Parshat Bo

Looking a little more closely at this last demand yields something of a surprise. Pharaoh in Exodus chapter 10 verse 24 says that the animals belonging to the Jews shall remain behind. In verse 25 Moshe refuses. This type of discussion has gone on several times before. (Exodus 8:4-11, 8:21-28, 10:8-11)

On all other occasions the dialogue is simply to be continued at another time. This time we first have the normal strengthening of Pharaoh's heart (v. 27), but then in v. 28 Pharaoh explodes and threatens Moshe that the next time he sees Pharaoh he will die. This ends the dialogue and presumably had the next plague not led to the exodus no further conversation would have gone on between the protagonists.

Taking such a step would appear to be counterproductive for Pharaoh. By this point he knows that G-d has the power to hurt him. He is obviously aware that there have been several occasions on which he has had to ask Moshe to pray for him to put an end to a plague that is too painful or onerous. To cut off the dialogue is therefore, to make himself even more vulnerable.

Further, Pharaoh had to know that holding on to all of the animals was unacceptable. He had previously heard Moshe say that the purpose of going to the desert was specifically to sacrifice animals to G-d (cf. Exodus 8:22). It could not therefore have been his expectation that Moshe would accept this demand. Had he maintained the dialogue he perhaps could have bargained for allowing the Jewish people to take a limited number of animals. We know that Moshe would not have accepted that demand either, but Pharaoh does not know that. Thus, by putting an end to the dialogue, he leaves himself no further room for maneuvering.

No one has ever suggested that Pharaoh was anything less than a competent or perhaps even brilliant leader and authority figure. His maneuvering in chapter 1 of Shemot to shift the blame for persecuting the Jews to his people or to the midwives is a brilliant exercise in the use of power (cf. Ramban Exodus 1:10). So, too, the Midrashic description (Exodus Rabbah:1:10) of how he personally took a tray of bricks and a trowel to suggest that he had become a brick layer so that the Jews would agree to take on the role of builders of storage cities that then led to their enslavement is also an indication that he had a superb knowledge of how to deal with and manipulate people. Closing of the dialogue is not at all to his advantage at this point. But he does it anyway.

Perhaps one can develop an explanation for his behavior by finding a pattern in the way the plagues are visited on the Egyptians. Many commentators, notably Ramban, have described patterns that repeat throughout the various plagues, at particular intervals.

The plagues I wish to examine are those in which a dialogue between Pharaoh and Moshe takes place. More specifically, I want to look at those plagues in which Pharaoh attempts to bargain with Moshe in one fashion or another, either to end the specific plague, or to end the exile and all of the plagues.

Of the eight plagues before the plague of darkness where the blowup occurs, there are four that fit this category, three which describe a dialogue entirely between Moshe and Pharaoh, and a fourth, the plague of locusts, where the dialogue is initiated because Pharaoh's servants have come to see the power of G-d as manifested in the plagues and to believe that Egypt has lost.

What is interesting is that in every one of these plagrues and not in the others, some reminder of the plague appears even after the plague is over. Let's look at these plagues in order to see what I mean.

The first of them is the plague of frogs. The description of the plague appears in Shemot 7:26-8:11. The dialogue is there throughout the plague, and it is here that Pharaoh makes his first offer to let the Jews go (chapter 8:4). In fact, in that verse, Pharaoh asks Moshe to pray for him that the plague end and Moshe, of course, agrees. However, despite Moshe's successful communication with G-d a remnant of the plague remains. In verse 9 of chapter 8 the frogs die, but in verse 10 we are told that the Egyptians gathered the dead frogs in heaps and as expected a terrible stench filled the land. The plague may have been over, but it was not completely over.

The second of the dialogue plagues was the plague of "arov". There is an initial problem here in that it is somewhat unclear exactly what this plague consisted of. The two possibilities are a mixture of animals or a mixture of insects. There is in fact stronger evidence from, for example in the poetic retelling of the plagues in Tehillim (Psalms 78), that the latter is the case. Whichever it is, this is again a plague that involves dialogue, (Exodus 8:21-26). It, also, involves Pharaoh asking Moshe to pray for him, (v.24), and Moshe acceding to that request because Pharaoh promises that the Jews will be allowed to go.

Most important there is again a reminder of the plague after the plague is over. We are told that when the plague ends the arov leaves and that not a single one is left in the vicinity of Pharaoh, his servants or his people (v.27). If the arov are animals this is strange. Some wild animals exist in the land of Egypt even when no plague is going on. A complete disappearance after the fact would be remarkable, and a reminder of the plague. This is even more true if the plague involved insects. The lack of any remnant is simply miraculous. Our sanitation and ability to control the insect population is far superior to anything that existed in ancient Egypt. Could anyone imagine a situation in which absolutely no insects could be found anywhere within an entire people and every one of its members? Further, although this absence sounds like a good thing, inevitably, over the long term, it would negatively affect crop production.

So, too, the loss of wild animals would cause overbreeding of other species, which would present a real problem. The lack of insects or animals would again be a reminder of the plague after the plague.

We move now to the third of the plagues in this category, that of barad or hail (Exodus 9:13-35). Again Pharaoh requests that Moshe pray (v.28). Again there is Moshe's acceding to the request, and again there is a reminder of the plague. As we are told in chapter 9 verse 31-32 the barley and the flax were eradicated, but the wheat and the spelt were not affected because they were late in their ripening and they had not grown at this point in time. So each time the Egyptians looked at their fields and saw the limited crops that remained (at least until the locust plague destroyed this remnant as well), they were reminded of what the hail had done, and how there was still some target of opportunity available.

We come to the fourth of the plagues, the plague of arbeh (locusts) (Exodus 10:1-20). This, in some ways is the most interesting of the plagues, because absent the argument of the servants --that in fact Egypt was lost and it was time to capitulate -- no dialogue would have occurred. Because of the servants' concerns, that dialogue does occur and again there is a similar pattern. There is a request for prayer and Moshe agrees to that request (verses16-18). Most importantly there is again a reminder of the plague after the plague is over. In chapter 10 verse 19 we are told that the plague ends when G-d brings a strong westerly wind to bear on Egypt, and as a result not a single locust remains in the entire border of the land.

Again this is remarkable. To not have a single member of the species present is a feat which modern science can not even begin to approximate at least when it comes to infestations of locusts. That statement is made by someone who now lives in an area where there is a locust infestation every seventeen years. Even with a seventeen year lead time, modern science has not been able to get close to getting rid of every single insect or even to keep the problem from happening. Since locusts might well be an important food source, this too hurts the Egyptians.

The pattern is, therefore, set. Each time Pharaoh and Moshe dialogue, at the end of the plague either a remnant of the plague or the complete absence of the core element of the plague serves to remind the Egyptians of the power of G-d. This is not surprising as in all of the examples Pharaoh has asked Moshe to pray and effectively has promised that he will let the Jews go. In each of these cases he reneges, and in each of these cases he attempts to hold on to some part of the Jewish people or their property rather than let them go. In each case the plague continues in some way.

We are now at the plague of darkness. Pharaoh has to be feeling weak. He is down to bargaining only for the animals after having given up on the people. The plague of darkness occurs. He is talking to Moshe as he had four times before. In each of those cases something about the plague in Egypt remained after the dialogue. When Moshe refuses Pharaoh's offer it must have struck him that the pattern was going to repeat itself. Possibly he was going to have no darkness at all, as in the case of the arov and of the locusts when not one arov or locust remained. That would be frightening in a desert country such as Egypt. The prospect of living with no darkness and only with the blinding and beating rays of the sun would truly be devastating. Egypt could hardly survive that kind of an experience.

I actually suspect that this was not the Pharaoh's concern. If you follow the pattern of the plagues, the first plague involved a remnant of the frogs remaining in Egypt. The second of these plagues involved the absence of any of the arov. The third plague, the plague of hail, involved a remnant remaining in the field, and the fourth plague, the plague of the locusts, again involved the absence of the locust. Following that pattern what should happen in this circumstance would be a remnant of the darkness.

Were I Pharaoh, this would be even more frightening, not so much because it would continue to be dark, but because of the Egyptian reaction to the darkness.

We are told that during the plague of darkness, the Egyptians did not move from their place. Nonetheless, and at the same time, Moshe continued to insist that even during the plague the Jews be allowed to get up and go.

Nothing would point out to Pharaoh the increasing weakness of the Egyptians as opposed to the growing strength of the Jews. More than what was occurring here, the Egyptians suffer a paralyzing fear during the plague of darkness which leads to their inability to function at all, while the Jews are determined to get up and go in the midst of the darkness.

In a very real sense whenever the Jews leave they will be heading into darkness. They don't know where they are going. They don't know what awaits them. In fact, Moshe indicates this reality in his response to Pharaoh's suggestion that they leave the animals behind. In chapter 10 verse 26, Moshe says," And we do not know how we will worship our G-d until we get there".

This contrast between the Jewish willingness to walk into the darkness of not knowing where they are going, as opposed to the Egyptian inability to walk into the darkness in familiar territory must have hit Pharaoh very hard. Particularly as it was his belief that Egypt would gain strength by subjugating the Jews which had led to this day, he must have been truly demoralized by this turn of events.

I suspect that the combination of his realizing that he had little if anything left with which to bargain along with this awareness of the total collapse of Egyptian power was too much for him. Continuing the dialogue could very well lead to a perpetuation of some aspect of the darkness beyond the plague and therefore to perpetuation of his encounter with the ultimate weakness at the core of his Egypt. Put simply, continued dialogue meant continued punishment. Bad enough in itself, but continued punishment meant continued exposure of weakness, which was simply intolerable.

I believe that it is for this reason that Pharaoh attempted to cut off all dialogue. I suspect that this was a desperate attempt by him to try to break the cycle described here.

In the limited setting I guess Pharaoh was successful. There appears to be no indication that the plague of darkness continues. The only problem for Pharaoh is that shortly there would come another period of darkness and at the very middle of that period of darkness G-d himself would descend on Egypt and kill every first born from the first born of the maid servant to Pharaoh's own child. In that sense the plague of darkness continued too.