Either God is Evil or Moses Was an Opportunist

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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