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.In Genesis, we were introduced to the idiom "go in unto" / "come in unto," meaning "to fuck."
2 For if thou refuse to let them go, and wilt hold them still,
3 Behold, the hand of the LORD is upon thy cattle which is in the field, upon the horses, upon the asses, upon the camels, upon the oxen, and upon the sheep: there shall be a very grievous murrain.
4 And the LORD shall sever between the cattle of Israel and the cattle of Egypt: and there shall nothing die of all that is the children's of Israel.
5 And the LORD appointed a set time, saying, To morrow the LORD shall do this thing in the land.
6 And the LORD did that thing on the morrow, and all the cattle of Egypt died: but of the cattle of the children of Israel died not one.
7 And Pharaoh sent, and, behold, there was not one of the cattle of the Israelites dead. And the heart of Pharaoh was hardened, and he did not let the people go.
8 And the LORD said unto Moses and unto Aaron, Take to you handfuls of ashes of the furnace, and let Moses sprinkle it toward the heaven in the sight of Pharaoh.
9 And it shall become small dust in all the land of Egypt, and shall be a boil breaking forth with blains upon man, and upon beast, throughout all the land of Egypt.
10 And they took ashes of the furnace, and stood before Pharaoh; and Moses sprinkled it up toward heaven; and it became a boil breaking forth with blains upon man, and upon beast.
11 And the magicians could not stand before Moses because of the boils; for the boil was upon the magicians, and upon all the Egyptians.
12 And the LORD hardened the heart of Pharaoh, and he hearkened not unto them; as the LORD had spoken unto Moses.
13 And the LORD said unto Moses, Rise up early in the morning, and stand before Pharaoh, and say unto him, Thus saith the LORD God of the Hebrews, Let my people go, that they may serve me.
14 For I will at this time send all my plagues upon thine heart, and upon thy servants, and upon thy people; that thou mayest know that there is none like me in all the earth.
15 For now I will stretch out my hand, that I may smite thee and thy people with pestilence; and thou shalt be cut off from the earth.
16 And in very deed for this cause have I raised thee up, for to shew in thee my power; and that my name may be declared throughout all the earth.
17 As yet exaltest thou thyself against my people, that thou wilt not let them go?
18 Behold, to morrow about this time I will cause it to rain a very grievous hail, such as hath not been in Egypt since the foundation thereof even until now.
19 Send therefore now, and gather thy cattle, and all that thou hast in the field; for upon every man and beast which shall be found in the field, and shall not be brought home, the hail shall come down upon them, and they shall die.
20 He that feared the word of the LORD among the servants of Pharaoh made his servants and his cattle flee into the houses:
21 And he that regarded not the word of the LORD left his servants and his cattle in the field.
22 And the LORD said unto Moses, Stretch forth thine hand toward heaven, that there may be hail in all the land of Egypt, upon man, and upon beast, and upon every herb of the field, throughout the land of Egypt.
23 And Moses stretched forth his rod toward heaven: and the LORD sent thunder and hail, and the fire ran along upon the ground; and the LORD rained hail upon the land of Egypt.
24 So there was hail, and fire mingled with the hail, very grievous, such as there was none like it in all the land of Egypt since it became a nation.
25 And the hail smote throughout all the land of Egypt all that was in the field, both man and beast; and the hail smote every herb of the field, and brake every tree of the field.
26 Only in the land of Goshen, where the children of Israel were, was there no hail.
27 And Pharaoh sent, and called for Moses and Aaron, and said unto them, I have sinned this time: the LORD is righteous, and I and my people are wicked.
28 Intreat the LORD (for it is enough) that there be no more mighty thunderings and hail; and I will let you go, and ye shall stay no longer.
29 And Moses said unto him, As soon as I am gone out of the city, I will spread abroad my hands unto the LORD; and the thunder shall cease, neither shall there be any more hail; that thou mayest know how that the earth is the LORD's.
30 But as for thee and thy servants, I know that ye will not yet fear the LORD God.
31 And the flax and the barley was smitten: for the barley was in the ear, and the flax was bolled.
32 But the wheat and the rie were not smitten: for they were not grown up.
33 And Moses went out of the city from Pharaoh, and spread abroad his hands unto the LORD: and the thunders and hail ceased, and the rain was not poured upon the earth.
34 And when Pharaoh saw that the rain and the hail and the thunders were ceased, he sinned yet more, and hardened his heart, he and his servants.
35 And the heart of Pharaoh was hardened, neither would he let the children of Israel go; as the LORD had spoken by Moses.
For example:
- (Genesis 16:2) And Sarai said unto Abram, Behold now, the LORD hath restrained me from bearing: I pray thee, go in unto my maid; it may be that I may obtain children by her. And Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai.
- (Genesis 38:9) And Onan knew that the seed should not be his; and it came to pass, when he went in unto his brother's wife, that he spilled it on the ground, lest that he should give seed to his brother.
- (Genesis 38:16) And he turned unto her by the way, and said, Go to, I pray thee, let me come in unto thee; (for he knew not that she was his daughter in law.) And she said, What wilt thou give me, that thou mayest come in unto me?
Looking back, I see that men have been going in unto men for some time. For example:
- (Genesis 40:6) And Joseph came in unto [his fellow prisoners] in the morning, and looked upon them, and, behold, they were sad.
- (Genesis 41:14) Then Pharaoh sent and called Joseph, and they brought him hastily out of the dungeon: and he shaved himself, and changed his raiment, and came in unto Pharaoh.
- (Exodus 7:10) And Moses and Aaron went in unto Pharaoh, and they did so as the LORD had commanded: and Aaron cast down his rod before Pharaoh, and before his servants, and it became a serpent
Still, if I were Moses and Aaron, and the big boss asked me to go in unto Pharaoh, I'd definitely ask for clarification. It can be pretty embarrassing to take instructions the wrong way.
Anyway, the plague of plagues continues, showing God's ability to do everything except advance the plot.
Fans of spectacle will note that they are some pretty nasty-ass plagues, the first two of which are described by new vocabulary words:
- murrain (meaning: "a pestilence or plague especially affecting domestic animals")
- blains (meaning: "an inflammatory swelling or sore")
The murrain is so bad, it kills all of the Egyptian cattle. Then all Egyptian people — and their dead cattle — get the blains. And that was a veritable golden age, compared to the hail (with special added guest: fire, plus bonus attractions rain and thunder) so bad it will not only kill all the people who don't find cover, it's gonna kill all the beasts all over again.
6 comments:
This story needs Charlton Heston.
Especially if the next chapter has a plague of hollow-point bullets.
lol. Seriously tho, notwithstanding his personal insanity I always enjoy watching Heston in movies; planet of the apes and soylent green in particular. Sorry to veer OT but I know this part of the bible too well and its been beaten to death by mass media and church.
Ah, yes, the "murrain" and the "blains". Afflictions long since brought under control by modern medicine. Perhaps this is why the fundamentalists insist on keeping the venerable King James in circulation - in their perfect world, only the fortunate few will have health insurance, so a knowledge of the murrain and the blains may prove useful in the wonderful world to come.
"Go in unto" isn't an idiom, its a euphemism. Moses goes "in unto" a tent, later, and I suspect that doesn't mean that Moses fucked the tent. Its a bit like writing "the schoolchildren played scrabble" and then a couple of pages later writing "Marion and Geoff decided that they were in love, and after fine wine and dining, they headed home, upstairs to the bedroom, where they undressed, and then, er.. 'played scrabble' ". I agree that Aaron 'going in unto' Pharoah and casting down his 'rod' is amusing, if taken as double entendre.
Murrain just means "death" (its from Latin "Mors" (as in "mortuary", and "morbid"), via french), and at the time the KJV was written was used to refer to livestock disease in general. Protestants (possibly also some catholics) have since erroneously taken "Murrain" to be some specific disease fitting the symptoms described in the bible.
Likewise "blains". "Blains" is still used as a general term in parts of the UK, "chill-blains" for example means the unpleasant sensation you get in your hands if you go out on a cold day, and then come in and warm your hands on a fire - the sharp change in temperature messes with your nervous system's sensory perception a bit.
What they refer to are two non-specific "pestilence" against the cattle. What has happened here, according to the documentary hypothesis, is that
-originally (represented by the Jahwist) the story had just a plague of hail, which damaged crops and hurt and sometimes killed cattle (remember that its a hot country, and the cattle are nowhere near as fat as in Europe and so forth)
-the Elohist tradition split the plague into two - a non-specific plague against the cattle ("pestilence"), and the more dramatic fire-hail against the crops.
-the two sources get merged together ("JE"), which the priestly source later reads
-the Priestly source drops the fire-hail (the priestly source is a boring writer, and tends to drop any hint of powerful imagery) and turns the non-specific "pestilence" against the cattle into boils
-a redactor (probably Ezra) splices JE together with the priestly source to make the book of Exodus (and other books), and by putting the priestly source's boils between JE's pestilence and JE's hail disconnects the two, and makes it seem like there were three plagues here, where the original story only had one.
-the redactor has occasionally added phrases like "and Pharaoh's heart was hardeded" (verse 7, second half), copying them from the priestly source, in order to make the combination seem more like as single document.
Note how Aaron and the magicians only appear in the plague from the priestly source (and by a two-word redaction in verse 27). Note how Moses does a plague in verse 22, and how YHWH does it in verse 6; each is the account from a different source. Note how Pharaoh's heart is hardened straight away by a plague in verse 12, but in verses 27-29 the initial result of a plague is for his heart to be softened; again they are from different sources. Note the end of verse 34 says that pharaoh's heart was hardened, but verse 35 immediately then says it was heartened - why does it repeat? answer:spliced together from different sources.
Only about two more chapters of plagues left...
By the way, ironically, when pointing out the phrase "go in unto", you missed out the only probable case of gay sex in Genesis - when Ham uncovers "his fathers nakedness". It doesn't mean his took his father's bedclothes off, after all "his father knew what Ham HAD DONE TO HIM", it means sex - in Leviticus (which is the next book), you repeatedly get the phrase "uncover the nakedness of" to mean "have sex with" in the list of forbidden sexual relationships (mother/father/daughter/etc). Anal rape is much more of a reason to severely curse someone's children (and have the curse confirmed by God) than stealing their clothes is.
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