- : Exodus Chapters
- 5, 6:
- 1-13, 28-30
- , 7, 8
- Pharaoh increases the Hebrew burden
God renews his promise to Israel and appoints Aaron
- Moses & Aaron before Pharoah
- The first 4 plagues
- Key Verses and Themes
- Chapter 6
- Abraham’s Covenant:
Exod. 6:3, 8
God continues to remind Moses, and by extension all the Hebrews, that what is about to happen is a part of the fulfillment of the covenant.
- Moses’s speech impediment:
- Exod. 6:12, 30
Moses again brings up his bad speech when presenting his doubts to the Lord…
- Chapter 7
- Aaron’s Rod:
Exod. 7:8-12
Aaron’s rod, or staff, is most remembered for this passage, and we later know this rod will be placed inside the Ark of the Covenant. Keep it in mind! Also, see the discussion questions for more.
- Chapter 8
- Oral Tradition:
Exod. 8:19
The Egyptians sorcerers/magicians are not named in this passage… but later St. Paul will name them. This is an example of something passed down via oral tradition, which we touch upon more in the discussion questions.
- Finger of God:
Exod. 8:19
The Egyptian magicians claim that the third plague is “the finger of God”. See the discussion questions to see what this means, and how Christ references it when speaking to the Pharisees.
References to the New Testament & our Church practices
- Oral Tradition
2 Timothy 3:8-9
No where in Exodus are the magicians named, but St. Paul here gives them names? That means he must have had them passed down to him via oral tradition, or in other words, it was a fact passed down through history, not by being written in the Old Testament scriptures, but by people speaking it.
- Finger of God
- Luke 11:20
- But if I cast out demons with the finger of God
…”, Christ references Himself! See how in the discussion questions.
- Discussion Questions
- EXODUS 5
What were the Egyptians doing to the Israelite workers?
The Egyptians no longer provided straw for the Israelites to use when making bricks, but they still required them to meet their daily quota for bricks as before. So the Israelites gathered stubble to try and use as a substitute for straw, but they were struggling to meet the quota for bricks.
Why were the Israeli taskmasters (overseers) mad at Moses and Aaron ?
They blamed Moses and Aaron for the harsher conditions and threats that they were now getting from the Egyptians.
- EXODUS 6
What does “uncircumcised lips” mean?
It’s a unique way of saying Moses had a speech impediment.
- EXODUS 7
What does God mean in v.1 where He says “I have made you as God to Pharoah…”
God is not saying He made Moses God in nature. God is saying that, through grace, the power He would give Moses to perform all that he would (miracles & plagues) would make him
- like a god
to Pharoah, lower-case "g”.
Is this idea that men could be “gods” a foreign idea? Let’s look at
Psalms 82:6
, “ ‘I [God] said, “You are gods, And all of you are children of the Most High”, which Christ quotes in
John 10:34-36
. Here we also see that Moses is called a “god” because he is given the words of God, as Christ just said. Now remember,
- The
- Word of God, with the definite article "
- the
" is Christ.
“Aaron’s Rod”
How were the magicians of Egypt able to do the same thing as Moses/Aaron with their rods?
These magicians worked by the kind of sorceries and incantations to which evil spirits or demons work through. But while they mimicked Moses/Aaron by their rods turning into snakes, Moses’s power came by God, creator of heaven and earth, so he easily triumphed over them, meaning God showed His superior power and dominion over the cheap, evil imitations of it.
How did the magicians find water to turn into blood if “all the waters” turned to blood by Moses/Aaron?
Two possible ways
They used nearby sea water from the Red Sea or Mediterranean Sea; refer to the maps in the booklet to see where they are in relation to Egypt.
They used the waters that were in the “Israeli” sides/parts of Egypt, which we know is more plausible because the plagues did not affect the Israelis, as we read in the later chapters (
Exod. 8:22; 9:4; 10:23; 11:7.
What does the 1st plague represent?
Blood is carnal/fleshy; it was to show the worldliness of the Egyptians and that they were preoccupied with thoughts of the flesh, ignoring the divine things that were about to occur.
- EXODUS 8
What does the 2nd plague represent?
Frogs are not intimidating like lions or snakes, but God bothered the Egyptians with this ignoble animal, to humble their pride and ego.
- Also, the ribbit of a frog is an empty sound
(think like a cricket’s croak, which is used as a sound to convey “emptiness”)
, but one that bothers, and it is compared to the poets of Egypt who brought deceptive fables into the world with their empty and conceited songs, but which “bothered” the human race because of their error and leading people astray.
So think about the filthy rap and pop music we have now, rapping about drugs, fornication, murder, bragging, cursing, in general vain and self-loving things. These empty sounds bother the soul of man by filling his mind, conscious and subconscious, with evil things.
- “Oral Tradition”
What does the 3rd plague represent and why couldn’t the magicians imitate it?
The lice represent heretics. Lice are so subtle and minute that they escape being seen by the eye unless one looks closely (
think about how they checked our hair for lice at school!
). But once on the body, they bite and feed off your blood, so even if you don’t see it, you will feel it. So too do heretics drill into souls with the subtle bites of their words. They attack with such cunning that one who is deceived neither sees nor understands the source of his deception. But heretical teachings lead people away from God and His Truth in Jesus Christ, and thus to death of the soul. Lice suck blood from the body, heresies suck the light and life from the soul. That’s why we warn against trying to change what the Church has taught for thousands of years, you get deadly heresies!
These magicians are like heretics because of their opposition to God. St Paul states this in
2 Timothy 3:8-9
when he says “Now as Jannes and Jambres resisted Moses, so do these also resist the truth: men of corrupt minds, disapproved concerning the faith; but they will progress no further, for their foolishness will be clear to all, as theirs also was” Notice also how their names were not in Exodus, but St. Paul knew them… that’s oral tradition!
So that’s why the magicians could not imitate the plague, because the plague represented themselves, and their own corruption, so their power failed them, realizing that this was “the finger (strength) of God”.
Going further on "oral tradition" to show that the Jews had passed down facts and practices that were not written in the Old Testament scriptures, but that supplemented their faith. So too, there are certain things passed down in our Faith that are not written in the Bible, but that are "good to know", like the name of the thief crucified to the right of Jesus, Dismas.
- Some other things, like our Holy Sacrament,
Malka
(holy leaven), were passed down this way, by the Apostles themselves, and we can see that this way of passing things down is not new or unsupported by the Bible. Use the
- questions form
if you're still curious to learn more!
What does the 4th plague represent?
Firstly, some church fathers say the plague was all types of flies, not just the common house fly. Some flies, like the stable fly, bite and feed off of blood (mainly of animals)
That being said, flies here represent carnal/fleshly desires, because they swarm and attack like demons, as well as spiritual anguish, because they are an insolent and restless animal. Think about how they annoy us, always flying around and rarely staying still.
“Finger of God”
What’s the significance of Christ using the term “Finger of God” in Luke 11:20, referencing Exod. 8:19?
Firstly, the “finger of “God is to be understood as being the Holy Spirit.
Matthew 12:28
confirms this, where the verse reveals the “finger of God” to be the Spirit, saying
- “If I with the
- Spirit of God
- cast out demons,”
- while Luke says,
- “If I with
- the finger of God
cast out demons.”
Christ here shows that the same One who brought forth the plagues and put to shame the evil powers of the sorcerers/magicians is now amidst them (the Pharisees & crowd), casting away demons. Showing that He, Jesus Christ, is God. Because remember, in
Exod. 7:5
Why did Moses say that Egyptians would “stone” them if they saw their “abominable” offerings?
Remember how Joseph didn’t eat in front of his brothers because the Hebrews were an abomination to the Egyptians?
Same sort of idea here, except that the Egyptians, who were farmers and cultivators, were appalled by the Israelites who were shepherds of flocks. We read this explicitly in
- Gen 46:34
“for every shepherd is an abomination unto the Egyptians.”
- This Week's Study
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