The Pulpit Commentaries
Exodus 8:20-24
EXPOSITION
THE FOURTH PLAGUE.
It has been noticed that—setting apart the last and most terrible of the plagues, which stands as it were by itself—the remainder divide themselves into three groups of three each—two in each group coming with a warning, and the third without. (See Exodus 8:16; Exodus 9:8; Exodus 10:21.) In other respects, no great regularity is observable. There is a general principle of increasing severity in the afflictions, but it does not obtain throughout the entire series. The first three caused annoyance, rather than actual injury, either to persons or property. Of the next three, two were upon property, one upon both property and person (Exodus 9:10). Of the remaining three, two again inflicted injury on property, while one (the plague of darkness) was a mere personal annoyance. The exact character of the fourth plague depends on the proper translation of the word 'arob. The Jewish commentators connected this word with 'Ereb and 'Arab, words meaning "mingled" or "mixed;" and supposed a mixed multitude of animals—beasts, reptiles, and insects—to be meant. But the expression used throughout, which is ha-'arob, "the 'arob," marks very clearly a single definite species. So much was clear to the LXX; who rendered the word by κυνόμυια, "the dog-fly," which is not the common house-fly (Musca domestica), but a distinct species (Musca canina). Flies of this kind are said to constitute a terrible affliction in Egypt; but they attack men chiefly, and do no harm to houses or to the fruits of the field, whereas the 'arob is spoken of as a pest in the houses, and as "destroying the land" (Exodus 8:24). It has been, therefore, suggested that the Blatta orientalis, or kakerlaque, a kind of beetle, is really intended. These creatures suddenly appear upon the Nile in great numbers; they "inflict very painful bites with their jaws; gnaw and destroy clothes, household furniture, leather, and articles of every kind, and either consume or render unavailable all eatables"(Kalisch). They sometimes drive persons out of their houses; and they also devastate the fields.
Lo, he cometh forth to the water. See Exodus 7:15, and comment. It is suspected that on this occasion Pharaoh "went to the Nile with a procession to open the solemn festival "held in the autumn when the inundation was beginning to abate (Cook). Say unto him. Repeat, i.e; the Divine command so often given (Exodus 5:1; Exodus 7:16; Exodus 8:1).
Swarms of flies is an unfortunate translation of a single substantive in the singular number, accompanied by the article. A mixture, etc; is nearly as bad. The writer must mean some one definite species of animal, which he called "the 'arob." On the probable identification of the animal, see the Introductory paragraph to this Chapter. And also the ground. The 'arob, like the frogs, was to plague them both inside their houses and outside, but especially inside.
I will sever in that day the land of Goshen. On the position of the land of Goshen, see the Excursus on the Geography. The "severance" is a new feature, and one distinguishing the later from the earlier plagues. It was an additional mark of the miraculous character of the visitations, well calculated to impress all thoughtful and honest minds. By all such it would be seen that the God who could make this severance was no local God of the Hebrews only, but one whose power extended over the whole earth.
A division. Literally "a redemption," i.e; a sign that they are redeemed from bondage, and are "My people," not thine any longer. To-morrow. Particulars of time and place are fixed beforehand, to mark clearly that the visitation does not take place by chance, or by mere natural law, but by Gods positive decree and by his agency.
A grievous swarm of flies. Rather "a multitude of beetles." As with the frogs, so with the beetles, it aggravated the infliction, that, being sacred animals, they might not be destroyed or injured. Beetles were sacred to Ra, the sun-god; and one form of Ra, Chepra, was ordinarily represented under the form of a beetle, or as a man with a beetle for his heath The land was corrupted. Rather "destroyed;" i.e. grievously injured, or "devastated"(as Kalisch renders). The beetles seriously damaged the growing crops.
HOMILETICS
God puts division between the good and bad, both here and hereafter
In some respects the good and the bad appear to be treated alike in this life, and no difference to be made between them. "God maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust" (Matthew 5:45). The Preacher's experience was that "all things come alike to all; there is one event to the righteous and to the wicked; to the clean and to the unclean; to him that sacrificeth and to him that sacrificeth not; as is the good, so is the sinner; and he that sweareth as he that feareth an oath"(Ecclesiastes 9:2). If God sends a pestilence upon a land, or a drought, or an excess of rain, or any other calamity, the good and the bad seem to suffer equally; no difference to be put between them. This is the first impression of the contemplative philosopher when he looks upon human life; and it is a true impression to a great extent. But there are limitations, which, though easily overlooked at the first glance, become apparent upon more careful examination. God does not treat all nations alike—he favours those which observe his laws; punishes those who disobey them. He seems sometimes especially to bless certain faithful families, as that of David, and to rain plagues upon others, as those of Saul, Herod the Great, and Napoleon. He gives, on the whole, to good men certain temporal advantages over bad men, as those which flow naturally (i.e. by his appointment) from industry, honesty, prudence, sobriety, and other virtues. The result is that "godliness" is said in Scripture to "have the promise of this life"(1 Timothy 4:8). And if we take into consideration the satisfaction of a good conscience, the confidence towards God, the calm trust, and the certain hope which sustain the good, and set in the opposite scale the doubts and fears and horrors of an evil conscience which afflict the bad, we shall have little doubt that the balance of happiness, even in this life, is with the servants of God. Still, no doubt the great "division" is put hereafter. "When the Son of Man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, before him shall be gathered all nations; and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats—and he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left" (Matthew 25:31). Awful the separation, where between the two "there is a great gulf fixed"(Luke 16:26)—on the one side heavenly joy and perfect felicity—on the other, "the blackness of darkness for ever"(Jude 1:13).
HOMILIES BY J. ORR
The plague of flies.
This torment is thought by many to have embraced winged pests of all kinds. In this case, it would include the mosquito, cattle-fly, beetles, dog-flies, and numbers of others. But see the exposition. We have to note regarding it—
I. PHARAOH FINDS AS BEFORE THAT THERE IS NO ESCAPING FROM THE HANDS OF GOD. He is met at the brink of the river, and confronted with the old alternative—"Let my people go else," etc. (Exodus 8:20, Exodus 8:21). The king, when he saw Moses, would have no difficulty in anticipating what was coming. The bitter greeting he would give him would be akin to that of Ahab to Elijah—"Hast thou found me, O mine enemy?"(1 Kings 21:20); nor would Moses' reply be very different from that given by the prophet—"I have found thee; because thou hast sold thyself to work evil in the sight of the Lord." What madness in the king to keep up this foolish, this suicidal contest! But the conflict of every sinner with Jehovah is of the same infatuated character. Stroke after stroke descends, yet impenitence is persevered in. Well may God say, "Why should ye be stricken any more?"(Isaiah 1:5.) His demand, through all, abides unchanged.
II. THE FOURTH PLAGUE SPRINGS FROM THE AIR. The sphere of judgment is widening and extending, taking in constantly new regions—water, earth, air. The voices that summon to repentance are heard from every side. A new demonstration of the universality of Jehovah's rule-of the unlimited sweep of his dominion (Exodus 8:22). Flies are agents which God can employ as a scourge of nations still. We read of singular feats in the way of insect-taming; of flies, bees, and even lice being trained to obey orders, and go through wonderful evolutions. Man's power of control over these minute creatures is but a feeble image of the power exercised over them by God. He enrols them among his battalions, and uses them to execute his commissions.
III. A NEW SIGN IS THIS TIME GIVEN—THE SEVERANCE OF THE LAND OF GOSHEN FROM THE REST OF EGYPT (Exodus 8:22, Exodus 8:23). The Israelites had probably been made fellow-sufferers with the Egyptians, at least in part, in the inconvenience experienced from the first three plagues. This was permitted, at once as a chastisement for their unbelief and murmurings, and as a purifying discipline. Nothing has been said as to the effect produced upon their minds by the outbreak of these terrific plagues; but they must have shown the Israelites the folly of their recent conduct, and wrought them up to a high pitch of expectation in the confidence that the day of their redemption was drawing near. With the production of this change of mind in the dwellers in Goshen, the nell for further inflictions upon them ceased, and a difference was thereafter put between them and the Egyptians. This astonishing separation was as clear a proof as could have been given of Jehovah's absoluteness in the government of the creatures, of the extent of his rule, and of the care he exercised over his chosen people. Possibly, Pharaoh had hitherto been taking encouragement from the fact that Israel was involved in the calamities. He may have been led to question:
1. God's power, seeing that he could not protect his own worshippers. It may have suggested itself to him that Jehovah's power was limited, and therefore might successfully be braved.
2. God's love for Israel. For if he loved them so much, why did he allow them to suffer? And if his interest in them was as weak as facts seemed to show, it was not impossible, if resistance was continued, that he might abandon them altogether.
3. The likelihood of God's proceeding to extremities. God, Pharaoh may have thought, must stop somewhere, else his own people will be destroyed together with mine. The need of protecting them is a safeguard against his proceeding to extremes with me. The severance now effected between Goshen and the rest of Egypt was a cruel blow to all such hopes. Thenceforward it was plain that God did care for Israel, that his power was as great as his/ore, and that whatever happened to Egypt, Israel was as safe as the pavilion of the Divine protection could make it. The fact is not without significance to ourselves. It teaches us that a deep and broad line of demarcation is really being put in God's thoughts between his own people and the rest of mankind, and that, whatever be the nature of his outward providence, he has their interests and well-being continually at heart. Those who encourage themselves in sin because they see that the righteous suffer with the wicked, and judge that this proves an absence of interest or care on the part of God, must submit to a great undeceiving. The last judgment will make a final separation (Matthew 25:31).
IV. THE FOURTH PLAGUE BROUGHT PHARAOH A SECOND TIME TO THE POINT OF SUBMISSION TO GOD'S COMMANDS. The separation of the territory of Israel seems greatly to have startled him, and he sent anew for Moses. The unwillingness of his mind to grant the required consent to the departure of the people is apparent from the interview.
1. Pharaoh proposes a compromise (Exodus 5:1). This is a common expedient with those who are hard pushed with questions of religion. It is, however, only a veil for the spirit of disobedience working underneath. The compromise proposed was unhesitatingly rejected by Moses. He had no authority to accept it. It was in its own nature an untenable one (Exodus 8:26). Nothing was to be gained by accepting it. By standing firm to his demand, he was certain to get the whole of what he wanted (Exodus 8:28), why then take a part? Had he accepted the compromise, it would probably only have embeldened Pharaoh to further resistance. God's servants will do well to imitate Moses in this distrust of compromises. Little good ever comes of them. Principle, not expediency, should rule the Christian's conduct. The intrusion of expediency into matters ecclesiastical has been a grievous source of weakness, of scandal, and of loss of spiritual power.
2. He ultimately yields. He concedes the whole demand; qualified only by the injunction not to go far away (Exodus 8:28). The interview leaves on one's mind the impression of sincerity—of a real relenting, of however short a duration, on the part of Pharaoh. Just so much the more fatal to his spiritual life was the subsequent hardening.
V. THOUGH WARNED BY MOSES OF THE PERIL OF ACTING DECEITFULLY, PHARAOH ANEW HARDENED HIS HEART (Exodus 8:32). Hardening, after the experience just described, may be regarded as almost settling Pharaoh's doom. He would soon be, if he was not already, irrecoverable. God had trusted him a second time, and this was the result. Obstinacy was passing into obduracy.—J.O.
HOMILIES BY D. YOUNG
The fourth plague-the flies: the immunities of Goshen.
The mere change from one chastising agent to another is not a matter to be dwelt on in considering this plague. We note that God makes the change from gnats to flies, and that Pharaoh, who was obdurate before the gnats, is so far affected before the flies as to make an offer of submission; but it is obviously impossible for us to see why the flies should be more efficacious than the gnats. The important thing is, not the gradation from gnats to flies, but the way in which Goshen was protected by Jehovah, and thereby proclaimed as under his favour. As in the third plague we are to notice the discomfiture of the magicians, rather than the gnats themselves, so in the fourth plague we are to notice the immunities that were secured to Goshen, rather than the flies. Thus we mark how majestically and how worthily of himself Jehovah moves on from point to point towards the climax of his visitations on Pharaoh. To say that these plagues increased in severity is not to say much. Their succession in this respect is not so traceable as the succession of the events which happened in connection with them. In considering these events in their succession, we see more clearly how far this narrative of the plagues is from being the construction of a mere story-teller. There is a certain Divine art as to what is inserted and what omitted; but of this we may be sure, that nothing is invented. Underneath the condensed and pregnant record there is a tremendous and bitter reality. Consider then—
I. THIS PROTECTION OF GOSHEN.
1. Note what this protection did for the Israelites. Had they then up to this time been sharers in the inconveniences and perils of the first three plagues? We must conclude that they had been; and that Jehovah only now deemed it fitting to extend special exemption to them. It was well for them to share somewhat of the sufferings of the Egyptians. (And we must bear in mind that however much they shared of these sufferings, yet afterwards, in the wilderness, the recollection of the comforts and delicacies of Egypt rose above all the recollection of the sufferings. Exodus 16:3; Numbers 11:4.) But now, with the fourth plague, the time has come to make a perceptible difference between Israelite and Egyptian. True, the contest is advancing, but there is still much to be done; and it is well to give Israel timely encouragements. They must wait a while to be liberated from Pharaoh's thraldom, yet surely it must rejoice and comfort their hearts to see themselves, even though in bondage, free from the afflictions which are coming ever more thickly upon Egypt. Though they have not all they want, it is something to have such a clear sign that God has marked them for his own. Even in this world, with all his sufferings, temporal disadvantages, and opportunities of gain missed, because he is a Christian, the Christian has that which makes the world to envy and to fear. For a while we must share in the world's sufferings, but the world cannot share in our joys. Israel has to suffer with Pharaoh in the beginning, but presently it escapes; whereas Pharaoh cannot by any plan extend Goshen among the habitations of his own people. If we would have the comforts of Goshen we must go there, fraternise with them that dwell there, and join ourselves on to them.
2. Note what this protection may have done for the Egyptians. It may have done much in the way of revelation as to the cause of their troubles. Up to this point, most of them, even while they experienced great sufferings, had no knowledge of what caused the sufferings. It is very improbable that the demands of Moses had become known to the great bulk of the people. To national troubles they were doubtless used at times—such troubles as had come to their ancestors in the seven years of famine—but these plagues were altogether beyond precedent, and must have provoked much active enquiry as to what possible cause could produce them. And now when this sharp division is made between Egypt and Goshen, this line evidently not of man's making, the Egyptian people cannot but feel at once that there must be some connection between their sufferings and the state of the Israelites. Hence—
3. It is possible that here we have the real reason why Pharaoh is now driven again into a sort of submission. What if he were more concerned at the absence of the flies from Goshen than at the presence of them among his own people! Might not this extraordinary exemption set his own people thinking too much, and cause his house to be divided against itself?
II. HIS PROPOSITIONS TO MOSES OF COMPROMISE. Pharaoh, on the occasion of his former yielding (Exodus 8:10), proposed to let the people go "to-morrow." Now he varies the terms of compromise. The people shall offer their sacrifices in the land. This offer he seems to have made in complete ignorance of the difficulties which lay in the way from the feelings of his own people. A fine man this, to be the ruler of a great kingdom! One who had to be taught the feelings of his own people by a stranger. Like most despots; he did not understand how vain it was to contend against the strength of custom and popular sentiment, particularly in matters of religion. Not only were the rites of Israelitish worship different from those of Egyptian worship, but one of the animals most frequently used for Israelitish sacrifice, would if so used before the Egyptians, have been viewed by them with the utmost repugnance. It was no visionary peril which Moses indicated. Whately, in his annotated edition of Bacon's Essays: speaking on this very subject of the strength of popular custom, illustrates it, curiously enough, from the conduct of the Alexandrian populace at a much later time. "When the Romans took possession of Egypt, the people submitted without the least resistance to have their lives and property at the mercy of a foreign nation: 'but one of the Roman soldiers happening to kill a cat in the streets of Alexandria, they rose on him and tore him limb from limb, and the excitement was so violent, that the generals overlooked the outrage for fear of insurrection."—In the land of Egypt then, says Moses; the sacrifices of Israel cannot be; and of course beyond the sufficient reason stated by Moses, there were others which there was no need to state, and which Pharaoh could not have understood, even if they had been stated.—But Pharaoh is driven from one proviso only to seek refuge in another. If the people go out, they are not to go very far. And yet this offer, conditional as it seemed, was not conditional in reality. It was enough to serve the purpose of Moses, and he could readily accept it. Once a bird is outside of the cage, a very few minutes will take it clear away from the risk of re-capture. If Pharaoh only lets Israel out of his hands, it matters not how far, the rest will settle itself. This promise was enough to justify Moses, in interceding for a withdrawal of the heavy hand of Jehovah; and Jehovah, in granting the request. Thus a second time was Pharaoh taken at his word. God, we see, takes men at their word when they make right resolutions. If they make wrong, selfish resolutions, he would have them alter them. But once they have resolved rightly, he holds them to the resolution, and gives opportunity to carry it out. God withdrew the flies, as he had withdrawn the frogs. There seems even something as miraculous about the withdrawal as about the original infliction. It might have been expected that a few of the flies would remain, just one here and there, but there remained not one. Lastly, notice what is now coming to be the regular result of Pharaoh's temporary yieldings. He gives way a little to pressure, but as soon as the pressure is removed, he returns to his original position. All these yieldings of his are but as the slight appearance of thaw when the sun is at his best on a keen winter's day. Pharaoh was thawed just a little on the surface of his nature. As soon as the heat of the present plague departed, the frost in his proud heart set in with more severity than ever.—Y.
HOMILIES BY J. URQUHART
The Fourth Plague.
I. THE SUPERSTITION OF EGYPT IS MADE ITS SCOURGE.
1. The land was covered with the sacred beetle. It swarmed upon the ground and in their homes. No movement was possible without crushing or treading under foot the insect they adored. When God overthrows idolatries the very reverence with which the idols have been regarded deepens the chastisement. When the covetous sink under the loss of wealth, they themselves have given its weight to the blow which crushes them.
2. The land was destroyed by it. No prayer or propitiation served to avert the judgment. A land is ever corrupted by its idolatry. With the knowledge and worship of the true God, purity and righteousness and truth are put far from it. The soul is marred and wasted by covetousness.
II. THE SEPARATION BETWEEN GOSHEN AND EGYPT.
1. Hitherto there had been no separation. Up to a certain point the just and the unjust suffer in common.
2. Beyond this, God shields his loved ones. They are alike visited by sorrow, etc.; but while there is darkness and the ministration of death in the abodes of the unrepentant, there is light and the ministration of life in the dwellings of the righteous.
III. THE REJECTED COMPROMISE. Nothing less than God's demand can be accepted. If we are to go free and to obtain the inheritance, we must make no compromise with the world or with sin; we must offer to God the full unfettered worship he demands. There must be full and complete separation between Egypt and Israel, the Church and the world, else it will be impossible to present before God the sacrifices he asks for. A Church unseparated from the world will be a worldly Church.
IV. PHARAOH'S BROKEN FAITH. We have no reason to doubt that he was sincere when he made the promise (Exodus 8:28). How many vows sincerely made in trouble are forgotten in the ease they sought to purchase! Under the pressure of affliction men are ready to sacrifice much to which, when God's hand is removed, they cling as to their life.—U.