June 30, 2009, 7:04 am by dc-agape.

Exodus Chapter 12:14-30

This is the second part of the Passover night.  YHWH is giving Moses the commands of what the Israelites must do in 14 days to be spared the plague of the first born.  YHWH promises that if the people do spread the blood of the sacrificial lamb on their doorframe no one will be killed in that house.  But then YHWH goes further.  The celebration of the Passover must be celebrated every year forever.  This is still practiced today by the Jewish faith, and seems to coincide with YHWH proscription fairly well.  As soon as YHWH finishes the commandments for what to do in 14 days:

Exodus 12:6 Take care of them until the fourteenth day of the month, when all the people of the community of Israel must slaughter them at twilight.

Exodus 12:21 Then Moses summoned all the elders of Israel and said to them, “Go at once and select the animals for your families and slaughter the Passover lamb.

Here is another blatant error in the Word of God.  Within the same chapter, even the same conversation, the story jumps two weeks.  You can rationalize this one as well, by claiming that Moses waited until the Day of Passover and at twilight to tell the Israelites what to do.  But then you would be forgetting YHWH commandment to select the animal take care of it for 14 days!  The Word of God is not perfect.  The Word of God has been altered or poorly written from its original.  As a result, a perfect YHWH, did not secure his transmitted Word to man.  This then means that the Word of God (the Bible) cannot be used as a source of YHWH’s will.  It is only a Tradition of Man!

The actual Passover is still riddled with the same error about the livestock.  When YHWH strikes down the firstborn even the livestock are affected, yet al the livestock in Egypt have been dead for at least 21 days.

Exodus 9:6 And the Lord did it: All the livestock of the Egyptians died, but not one of the animals belonging to the Israelites died.

Exodus 12:29 At midnight the Lord struck down all the firstborn in Egypt, who sat on the throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner, who was in the dungeon, and the firstborn of all the livestock as well.

How can a perfect being with the unaltered perfect Word repeat the same mistake over and over?  How can we puny humans trust a Book that has been contaminated with the Traditions of Men?  How can humans know which parts of the Word of God has not been altered?  

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June 29, 2009, 10:00 am by dc-agape.

Exodus Chapter 12:1-13

This part of the Book of Exodus is the Passover.  The very first thing to take note is the length of time from Moses’ warning to the Pharaoh to the time of the Passover – 14 days:

Exodus 12:1 The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in Egypt, “This month is to be for you the first month, the first month o your year. 

Exodus 12:6 Take care of them until the fourteenth day of the month, when all the people of the community of Israel must slaughter them at twilight.

So even after the Israelites have been in slavery at least 80 years, when Moses returned from Midian, the Israelites had to wait even longer.  It took 25 days from the time Moses first spoke to the Pharaoh before the people turned on Moses due to making bricks without straw.  Then there was the additional 19 days between turning the staff into a snake and the 9^th plague.  And now there is an additional 14 days before Passover. You can say that “YHWH works in mysterious ways” or that “YHWH operates at his own time frame” but come on these were his people!  80 years of slave labor (or more) before he even starts to rescue them.  Then 58 days of the most backbreaking labor they have endured, just so that YHWH can perform some hideously cruel “wonders” on the mind-controlled Egyptians?  In my last post I indicated that YHWH was not a loving god, but this takes the cake!  Two additional months of intense slavery, just so YHWH can show off!  Isn’t that the epitome of arrogance?

Finally this is the night that YHWH frees his people.  He tells them to slaughter the lamb and spread the blood on the door frame, which will keep his final plague from entering their house.  He also tells them to be prepared to leave immediately, by dressing in traveling cloths while eating the roasted lamb.  That’s right it cannot be boiled it must be cook over a fire.  Isn’t that lovingly kind of YHWH, he will protect his people if they do exactly what he tells them to do.

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June 28, 2009, 7:55 am by dc-agape.

Exodus Chapter 11

This is the post that completely annihilates any concept that humans have freewill, if YHWH of the Old Testament exists.  Chapter 11 of Exodus mentions YHWH’s complete control of all human actions, not just once, and not just of the Pharaoh.  This chapter also continues the same mistake that I have reported before about the Egyptian livestock.

If any Christian claims that humans have freewill, this is the chapter that negates that opinion.  This is the chapter that proves that freewill Christians are lacking in their understanding of the monster that they worship.  This is the chapter that proves that the concept of freewill is a Tradition of Man.  And here are the verses that prove it:

Exodus 11:3 (The Lord made the Egyptians favorably disposed toward the people, and Moses himself was highly regarded in Egypt by Pharaoh’s officials and by the people.)

Exodus 11:5 Every firstborn son in Egypt will die, from the firstborn son of Pharaoh, who sits on the throne, to the firstborn son of the slave girl, who is at her hand mill, and all the firstborn of the cattle as well.

Exodus 11:9 The Lord said to Moses, “Pharaoh will refuse to listen to you – so that my wonders may be multiplied in Egypt.

Exodus 11:10 Moses and Aaron performed all these wonders before Pharaoh, but the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he would not let the Israelites go out of his country.

I know that this is 40% of the chapter, but in each case it repeats that YHWH does not provide for freewill.  YHWH makes the people regard the Israelite “slaves” favorably.  YHWH kills nearly the entire nation of Egypt, unless you consider that the firstborn rarely live anyway.  I wonder if the firstborn also include the grandfathers, fathers, and children.  But of course the murder of the firstborn would not include Rameses II, since Rameses II was a second son, but Ahmose was also a second son!  These two Pharaoh’s are the only one who would have survived, because it would seem that all the other Pharaohs of the 18^th dynasty were first born sons/wives.  But what was the likelihood that a first born son would survive to adulthood in the 18^th Dynasty?   It was actually very low!  In fact, this last plague, if not directly cause by the disease spread by the Red Tide, the frogs, the gnats, the flies, the death of all livestock, the boils, the hail (destruction of food crops) or the locust, would not have affected the Egyptians that greatly.  Death of a child was common place, and which ever oldest child was alive at the death of the father was the inheritor – son or daughter or wife!  Only from a patriarchal society would the death of the firstborn son cause:

Exodus 11:6 There will be loud wailing throughout Egypt – worse than there has ever been or ever will be again.

Isn’t that nice imagery?  The loving YHWH murdering innocent firstborn sons, just to show off!  Worse is that this loving YHWH planned the whole thing and controlled the events that would lead up to his final “wonder” the cold-blooded murder of children.  Who wants to worship this beast?  Why do we even have records of this monster existing?  How can anyone claim that this corruption of good could possibly have any capacity to love?  As an Atheist, I cannot see how anyone, out of fear or out of humility, could worship this vile, evil tyrant named YHWH.

It is worth repeating the error in the Word of God.  It is even more important that this mistake has been repeated! 

Exodus 9:6 And the next day the Lord did it: All the livestock of the Egyptians died, but not one animal belonging to the Israelites died.

Exodus 9:10 So they took soot from a furnace and stood before Pharaoh.  Moses tossed it into the air, and festering boils broke out on men and animals.

Exodus 9:21 But those you ignored the word of the Lord left their slaves and livestock in the field.

Exodus 11:5 Every firstborn son in Egypt will die, from the firstborn son of Pharaoh, who sits on the throne, to the firstborn son of the slave girl, who is at her hand mill, and all the firstborn of the cattle as well.

In that first verse YHWH kills all the livestock.  Now in the second verse, you could make the claim that this was the wild animals, cats, and dogs.  But that seems to be just rationalization.  The last two verses clearly state that the Egyptians still had livestock, which is in complete contradiction to Exodus 9:6.  The Word of God is flawed and in the case of a perfect supreme being, this means that his word cannot be taken literally. 

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June 27, 2009, 7:20 am by dc-agape.

Exodus Chapter 10:21-29

I have finally reached the one truly indescribable plague in this entire series.  Somehow Egypt was in darkness for three days.  Nothing in nature can produce this type of phenomenon.  But does that mean it really happened?

I believe in my post on the plagues that I have given well enough reasons to know that all these plagues may have been Tall Tales.  I believe that I have covered the possibility that Moses used the natural disasters to his benefit.  And I believe that I have also given good enough reasons to know that many errors have occurred in the retelling of these events. Should we believe that the darkness lasted for three full days?  Should we believe that the Egyptians could not light a torch and continue to carry on as if it was a normal, but extended, night?  But this is what the Word of God claims:

Exodus 10:23 No one could see anyone else or leave his place for three days.  Yet all the Israelites had light in the places where they lived.

This of course, adds one more mistake to a growing list.  For the very next verse claims that the Pharaoh summoned Moses:

Exodus 10:24 Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and said, “Go, worship the Lord.  Even your women and children may go with you; only leave your flocks and herds behind.”

If no one could see in Egypt, and no one could leave their houses, how did someone reach Moses to summon him and how did Moses reach the palace of the Pharaoh?  The Word of God clearly states that lights were only available in Goshen!  So without a doubt here is another error in the Word of God.

I will end this reminding my readers that here again YHWH took freewill from the Pharaoh:

Exodus 10:27 But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he was not willing to let them go.

If anyone claims that we have freewill and that YHWH exists they are making a contradiction.  YHWH had planned these events from the time of Abram, he controlled the entire nation of Egypt and Israel so that these things would be able to occur.  From each and every birth, to the natural disasters that forced Jacob to move to Egypt, and all the way to hardening the Pharaoh’s heart, YHWH controlled every little event required for these plagues to take place.  This would include formation of the Red Tide that turned the water to “blood” and all the consequences of that single natural phenomenon.  It would also include allowing the Egyptians to “sin” against YHWH so that he could “punish” them.  And it would also include the cold blooded murder of millions of Egyptian people, livestock, and crops.  This combination of events proves without a single lingering doubt that if YHWH existed, Satan is the good guy!

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June 26, 2009, 8:17 am by dc-agape.

Exodus Chapter 10:1-20

I am almost finished with the plagues that YHWH pre-planned to unleash on the 3,000,000 Egyptians generations before they were born.  All of them happened because YHWH hardened the Pharaoh’s heart.  This post will be about the plague of locust.  The swarming of locust in the Egyptian Nile is not uncommon, so this “plague” was just another natural event that Moses took advantage of. 

More than one error in the Word of God occurs during this plague.  Remember this verse:

Exodus 9:25 Throughout Egypt hail struck everything in the fields – both men and animals; it beat down everything growing in the fields and stripped every tree.

Well here we are told a different story:

Exodus 10:15 They covered all the ground until it was black.  They devoured all that was left after the hail – everything growing in the fields and the fruits on the trees.

If every plant in the field were beaten down by the hail, would there be anything left for the locust to eat?  If the trees were stripped bare by the hail would not the fruit have also been stripped as well?  For that matter the locust swarm was most likely due to the hail storm anyway.  The natural food supply for the locust was destroyed by the hail which then caused them to swarm in search of food.

But there are more mistakes in this story about the plague:

Exodus 10:1 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his officials so that I may perform these miraculous signs of mine among them that you may tell your children and grandchildren how I dealt harshly with the Egyptians and how I preformed my signs among them, and that you may know that I am the Lord.”

But just a little later the official’s hearts were not hardened, only the Pharaoh’s heart was:

Exodus 10:7 Pharaoh’s officials said to him, “How long will this man be a snare to us?  Let the people go, so that they may worship the Lord their God.  Do you not yet realize that Egypt is ruined?”

Does this sound like a group of officials that have had their hearts hardened by YHWH?  They are begging the Pharaoh to let the people go!  Notice also the true purpose of these plagues.  YHWH planned them specifically for his own ego.  He wants to be worshipped and to ensure this practice he is willing to be as brutal and cruel as any of the ancient polytheist gods of Rome, Greece, Egypt, or Babylonia.  This is the second error in the Word of God, there is one more.

I have mentioned before that how do slaves own property and that Moses lied to Pharaoh about the purpose of the festival.  But both are worth mentioning again. 

Exodus 9:9 Moses answered, “We will go with our young and old, with our sons and daughters, and with our flocks and herds, because we are to celebrate a festival to the Lord.”

In what nation have you ever heard of slaves owning flocks and herds?  The Israelites were not slaves!  But this festival is a cover-up.  Moses never plans on returning to Egypt, so when it is appropriate YHWH approves of bearing false witness.  And as we all know that lying happens to be something that YHWH finds detestable:

Proverbs 6:16-19 There are six things the Lord hates, seven that are detestable to him:  haughty eyes, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked schemes, feet that are quick to rush to evil, a false witness who pours out lies and a man who stirs up dissension among brothers.

One of the truly Deadly Sins is lying, yet Moses has repeated this lie to Pharaoh numerous times!  Here is another example of the changing YHWH.  YHWH is not immutable!  So at least two other verse in the Word of God are false and made to prove that the Word of God is not to be used as a source of ethical behavior (Numbers 23:19, 1^st Samuel 15:29).  But here is more proof that YHWH does change his mind.  He would not allow Moses to lie to the Pharaoh, even a little white lie, if YHWH did not change his mind.  He would find Moses detestable and hate him for the lie that was told to the Pharaoh.

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June 25, 2009, 10:21 am by dc-agape.

Exodus Chapter 9:12-35

We finally get to a plague that is not linked by a natural sequence of events.  This is the plague of hail.  Hail storms are not infrequent in the region of the Nile!  So this is plague may not be linked to the other ones, but one thing should be noted:

Exodus 8:8 Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “Pray to the Lord to take the frogs away from me and my people, and I will let your people go to offer sacrifices to the Lord”

Exodus 8:25 Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “Go, sacrifice to your God here in the land.”

Exodus 9:27 Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron.  “This time I have sinned,” he said to them.  “The Lord is in the right and I and my people are in the wrong.

Three times after the first seven plagues started Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron.  Two more of the plagues Moses and Aaron did not warn the Pharaoh.  So five of the seven plagues Moses could easily take the responsibility for after the fact! 

This naturally occurring hail storm could easily be just an additional problem in a troubled nation.  Remember that the first plague ruined their water supply and began the destruction of their crops and supply of fish.  The next three plagues continued to degrade whatever hygiene the Egyptians and Israelites had.  Which then lead to the next two plagues on the livestock and boils on the humans.  So a huge hail storm would be considered linked to the rest by the people but it would do great damage to the remaining food sources.

There is an error in this section.  Let me compare two verses:

Exodus 9:6 And the next day the Lord did it: All the livestock of the Egyptians died, but not one animal belonging to the Israelites died.

Exodus 9:21 But those who ignored the word of the Lord left their slaves and livestock in the field.

Two things come to mind here.  First, the hail storm could not have killed the Egyptian livestock, because that had already occurred in the plague on the livestock!  The Word of God is in error.  Second, I didn’t realize that slaves could own livestock.  But it seems the Israelite slaves were in much better condition than most slaves, since they did own livestock!  Are we sure they were slaves?  Could it be that they were regular citizens of Egypt and had to work like any other group within the society?  We have precedence that they were not slaves.  The Tractate Vision of Amram indicates that the Israelites could visit the land of Canaan when required.  It really is starting to look like the Traditions of Man have blown this whole sequence of events out of proportion.

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June 24, 2009, 8:21 am by dc-agape.

Exodus Chapter 9:1-12

In this post I want to cover two more of the plagues that would have been consequences not of YHWH judgment, but if a form of Red Tide had entered the Nile, destroyed the fish, created rapid population growth of the frogs, the frog population died due to toxic effects of the Nile infestation (or starvation), and creating a gnat and a fly overpopulation from their rotting corpse.  The distinction here between what happens to the Israelites and the Egyptians can easily be explained by hygiene, the Israelites destroyed the frog carcasses, which would in turn minimize the gnats and fly population in the area of Goshen.  As a result, this means that Moses was nothing more than a con man, using a singular natural disaster and it’s after effects to his own personal gain in the process freeing the Israelites, who may not have been slaves, from Egypt. 

Both of the next two plagues would have been from diseases brought by the overpopulation of gnats and flies.  When the carcasses of the frogs start to decompose certain deadly parasites have plenty of breeding grounds.  Cholera, Ebola, and Typhus are all spread after mass die offs.  These diseases would account for the death of the livestock and for the boils.  So again, so far all the plagues that have been caused by YHWH may have had a completely natural origin.  On the other hand, since we know from The Books of Genesis and Exodus that YHWH planned these plagues, the suffering could have been at his direction.  If this is the case, there is no doubt that he is a cruel hateful evil monster.

Interestingly, the livestock of the Israelites was spared.  Yet no indication occurs the Israelites were spared from the boils.  This would make sense.  Cholera and Typhus can be controlled by hygiene, yet nothing stops Ebola.

So this leaves us with an either/or situation.  Moses was using a natural disaster claiming divine intervention.  We have numerous cases of that occurring even today.  Hurricane Katrina, the December Tsunami, and the Australian forest fires have all been used to claim supernatural intervention.  On the other hand, we have the Word of God claiming that YHWH had planned this back in Abram’s day (before he was called Abraham) – Gen 15:13-15.  We also know from the Book of Exodus that YHWH revealed his plan prior to these events to Moses (Exodus 4:21).  So the either or situation is this: either Moses was an opportunist with no supernatural ally or YHWH is a monster that made millions of innocent humans and animals suffer and die. Worst of all is that this is only the 6^th plague.  There are four more to go!

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June 23, 2009, 4:41 pm by dc-agape.

Exodus Chapter 8:15-32

Now the next two plagues happen over the next two days after the frogs have died.  The first one, without even confronting the Pharaoh, starts with Aaron turning all the dust in Egypt into gnats.  For some odd reason the Pharaoh’s magicians attempt to duplicate this.  Shouldn’t they be attempting to alleviate this?  Either way they fail, proving that this plague is truly supernatural…or not.  What happens to bloating dead animal bodies, frogs in this case?  The decomposing bodies (in heaps) first attract gnats and other small rapid lifespan creatures.  Gnats would begin to breed rapidly as the frogs decompose, especially if pools of water were near the “heaps”.  But also, within 4-10 days flies would have already laid eggs in the frog’s bodies and those maggots would begin to turn into adult flies.  Hence, both the two plagues that follow the death of the frogs would be natural occurrences without any help from a supernatural being.

But this is not the end of this plague.  YHWH promises that the Israelites will be spared the flies but not the frogs or the gnats.  This could easily be done.  All the Israelites needed to do was get rid of the dead decomposing frog bodies!  Remove them and the flies will follow the bodies.  So all this tells us is that the Israelites were more worried about sanitation and hygiene than the Egyptians. 

This plague of flies was worse than the gnats.  In fact, it ruined the entire land of Egypt.  I’m not sure that much was left to ruin after the water became undrinkable, which would have destroyed the crops and live stock.  And if the water shortage didn’t do it the dead frogs were certainly a health hazard!  Adding the flies was just an additional blow to and already weakened community. 

Pharaoh again summons Moses and Aaron.  This time he tells them it is ok to go and make their sacrifices.  But now it is Moses that rejects the offer.  He requires that the people be allowed to travel out of Egypt for a three day trip one-way and then it would be assumed that it would be another three days back.  Or at least this is the little white lie that Moses and Aaron tell the Pharaoh.  Moses again asks YHWH to lift the plague and surprisingly, walaa, the flies are gone!  Well, this only allows the Pharaoh to harden his heart again.  But it really isn’t the Pharaoh that has done this.  I have already repeated this by I will repeat after every post on this sequence of plagues.  YHWH hardened Pharaoh’s heart.  Pharaoh had no freewill.  YHWH intended all of this to happen.  YHWH was punishing innocent people for something he had planned for generations:

Gen 15:13-14 Then the Lord said to him, “Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own, and they will be enslaved and mistreated four hundred years.  But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves, and afterword they will come out with great possessions.

Exodus 4:21 The Lord said to Moses, “When you return to Egypt, see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders I have given you the power to do.  But I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go.

Everything that happens was planned and orchestrated by YHWH.  All the suffering, all the pain, all these events were non-negotiable.  Not due to the sins of the Egyptians, but due to an arbitrary evil, hateful, supernatural being.  Whoever said we have freewill was lying!

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June 22, 2009, 8:38 am by dc-agape.

Exodus Chapter 7:25-8:15

YHWH waits seven days after destroying the Nile, the food crops, and dehydrating the Egyptians and Israelites before telling Moses and Aaron to go to the Pharaoh again.  This time Moses and Aaron threaten the Pharaoh with a plague of frogs.  Since YHWH has hardened the Pharaoh’s heart, he ignores their threat. 

The next day frogs swarm out of the Nile.  They cover everything, including the cooking equipment and beds.  Even the NIV Study Bible recognizes that this would have occurred. The reason given is that without fish in the Nile, the food the frog relied on would multiply rapidly.  So this plague was actually not due to supernatural results.  The Study Bible goes further and indicates that the frogs may have died due to bacterial infects from the source of “Plague of Blood” a Red Tide phenomenon. 

The Pharaoh begs for the frogs to be taken away, but oddly he tells Moses and Aaron to wait a day.  Why would a leader of what is left of 3,000,000 people want to wait even an hour before the frogs are removed?  This whole event is looking more and more like Moses and Aaron taking advantage of a single phenomenon, the Red Tide and its results, to claim supernatural activity. 

Well the frogs do die, but they are not taken away as the Pharaoh as requested.  And remember the Israelites are also suffering from both the Nile turning to “blood” and from the now dead frogs.  The frogs are swept up into heaps, but the land reeked of their rotting corpses.  What happens to rotting animal corpses?  The next two plagues, that’s what!  But I will cover that in the next post.

The important thing here is that the Pharaoh’s heart is hardened as soon as the frogs die.  But this is not the Pharaoh’s fault:

Exodus 8:15 But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and would not let listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the Lord had said.

YHWH did not just say that the Pharaoh would harden his heart, what he actually said was that YHWH, himself, would harden the Pharaoh’s heart:

Exodus 4:21 Then the Lord said to Moses, “When you return to Egypt, see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders I have given you the power to do.  But I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go.

This is a two-fold action here.  First, YHWH has already planned to do all ten plagues!  Second, he has guaranteed that the Pharaoh’s heart will be hardened after each of the first nine plagues.  So this story has nothing to do with how evil the Pharaoh was, he was just a puppet in YHWH’s hands.  But more seriously, the entire events of these plagues could be linked.  Or at least all but two of the plagues could be.  The plague of hail may have been a lucky accident.  The plague of darkness is quite odd, but I will get to these plagues later.

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June 21, 2009, 6:32 am by dc-agape.

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Exodus Chapter 7:13-24

Because YHWH has hardened the heart of Pharaoh (Exodus 7:3) the last bit of simple sorcery did not work (7:11-12).  Now the Tall Tale gets even Taller.  Moses and Aaron leave, but YHWH tells them to return to the Pharaoh the next day.  Again, why would a ruler of close to 4,000,000 people even see someone that belongs to the slave ranks and second has already had their case dismissed as lacking any merit. 

The very first of YHWH unjustified plagues nearly kills everyone in Egypt including the Israelites, the first proof that this is a Tall Tale.  Moses tells Aaron to turn all the water in Egypt to blood, even the water stored in the homes.  To make matters worse, all the fish in the Nile also die.  So the innocent people, including the Israelites have lost two sources of sustenance in a desert nation: water and fish.  This, of course, would also ruin the crops for the entire season.  So in one miraculous act, YHWH has basically wiped out the Israelites and the Egyptians, neither of which have been treated justly by YHWH.  Two additional things about this make it quite clear that this is a Tall Tale.  But here is where the Word of God has an error:

Exodus 7:22 But the Egyptian magicians did the same thing by their secret arts, and the Pharaoh’s heart became hard; he would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the Lord said.

If Aaron had already turned all the water into blood, how could the magicians repeat the act?  There was no water left to turn into blood!  But here is the second thing that makes this a Tall Tale:

Exodus 7:24 And all the Egyptians dug along the Nile to get drinking water, because they could not drink the water from the river.

As we all know too well about water pollution, it seeps into the ground water!  The Egyptians and the Israelites could not have dug along the Nile for water, for this too would have been tainted with blood.

Is there anything about this Tall Tale that actually makes YHWH look good?  From the Atheist point of view the answer is a resounding: No!  YHWH has already chosen to perform these acts, by of all things, removing freewill from the Pharaoh.  Worse, he punishes millions of people, including the Israelites, with his very first plague.  How many people died from this single cruel action?  Their food supply was either dead (the fish) or ruined (the plants).  To top that off they had no water to drink…in a desert environment!  If this is not complete fiction, YHWH is a worse tyrant than any of the old polytheist one combined.

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