Plagues of Egypt Versus Egypt’s Gods

Document by Ann Miller 

 

 

 

First Plague: Water into Blood

Exodus 7:17 Thus saith Yehovah, “In this shalt thou know that I am Yehovah. Behold, I will smite upon the water that is in the river with the staff that is in my hand. And it shall be turned into blood. ¹⁸And the fish that is in the river shall die, and the river shall stink. And the Egyptians shall loathe to drink the water out of the river.” ¹⁹And Yehovah said to Moses, “Say unto Aaron, ‘Take thy staff. And stretch out thy hand upon the waters of the Egyptians upon their streams, upon their rivers and upon their ponds, and upon all their reservoirs of water that they may become blood. And there shall be blood throughout the land of Egypt in both vessels of wood and in vessels of stone.’ ”

The Egyptians worshipped the Nile River under various names and symbols. It was called the father of life and the father of the gods. Thus, the first public miracle was a blow to a god of Egypt. The Egyptians abhorred blood. Their horror must have been extreme when they saw their sacred river and all other water in their country turned to blood.

• Another source [What source?] says:
• Anuket
• Other Names: Anket, Anqet, Anukis.
• Patron of the Nile and its inundation.
• Appearance: a woman wearing a crown of reeds and ostrich feathers, often accompanied by a gazelle.

• Description: Anuket was most likely an imported goddess from Nubia, and was worshipped as the ‘nourisher of the fields’, referring to the annual inundation of the Nile that deposited a layer of rich silt on the agricultural areas. She formed a triad with Khenmu and Satis, and in later times was identified with Nephthys. Her name means embrace, and may refer to the banks of the Nile that yearly would embrace the fields to bring fertility to the land.

 

Second Plague: Frogs

Exodus 8:5 And Yehovah said to Moses, “Say unto Aaron, “Stretch out thy hand with thy staff over the streams, over the rivers, and over the ponds, and cause frogs to come up on the land of Egypt.’ ” ⁶And Aaron stretched out his hand over the waters of Egypt. And the frogs came up and covered the land of Egypt.

Heqet (Heket) was a goddess of childbirth, creation and grain germination. She was depicted as a frog or a woman with the head of a frog, betraying her connection with water.

As a water goddess, she was also a goddess of fertility where she was particularly associated with the later stages of labour. In this way, the title of Servants of Heqet may have been a title applied to her priestesses who were trained as midwives.

 

Third Plague: Lice

Exodus 8:16 And Yehovah said to Moses, “Say unto Aaron, ‘Stretch out thy staff and smite the dust of the earth. And it shall become lice throughout the land of Egypt.’ ” ¹⁷And they did so. And Aaron stretched out his hand with his staff. And he smote the dust of the earth. And there arose lice on man and on beast. All the dust of the land became lice throughout the land of Egypt.

Geb (another god) was thought to represent the earth. He is pictured as reclining beneath the sky-goddess Nut. Geb, ‘the Great Cackler’, was represented as a goose. He was said to have laid the egg from which the sun was hatched.

Instead of the sky and the earth laying an egg representing the sun, the dust of the earth brought forth lice, which would in turn lay louse eggs on the Egyptians. They were big on being clean. Body lice don’t go along with being clean. They certainly don’t render priests clean.

 

Fourth Plague: The Swarm

Exodus 8:20 And Yehovah said to Moses, “Rise up early in the morning, and stand before Pharaoh. Behold, he will go out to the water. And say to him, ‘Thus saith Yehovah, “Send my people! And they have served me! ²¹For if thou will not send my people, behold I will send a swarm upon thee and upon thy slaves and upon thy people and into thy houses! And the houses of the Egyptians shall be full of the swarm, and also the ground on which they are! ²²And I will distinguish the land of Goshen in which my people dwell in that day. And no swarm shall be there. And thou shalt know that I, Yehovah am in the midst of the land. ²³And I will segregate between my people and thy people! This sign shall be tomorrow!” ’ ” ²⁴And Yehovah did so. And the swarm came in a multitude into the house of Pharaoh and into the houses of his slaves and throughout the land of Egypt. The land was corrupted by the swarm.

The swarm corrupted the land. This attack was against every god that made the land (soil) profitable and productive.

 

5th Plague: Dead Cows

Exodus 9:4 And Yehovah will distinguish between the cattle of Israel and the cattle of Egypt; and there shall nothing die of all that the children of Israel have. ⁵And Yehovah appointed a set time, saying, To-morrow will Yehovah do this thing in the land. ⁶And Yehovah did this thing on the following day, and all the cattle of Egypt died; but of the cattle of the children of Israel died not one.

This is also directed against the gods of Egypt who were supposed to be manifest in the various forms, all of which were considered sacred. Egyptians held every animal sacred. They worshipped almost every form of nature, sun, moon, stars, and rivers. Jupiter was adored in the form of a ram, Apollo a crow, Bacchus a goat, Juno a heifer, Diana a cat, Venus a fish, Mercury an ibis.

This attack was especially against Hathor, the cow goddess.

 

Sixth Plague: Boils

Exodus 9:8 And Yehovah said to Moses and to Aaron, “Take to yourselves handfuls of ash of the furnace. And Moshe shall scatter it toward the heavens before the eyes of Pharaoh. ⁹And it shall become fine dust over all the land of Egypt, and shall become boils on man and on cattle breaking out with blisters throughout the land of Egypt.” ¹⁰And they took ashes of the furnace, and stood before Pharaoh. And Moses sprinkled it toward the heavens. And it became boils with blisters breaking out on man and on cattle. ¹¹And the scribes could not stand before Moses because of the boils; for the boils were on the scribes, and on all the Egyptians.

Ash from a furnace makes lye; lye is used in making soap. Soap cleans. Boils picture the opposite of a clean body.

The goddess Qadshu (alternately spelled Qudshu, Qodesh, Qadesh, Qadashu, Qadesha, Qetesh, Qedeshet, Kedesh) was a latter Egyptian goddess of sexuality. (The Hebrew word kedesh means holy-one, and also refers to temple whores in this form of the word.) They were considered clean ones. They would have been unable to do their sexual functions with boils in the worst places.

 

Seventh Plague: Hail

Exodus 9:22 And Yehovah said to Moses, “Stretch out thy hand toward the heavens that there may be hail throughout the land of Egypt upon men and upon cattle and upon every herb of the field in the land of Egypt.” ²³And Moses stretched out his staff toward the heavens. And Yehovah gave voices and hail. And the fire ran along the ground; and Yehovah rained hail on the land of Egypt. ²⁴And there was very grievous hail and fire mingled with the hail such as there had been none like it in all the land of Egypt since it became a nation. ²⁵And the hail smote all that was in the field, both men and cattle throughout the land of Egypt. And the hail smote every herb of the field, and broke every tree of the field. ²⁶There was no hail only in the land of Goshen where the children of Israel were.

The Egyptians had at least one god that controlled weather, and another god that dealt with chaos. Hail gave the Egyptians a taste of their gods as they had never seen. Yehovah controlled both the weather and the chaotic attacks.

 

Eighth Plague: The Locust

Exodus 10:4 “If thou refuse to send my people, behold, I will bring locusts into thy borders tomorrow. ⁵And they shall cover the face of the land so that ye will not be able to see the land. And they shall eat the residue of what escaped that ye have remaining from the hail, and shall eat every tree that ye have growing in the field. ⁶And they shall fill thy houses and the houses of all thy slaves and the houses of all the Egyptians, which neither thy fathers nor thy fathers’ fathers have seen since the day that they were upon the earth unto this day!” And he turned and went out from Pharaoh.

This plague was directed against the god Serapis who was supposed to protect the land from locusts and from Shu, god of the air. The creatures came at the command of Yehovah and went when He commanded them to go, proving He was the God of gods, and that the gods of Egypt were false and powerless.

 

Ninth Plague: Darkness

Exodus 10:21 And Yehovah said to Moses, “Stretch out thy hand toward the heavens, that there may be darkness in the land of Egypt so that one may feel darkness. ²²And Moses stretched out his hand toward the heavens. And there was a thick darkness throughout the land of Egypt three days. ²³They saw not one another, neither rose any from his place for three days. But all the children of Israel had light in their dwellings.

This plague was directed against Re the sun god who was supposed to protect from any curse of the sun and bring natural blessings of light, warmth, and fruitfulness and Thoth and Chons the moon gods. It pitted these gods against Set, the god of chaos and Bes guarding against evil spirits and misfortune.

One plague attacked multiple gods by showing their impotence or by making them stink.

Re (Ra) was the Egyptian sun god who was also often referred to as Re-Horakhty, meaning Re (is) Horus of the Horizon, referring to the god’s character. The early Egyptians believed that he created the world. The rising sun was the symbol of creation. The daily cycle of sunrise and sunset was obliterated during those days of felt darkness.

 

Tenth Plague: Slaughter of the Firstborn

Exodus 11:5 And all the firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sits on his throne even unto the firstborn of the slavewoman who is behind the mill, and all the firstborn of cattle.

The death of the first born was a blow against all the gods of Egypt since they were worshipped as different animals. Slaying the firstborn of beasts as well as men was literally bringing judgment on the gods. When any idolatrous nation was destroyed, folks placed the blame on the gods who abandoned that nation or who were overcome by stronger gods.

Several gods of Egypt were supposedly protectors of the lives of men and beasts. The Pharaoh was considered a god, and his son the next god. No god of Egypt had the power to stand against the God of the Hebrews.

The Egyptian occult leaders spoke of the strength of the Gods of the Hebrews when they declared during the lice plague, “This is the finger of the Gods” (Exodus 8:19). If the finger of the Gods of Israel could do this, what could the hand of the Gods do? What could the arm of the Gods do? What could Yehovah the Gods of the Israelis do?

Thus, Yehovah used only ten smitings to undermine every Egyptian god and goddess. He even undermined the gods and goddesses of the dead whose services included transporting and protecting the dead to their resting places awaiting the next life. So many deaths and so much chaos didn’t permit ritual offerings and preparations to occur in their prescribed manners. Pharaoh himself was drowned in the sea before a slave population that didn’t touch him; the sea god killed the Pharaoh god. What shame would have been brought on the greatest power in the region! Not a single weapon was used against the Egyptians; yet their army was totally defeated by their gods — or was it by the Gods of Israel?