My first advice to anyone asking me how to get more spiritually serious is “read the Bible”. It is the first step to reversing the curse of ignorance and biblical illiteracy. These two factors literally “plague” Christians all over the world today..
I practice what I preach. I follow a daily Bible reading program. I’ve read through the Bible multiple times… but every time I go through, I find things that pique my interest and arouse my curiosity.
Today was my third day reading the book of Exodus. And right on schedule I rolled into the story of the 10 Plagues.
Now, the story of the 10 plagues is culturally familiar (although, most people probably couldn’t list the 10 plagues, let alone in order). But if I’m honest, I have to say they seem completely random.
Blood, frogs, gnats, flies… why would God choose all of these things? I mean if I had to choose 10 “disasters” to plague a people, I don’t think I would come even close to that.
This is where daily Bible reading becomes a double blessing. The first blessing, of course, is reading God’s Word and becoming familiar with it. The second blessing comes with curiosity and asking questions that lead deeper into what it says.
I’ve always “heard” that the 10 plagues weren’t just persecuting Pharaoh. They were direct attacks against the religious system of the Egyptians. There were in effect Jehovah God “throwing down” on any Egyptian rivals.
But reading today, I decided to go deeper and do some research to put more detail to this. Which Egyptian gods? How was the plague an attack against them?
Here’s a brief rundown of what I learned:
- Blood – Multiple Egyptian Gods were associated with the Nile: Khnum, Hapi, Osiris. Making the Nile bleed was tantamount to making them bleed.
- Frogs – The god Hept had the head of a frog. Imagine how the priests of Hept felt when there were thousands or millions of dead frogs (Hept-heads) every where?
- Gnats (lice) – Geb was the god of the dust used to create this plague. God used Geb’s symbol to persecute the Egyptians.
- Flies – Khepri had the head of a fly (what a god to worship!). But even Khepri “performed” when God demanded it.
- Livestock die – Hathor was the goddess of fertility. Certainly makes Hathor look inept and impotent.
- Boils – Isis and Imhotep were over health and healing. They couldn’t do a thing to bring health or healing to the Egyptians.
- Hail – Nut and Shu were gods of the sky and winds. Yet God was able to invade “their domain” and bring destruction on the Egyptians.
- Locusts – Nepr and Nepri were gods of the grain. And the locust were greater than them and ate all the remaining grain.
- Darkness – Ra, was the sun god. And Ra was “turned off” for 3 days.
- Death – Pharaoh himself was worshipped and lost his firstborn.
And really this is only a simple representation of the smackdown. There are other sources that include a much wider array of Egyptian gods who were being shown as false idols.
I found a really excellent 1 page infographic of this that lays it all out really nicely. It seems to be shared widely and I couldn’t find the original author, so I’ve put a copy on my website:
https://www.dennis-stevenson.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/10plagues-696×848-1.png
Go deeper. Take a look at this. The 10 Plagues isn’t just a children’s story. It’s a public systematic dismantling of an entire cultural religious system.
God was making a statement of who He is and how He regards other “gods”.
I hope this scratches your curiosity and you’ll lean in on learning. Do some research. Re-read the passage in Exodus. Go farther.
Only good will come in your life if you lean in on this.
Until next time,
Dennis
