Paul Kretzmann Commentary - Exodus 9:1 - 9:7

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Paul Kretzmann Commentary - Exodus 9:1 - 9:7


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The Plague of the Pestilence of Beasts

v. 1. Then the Lord said unto Moses, Go in unto Pharaoh and tell him, Thus saith the Lord God of the Hebrews, Let My people go that they may serve Me. This was now the standing formula of demand.

v. 2. For if thou refuse to let them go and wilt hold them still,
hold them back, using force upon them, in spite of the fact that Jehovah had made known His will so emphatically,

v. 3. behold, the hand of the Lord is upon thy cattle which is in the field,
the domestic animals of every variety, upon the horses, upon the asses, upon the camels, upon the oxen, and upon the sheep, upon the flocks; there shall be a very grievous murrain, a destructive pestilence, against which human skill would avail nothing.

v. 4. And the Lord shall sever between the cattle of Israel and the cattle of Egypt,
set a sharp line of distinction; and there shall nothing die of all that is the children's of Israel. The fact that this exception of Israel's cattle was predicted and came to pass in just that way was to impress upon Pharaoh and upon all the Egyptians the unlimited power of the true God.

v. 5. And the Lord appointed a set time, saying, Tomorrow the Lord shall do this thing in the land.
This was further evidence of His omnipotence.

v. 6. And the Lord did that thing on the morrow, and all the cattle of Egypt died,
the various kinds were destroyed in such great numbers that there was only a negligible quantity remaining,

v. 19.
; but of the cattle of the children of Israel died not one.

v. 7. And Pharaoh sent, and, behold, there was not one of the cattle of the Israelites dead.
The words of the Lord had again been fulfilled literally. And the heart of Pharaoh was hardened, and he did not let the people go. He was further confirmed in his obduracy and incidentally showed his tyrannical disposition, since the plague, which struck chiefly his poor subjects, affected him very little, although he had convinced himself of the miraculous sparing of the Israelites. A person who is hardened against God will also lose his feeling of affection toward his fellow-men.