TA AD KOH
וְאָמַרְתָּ אֵלָיו יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵי הָעִבְרִים שְׁלָחַנִי אֵלֶיךָ לֵאמֹר שַׁלַּח אֶת עַמִּי וְיַעַבְדֻנִי בַּמִּדְבָּר וְהִנֵּה לֹא שָׁמַעְתָּ עַד כֹּה
KJ: And thou shalt say
unto him, The LORD God of the Hebrews hath sent me unto thee, saying, Let my
people go, that they may serve me in the wilderness: and, behold, hitherto thou
wouldest not hear.
The sentence is clearly left unfinished. Note that YHVH has instructed both Mosheh and Aharon to be present, yet he gives his instructions only to one of them (VE AMARTA rather than VE AMARTEM). Who speaks then, Mosheh or Aharon?
The 3-day feast again, not the flight to Kena'an. Multiple stories, continuously mixed-up.
7:17 KOH AMAR YHVH BE ZOT TEDA KI ANI YHVH HINEH ANOCHI MAKEH BA MATEH ASHER BE YADI AL HA MAYIM ASHER BA YE'OR VE NEHEPHCHU LE DAM
כֹּה אָמַר יְהוָה בְּזֹאת תֵּדַע כִּי אֲנִי יְהוָה הִנֵּה אָנֹכִי מַכֶּה בַּמַּטֶּה אֲשֶׁר בְּיָדִי עַל הַמַּיִם אֲשֶׁר בַּיְאֹר וְנֶהֶפְכוּ לְדָם
KJ: Thus saith the LORD,
In this thou shalt know that I am the LORD:
behold, I will smite with the rod that is in mine hand
upon the waters which are in the river,
and they shall be turned to blood.
After the creation of the serpents, who symbolise cell division through their bifurcation when the world is brought into being, the transformation of water into blood (Jesus will do something of the same order, but in reduced eucharist, at Cana): blood being the source of life without which no creature in the universe can come into being, and YHVH's most treasured creation, as we know from the laws of Kashrut. Logic thus far tells us we are witnessing an Egyptian Creation myth (Spring as the annual re-creation of the world) - and incidentally the Egyptian gods Ptah and Khnum were believed by the Egyptians to be the creators of all things. Let us see if it continues to pan out that way; and if not...
7:18 VE HA DAGAH ASHER BA YE'OR TAMUT U VA'ASH HA YE'OR VE NIL'U MITSRAYIM LISHTOT MAYIM MIN HA YE'OR
וְהַדָּגָה אֲשֶׁר בַּיְאֹר תָּמוּת וּבָאַשׁ הַיְאֹר וְנִלְאוּ מִצְרַיִם לִשְׁתּוֹת מַיִם מִן הַיְאֹר
KJ: And the fish that is in the river shall die, and the river shall stink; and the
Egyptians shall lothe to drink of the water of the river.
HA DAGAH: Meaning the regular fish that live in the river, or perhaps the Taninim again, who will be destroyed by the act of Creation, as in the Ophic and other versions we witnessed in Genesis 1? The latter is more likely, because grammatically the regular fish should be given as HA DAGIM...YAMUTU (הדגים...ימוטו), where this is not only singular, but feminine singular. The problem throughout this text is the assumption that the "waters" mean the river Nile, but the word used is YE'OR (יאר), which could just as easily mean the primal ocean of Creation.
There is an Egyptian myth which is the equivalent of Tahamat. During his daily journey across the sky (click here), the sun god Ra (or Re) would be confronted by an enemy serpent who he had to defeat with the aid of the god Set. This battle with the "dragon" is located at Bakhu, the mountainous western support of Heaven where the sun sets. Sometimes the serpent is called Apep or Apopis; he threatens to devour the solar boat in the seventh and twelfth hours of night and thereby destroy the created order, returning the world to a state of chaos. He is portrayed as an evil god, the deification of darkness and chaos (Isfet in Egyptian), and thus the opponent of light and Ma'at (order/truth). This clearly makes a parallel with the Tahamat myth and with the first version of Creation in Genesis 1 (this also helps us get back beyond Geoffrey of Monmouth's bowdlerisation of the Arthurian version! see my notes at verse 11).
VE NILU: And clearly we are meant to hear the word NILE.
The root of NILU in the Yehudit is obscure. There is no root NALA (נִלְא). With an Aleph (א) there is ELAH, which goes with ELON to make various species of oak-tree - but this doesn't help us. With a Hey (ה) there is HALAH = "to remove", but this doesn't help either. There is no root with a Yud (י), and no other letter provides a form where the initial would be dropped in this manner. So where does the word come from, and why is it translated to mean "loath"? Other versions offer "will be unable to" and even (Chabad.org) "will weary [in their efforts]", based on Rashi, who isn't often baffled, but who quotes Targum Jonathan, which gives "the Egyptians [will become weary trying to seek a remedy for the waters of the Nile so that it would be fit to drink]", an incomplete translation which suggests that Jonathan was baffled too. TheBibleNet suggestion is that the scribe was trying to establish an aetiology, somewhat pejorative, for the Nile itself, and effectively neologised the verb LINLO'A.
The word "Nile" in fact comes from the Greek Neilos (Νεῖλος), which probably means "valley", but there is no clear Greek etymology for this either; most likely the Greeks simply adopted an already existing word and then used it in other contexts. It is not Coptic - they call the river Piaro in Sahidic, or Hiaro in Bohairic. The hieroglyph for the river Nile is:
which is pronounced ITERU and means "waters".
How then should we translate NILU and the phrase as a whole? If we are witnessing a Creation myth, then we should read it as:
BN (Egyptian mythology translation): "And the great sea-monster Apep shall die, and the primal ocean shall run with his blood, and the Egyptians will be unable to drink the water in the primal ocean."
samech break
7:19 VA YOMER YHVH EL MOSHEH EMOR EL AHARON KACH MAT'CHA U NETEH YADCHA AL MEYMEY MITSRAYIM AL NAHAROTAM AL YE'OREYHEM VE AL AGMEYHEM VE AL KOL MIKVEH MEYMEYHU VA YEHIYU DAM VE HAYU DAM BE CHOL ERETS MITSRAYIM U VA ETSIM U VA AVANIM
וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוָה אֶל מֹשֶׁה אֱמֹר אֶל אַהֲרֹן קַח מַטְּךָ וּנְטֵה יָדְךָ עַל מֵימֵי מִצְרַיִם עַל נַהֲרֹתָם עַל יְאֹרֵיהֶם וְעַל אַגְמֵיהֶם וְעַל כָּל מִקְוֵה מֵימֵיהֶם וְיִהְיוּ דָם וְהָיָה דָם בְּכָל אֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם וּבָעֵצִים וּבָאֲבָנִים
KJ: And the LORD spake
unto Moses, Say unto Aaron, Take thy rod, and stretch out thine hand upon the
waters of Egypt, upon their streams, upon their rivers, and upon their ponds,
and upon all their pools of water, that they may become blood; and that there may be blood throughout all the land of Egypt, both
in vessels of wood, and in vessels of stone.
If this were the action of a deity in the heavens, what Aharaon is being asked to do might be viable; but without making a very long journey, he cannot achieve this while standing in one single place, unless metaphorically, allegorically - liturgically.
Robert Graves and Joseph Campbell both tend to the view that the story was originally written down in hieroglyphs, but that the later Yisra-Elite editors didn't understand hieroglyphs, so they interpreted them semiotically. To get the proper story we would need to reconstruct the hieroglyphs and then try to interpret them correctly – it isn't actually very difficult to do; but it is likely to yield a very different tale from the one in Exodus.
Robert Graves and Joseph Campbell both tend to the view that the story was originally written down in hieroglyphs, but that the later Yisra-Elite editors didn't understand hieroglyphs, so they interpreted them semiotically. To get the proper story we would need to reconstruct the hieroglyphs and then try to interpret them correctly – it isn't actually very difficult to do; but it is likely to yield a very different tale from the one in Exodus.
EMOR: Unusual grammar.
MEYMEY: Throughout this verse vocabulary is used which parallels the Genesis Creation myth. A distinction has already been made between MAYIM (MEYMEY here in the genitive - מֵימֵי) and YE'OR (יאר) - essentially the MAYIM are the elemental water of the heavens, where the YE'OR is the physical water on the Earth. Now a further distinction will be made: NAHAROTAM (נַהֲרֹתָם) are the rivers; YE'OREYHEM (יְאֹרֵיהֶם), which are usually translated as "streams", but could mean "tributaries", though we have seen that it also seems to have the meaning of "primal ocean"; AGMEYHEM (אַגְמֵיהֶם) is used in Isaiah 35:7 and 42:15, as well as Psalm 107:35, to mean "pools of water", but in every case these refer to hot springs, AGAM (אגם) meaning "hot". MIKVEY (מִקְוֵה) is translated here as "pools of water", because in Rabbinic times the custom of purification in a pool of water became normative; but MIKVEH in Genesis 1 is the separation of the waters above the RAKIYA (רקיע) from those below it - we would call it "the Earth's atmosphere".
MITSRAYIM: This word has probably been added by the Redactor, in order to localise the story, and thereby to impute to Mosheh a universal Egyptian myth of Creation.
KACH MAT'CHA: Can therefore be read, quite literally, as the act of waving a magic wand, a rather more comprehensible version of the act of Creation than the abstract linguistic "Let there be...".
A better reading of this would therefore be:
BN (Egyptian mythology translation): "And YHVH said to Mosheh: "Tell Aharon: Take your sceptre, and stretch your hand out over the elemental waters, over the waters on the Earth and the waters above the firmament that divides Earth from Heaven, and over the waters that gush up from beneath the Earth, that they may fill with the blood of the defeated serpent Apep; and there shall be blood throughout all of creation, in vegetation and in minerals as in all things."
Aharon, in this instance, being, of course, Haroun, which is to say Hor (Horus), while Mosheh stands in for Ra.
7:20 VA YA'ASU CHEN MOSHEH VE AHARON KA ASHER TSIVAH YHVH VA YAREM BA MATEH VA YACH ET HA MAYIM ASHER BA YE'OR LE EYNEY PHAR'OH U LE EYNEY AVADAV VA YEHAPHCHU KOL HA MAYIM ASHER BA YE'OR LE DAM
וַיַּעֲשׂוּ כֵן מֹשֶׁה וְאַהֲרֹן כַּאֲשֶׁר צִוָּה יְהוָה וַיָּרֶם בַּמַּטֶּה וַיַּךְ אֶת הַמַּיִם אֲשֶׁר בַּיְאֹר לְעֵינֵי פַרְעֹה וּלְעֵינֵי עֲבָדָיו וַיֵּהָפְכוּ כָּל הַמַּיִם אֲשֶׁר בַּיְאֹר לְדָם
KJ: And Moses and Aaron
did so, as the LORD commanded; and he lifted up the rod, and smote the waters
that were in the river, in
the sight of Pharaoh, and in the sight of his servants; and all the waters that were in the river were turned to blood.
BN: And Mosheh and Aharon did so, as YHVH instructed them; and he lifted up the sceptre, and struck the waters that were in the river, in the sight of Pharaoh, and in the sight of his servants; and all the waters that were in the river were turned to blood.
I leave it to my reader to retranslate this based on the notes above. But to assist you: First the bifurcated serpent, engendering cell-division, enabling the primal egg to hatch. Then the establishment of the elements, the E of the Cosmos. Now the flowing of blood through the universal veins and arteries. And a first hint of the corn-god. Yay, the world is coming into being. Spring will soon be here!
7:21 VE HA DAGAH ASHER BA YE'OR METAH VA YIV'ASH HA YE'OR VE LO YACHLU MITSRAYIM LISHTOT MAYIM MIN HA YE'OR VA YEHI HA DAM BE CHOL ERETS MITSRAYIM
וְהַדָּגָה אֲשֶׁר בַּיְאֹר מֵתָה וַיִּבְאַשׁ הַיְאֹר וְלֹא יָכְלוּ מִצְרַיִם לִשְׁתּוֹת מַיִם מִן הַיְאֹר וַיְהִי הַדָּם בְּכָל אֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם
KJ: And the fish that was in the river died; and the river stank, and the Egyptians
could not drink of the water of the river; and there was blood throughout all the
land of Egypt.
LO YACHLU: Taken literally, this phrase should have clarified Rashi's confusion at verse 18. Yet he makes no comment.
7:22 VA YA'ASU CHEN CHARTUMEY MITSRAYIM BE LATEYHEM VE YECHAZEK LEV PAR'OH VE LO SHAMA AL'EHEM KA ASHER DIBER YHVH
וַיַּעֲשׂוּ כֵן חַרְטֻמֵּי מִצְרַיִם בְּלָטֵיהֶם וַיֶּחֱזַק לֵב פַּרְעֹה וְלֹא שָׁמַע אֲלֵהֶם כַּאֲשֶׁר דִּבֶּר יְהוָה
KJ: And the magicians of
Egypt did so with their enchantments: and Pharaoh's heart was hardened, neither
did he hearken unto them; as the LORD had said.
This in fact is the traditional Rabbinic translation, from Sanhedrin 67.b (TheBibleNet translation is given below), including its square parenthesis; and in truth it is not far from the Egyptian mythology version, on this occasion. The text tells us that the "magicians" of Mitsrayim were able to do the same thing, but. most likely, either Mosheh and Aharon were themselves those "magicians" of Egypt, or there was neither an Aharon nor a Mosheh, and this is simply the regular annual New Year at Passover liturgy of the sun god Re, re-telling the Creation story in the traditional Egyptian manner, prior to making the journey to the sacred mountain for the annual covenant renewal ceremony.
BN (Egyptian mythology translation): And the shamen of Mitsrayim did the same, using their knowledge of the same sacred arts; and Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he refused to heed they told him YHVH had said.
BN (Egyptian mythology translation): And the shamen of Mitsrayim did the same, using their knowledge of the same sacred arts; and Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he refused to heed they told him YHVH had said.
7:23 VA YIPHEN PAR'OH VA YAVO EL BEYTO VE LO SHAT LIBO GAM LA ZOT
וַיִּפֶן פַּרְעֹה וַיָּבֹא אֶל בֵּיתוֹ וְלֹא שָׁת לִבּוֹ גַּם לָזֹאת
KJ: And Pharaoh turned and
went into his house, neither did he set his heart to this also.
If this is indeed a version of the Egyptian creation myth, it is interesting to see what the Ezraic scribes have done with it: where Elohim in the Genesis version finds everything that he has made "good", Re continuously rejects Creation until it is forced on him. And as such the scribes enable their followers to acknowledge Elohim - or in this version YHVH - as the supreme Creator, and to reject the Egyptian in the process. Clever! But also culturally significant, because in this we can also see the primal sources of the Gnosticism which will emerge in Egypt several centuries later - a religion in which the universe is not created by the creative deities at all, but by ... click here for a very full and thorough explanation of the later form of Gnosticism, which removed the mythological and replaced it with the metaphysical... click here for the Albigensian form, which, albeit in a very Christianised manner, reverted to something closer to the earliest Egyptian. In either version, the world is imperfect because it was the imperfect anti-deity who created it.
SHAT: Just as we recognised Dagon in DAGAH, so we should have no difficulty seeing the name of the slayer of OSHER (Osiris) here - Shet in Yehudit, Set in Egyptian - and yes, as you will see in the illustration at my link, Shet is always depicted carrying the same "rod" as Mosheh and Aharon. Shet, as spirit of the waning year, is bound to "go back into his house" when Osher starts to wax as the new-born year.
7:24 VA YACHPERU CHOL MITSRAYIM SEVIYVOT HA YE'OR MAYIM LISHTOT KI LO YACHLU LISHTOT MI MEYMEY HA YE'OR
וַיַּחְפְּרוּ כָל מִצְרַיִם סְבִיבֹת הַיְאֹר מַיִם לִשְׁתּוֹת כִּי לֹא יָכְלוּ לִשְׁתֹּת מִמֵּימֵי הַיְאֹר
KJ: And all the Egyptians
digged round about the river for water to drink; for they could not drink of
the water of the river.
7:25 VA YIMAL'E SHIV'AT YAMIM ACHAREY HAKOT YHVH ET HA YE'OR
וַיִּמָּלֵא שִׁבְעַת יָמִים אַחֲרֵי הַכּוֹת-יְהוָה אֶת-הַיְאֹר
KJ: And seven days were
fulfilled, after that the LORD had smitten the river.
YHVH, not Aharon!
VA YIMAL'E: The wording is too precise, and anyway YHVH would have rested on the Sabbath, so 6+1 please. A religious ritual of some sort has just taken place, which requires seven full days - the week of Creation - to be complete. A week in the Creation of Elohim, not YHVH, according to Genesis 1, but the whole point of this tale is the establishment of the supremacy of YHVH in Creation, so this is a logical double-transfer: from Re and Elohim.
VA YIMAL'E: The wording is too precise, and anyway YHVH would have rested on the Sabbath, so 6+1 please. A religious ritual of some sort has just taken place, which requires seven full days - the week of Creation - to be complete. A week in the Creation of Elohim, not YHVH, according to Genesis 1, but the whole point of this tale is the establishment of the supremacy of YHVH in Creation, so this is a logical double-transfer: from Re and Elohim.
The seven days are always symbolic; and with 10 plagues making 70 days, even more symbolic. Count back 70 days before Passover and see where you arrive – to which the answer is: the 4th of Shevat, or the 5th if you count Passover as the day (15th Nisan) and not the eve (14th Nisan). Nothing of any significance there, in the Beney Yisra-Eli calendar. Was there any significance in the Egyptian calendar? Or perhaps there didn't need to be, because the point of the 70 days is not the setting-out, but the arriving. Is October 23rd in any way significant in the Christian or the western secular calendar? No - but it is nonetheless the day you reach, if you count back 70 days before the New Year on January 1st. The key is the denoting of the passing of the Winter, and that is never precise.
But two riders to this: first, that the number 70 has huge significance in the Yisra-Eli world, but in Egypt 72 was more significant, usually based on 12 x 6. So was the original of this in fact 12 x 6+1, keeping the day of Shabbat out of the 6-day creation week? Secondly, and it leads to exactly the same point - in fact the first point requires it - were there twelve plagues, and not ten? See again my note to Exodus 4:9. See the link to 72 earlier in this paragraph, but also my notes on the specifically Egyptian, and the variations between that and the Babylonian, here.
Some versions break the chapter here, with verses 26-29 becoming verses 1-4 of the next chapter. I have included all four verses in both places, so that students are able to follow the text by either route.
pey break
Some versions break the chapter here, with verses 26-29 becoming verses 1-4 of the next chapter. I have included all four verses in both places, so that students are able to follow the text by either route.
7:26 VA YOMER YHVH EL MOSHEH BO EL PAR'OH VE AMARTA ELAV KOH AMAR YHVH SHALACH ET AMI VE YA'AVDUNI
וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוָה אֶל מֹשֶׁה בֹּא אֶל פַּרְעֹה וְאָמַרְתָּ אֵלָיו כֹּה אָמַר יְהוָה שַׁלַּח אֶת עַמִּי וְיַעַבְדֻנִי
KJ (8:1): And the LORD spake
unto Moses, Go unto Pharaoh, and say unto him, Thus saith the LORD, Let my
people go, that they may serve me.
VA YOMER: Not VA YEDABER on this occasion. "To say" rather than "to speak".
SHALACH: He doesn't actually say "Let my people go", though that has become a nice piece of folk-lore based on a poetical mistranslation. He instructs Pharaoh to send them; which is not the same.
VA YA'AVDUNI: So many times I have raised the question as to whether or not the Beney Yisra-El were actually slaves, or something different, and this verse becomes a key occasion in the debate. YHVH does not say "that they may serve me", though that is the standard translation of VE YA'AVDUNI; rather he says "and they will worship me"; but the verb in question is nonetheless the same one as for "slavery" - LA'AVOD (לעבוד); and in synagogue to this day, the service of worship is still called AVODAH.
Pharaoh's refusal is of course necessary. YHVH, or Ra, or Re, is Creating the world, week by week, measure by measure. Pharaoh cannot send his people (yes, his people) to worship their and his god, until the full process of Creation is complete, and this, its accompanying liturgy and dramatic representation. Just as Av-Raham demanded the sparing of the Cities of the Plain, so Pharaoh here: unspoken inside the liturgy is the response: "finish Creation and then they can go and worship you. Not before." The hardening of Pharaoh's heart is simply his stubborn insistence on the fullness of Creation; and this is the ultimate and legitimate task of the sacred king in any fertility cult.
Pharaoh's refusal is of course necessary. YHVH, or Ra, or Re, is Creating the world, week by week, measure by measure. Pharaoh cannot send his people (yes, his people) to worship their and his god, until the full process of Creation is complete, and this, its accompanying liturgy and dramatic representation. Just as Av-Raham demanded the sparing of the Cities of the Plain, so Pharaoh here: unspoken inside the liturgy is the response: "finish Creation and then they can go and worship you. Not before." The hardening of Pharaoh's heart is simply his stubborn insistence on the fullness of Creation; and this is the ultimate and legitimate task of the sacred king in any fertility cult.
7:27 VE IM MA'EN ATAH LESHALE'ACH HINEH ANOCHI NOGEPH ET KOL GEVULCHA BA TSEPHARD'IYM
וְאִם מָאֵן אַתָּה לְשַׁלֵּחַ הִנֵּה אָנֹכִי נֹגֵף אֶת כָּל גְּבוּלְךָ בַּצְפַרְדְּעִים
KJ (8:2): And if thou refuse to
let them go,
behold, I will smite all thy borders with frogs:
Frogs? The most primoridal of all creatures, inhabitants equally or earth and land, producers of those serpent-like creatures the tadpoles, and when you see your first tadpoles in the seemingly deadwater of you local pond, you know you have your first physical sign that spring is blooming...
The man I met at the Living Torah museum in Brooklyn makes a case for these, rather than the Tanin earlier, being crocodiles. But the text here gives TSEPHARDIM (צְפַרְדְּעִים), which is unquestionably frogs. To the Egyptians, the frog was a symbol of life and fertility, since millions of them were born after the annual inundation of the Nile, which brought fertility to the otherwise barren lands. The fertility goddess Heqet (Heket, Heqet) was usually depicted as a frog, or as a woman with a frog's head, and sometimes as a frog on the end of a phallus. The Ogdoad (Greek "ογδοάς" = the eightfold) were eight deities worshipped in Khmunu (Hermopolis) during the Old Kingdom, the 3rd through 6th dynasties, between 2686 BCE and 2134 BCE; she was one of them. Hat-Hor and Ra headed this pantheon, with Ra later replaced by Thoth; at the time of Akhenaten, Ra became Atum-Ra; this pantheon was still in place at the time of the Mosheh story.
In the original liturgy, then, it is not so much a plague of frogs, as the appearance of Heqet alongside Ra in the process of Creation. The serpent has been sliced in two, its blood has provided a source for life, Set has retreated, and now life itself begins to emerge from the waters of Creation; in the Genesis version "creeping things" (Ha Remeset - הרמשת) replace the frogs (for which see also Genesis 1:21).
But they are also more than frogs, and more than just Heqet. In the Ogdoad, the eight deities were arranged in four female-male pairs, the females associated with snakes and the males with frogs: Naunet and Nu, Amaunet and Amun, Kauket and Kuk, Hauhet and Huh. Apart from their gender, there was little to distinguish the female goddess from the male god in a pair; indeed, the names of the females are merely the female forms of the male name and vice versa (as Yehudah and Yehudit, as Dan and Dinah among the Beney Yisra-El; as male Theodor becomes female Dorothea in the Greek). Essentially, each pair represents the female and male aspect of one of four concepts, namely the primordial waters (Naunet and Nu), air or invisibility (Amunet and Amun), darkness (Kauket and Kuk), and eternity or infinite space (Hauhet and Huh). Together the four concepts represent the primal, fundamental state of the beginning; they are what always was. In the myth, however, their interaction ultimately proved to be unbalanced, resulting in the arising of a new entity. When the entity opened, it revealed Ra, the fiery sun, inside. After a long interval of rest, Ra, together with the other deities, created all other things.
We actually know some of the prayers and sacrificial acts that were made to the eight gods - or to the nine, the Ennead, when Re/Ra was later included as the father of the eight. For example:
"Praise to thee, O Nile, that issues from the earth and comes to nourish Egypt... that waters the meadows, he that Ra has created to nourish all cattle... that gives drink to the desert places, which are far from water... when the Nile floods, offering is made to you, cattle are slaughtered for you, a great oblation is made for you... offering is also made to every other god, even as is done for the Nile, with incense, oxen, cattle, and birds upon the flame. All you men, extol the Nine Gods, and stand in awe of the might which his son, the Lord of All, has displayed, even he who makes green the Two Riverbanks. You are verdant, 0 Nile, you are verdant. He who makes Man to live on this cattle, and his cattle on the meadow ..." (see Adolph Erman, "The Ancient Egyptians", 1966, p. 146.)
7:28 VE SHARATS HA YE'OR TSEPHARD'IM VE ALU U VA'U BE VEYTECHA U VA CHADAR MISHKAVECHA VE AL MITATECHA U VE VEYT AVADEYCHA U VE AMECHA U VE TANUREYCHA U VE MISH'AROTEYCHA
וְשָׁרַץ הַיְאֹר צְפַרְדְּעִים וְעָלוּ וּבָאוּ בְּבֵיתֶךָ וּבַחֲדַר מִשְׁכָּבְךָ וְעַל מִטָּתֶךָ וּבְבֵית עֲבָדֶיךָ וּבְעַמֶּךָ וּבְתַנּוּרֶיךָ וּבְמִשְׁאֲרוֹתֶיךָ
KJ (8:3): And the river shall
bring forth frogs abundantly, which shall go up and come into thine house, and
into thy bedchamber, and upon thy bed, and into the house of thy servants, and
upon thy people, and into thine ovens, and into thy kneadingtroughs:
Which, of course, is unpleasant, but an expected nuisance, like red ants in October in Florida, and mosquitoes in the wet season in Brazil, and late buses in suburban London throughout the year; and in fact, given the nature of the religion, the people would have rejoiced to be told this, because it meant that the fertility gods were favourable to them, and the Nile was going to flood again next year, and bring them good crops and a rich harvest - a harvest, indeed, whose year would begin at the Passover, when eventually they are allowed to go to the holy mountain and celebrate it.
Why are some of these rendered as ECHA but others as EYCHA?
7:29 U VECHA U VE AMCHA U VE CHOL AVADEYCHA YA'ALU HA TSEPHARD'IYM
וּבְכָה וּבְעַמְּךָ וּבְכָל עֲבָדֶיךָ יַעֲלוּ הַצְפַרְדְּעִים
KJ 8:4: And the frogs shall
come up both on thee, and upon thy people, and upon all thy servants.
Yes, and your wonderfully cultivated garden will also be filled with weeds and nettles and unwanted wildflowers, and plagues of birds will nest in your trees and leave their droppings on your patio, and bees will swarm just where your children are playing in the paddling-pool, and squirrels will breakfast on your tulip bulbs, and foxes will browse your garbage-bins, and, and ...
This verse appears to be a repetition, though liturgy often does that; yay, indeed, liturgy often does that, for dramatic effect.
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