Comentarios bíblicos

Ex 7:1-25.

SECOND INTERVIEW WITH PHARAOH.

1. the Lord said unto Moses--He is here encouraged to wait again on the king--not, however, as formerly, in the attitude of a humble suppliant, but now armed with credentials as God's ambassador, and to make his demand in a tone and manner which no earthly monarch or court ever witnessed.

I have made thee a god--"made," that is, set, appointed; "a god"; that is, he was to act in this business as God's representative, to act and speak in His name and to perform things beyond the ordinary course of nature. The Orientals familiarly say of a man who is eminently great or wise, "he is a god" among men.

Aaron thy brother shall be thy prophet--that is, "interpreter" or "spokesman." The one was to be the vicegerent of God, and the other must be considered the speaker throughout all the ensuing scenes, even though his name is not expressly mentioned.

3. I will harden Pharaoh's heart--This would be the result. But the divine message would be the occasion, not the cause of the king's impenitent obduracy.

4, 5. I may lay mine hand upon Egypt, &c.--The succession of terrible judgments with which the country was about to be scourged would fully demonstrate the supremacy of Israel's God.

7. Moses was fourscore years old--This advanced age was a pledge that they had not been readily betrayed into a rash or hazardous enterprise, and that under its attendant infirmities they could not have carried through the work on which they were entering had they not been supported by a divine hand.

9. When Pharaoh shall speak unto you, &c.--The king would naturally demand some evidence of their having been sent from God; and as he would expect the ministers of his own gods to do the same works, the contest, in the nature of the case, would be one of miracles. Notice has already been taken of the rod of Moses

(Ex 4:2),

but rods were carried also by all nobles and official persons in the court of Pharaoh. It was an Egyptian custom, and the rods were symbols of authority or rank. Hence God commanded His servants to use a rod.

10. Aaron cast down his rod before Pharaoh, &c.--It is to be presumed that Pharaoh had demanded a proof of their divine mission.

11. Then Pharaoh also called the wise men and the sorcerers, &c.--His object in calling them was to ascertain whether this doing of Aaron's was really a work of divine power or merely a feat of magical art. The magicians of Egypt in modern times have been long celebrated adepts in charming serpents, and particularly by pressing the nape of the neck, they throw them into a kind of catalepsy, which renders them stiff and immovable--thus seeming to change them into a rod. They conceal the serpent about their persons, and by acts of legerdemain produce it from their dress, stiff and straight as a rod. Just the same trick was played off by their ancient predecessors, the most renowned of whom, Jannes and Jambres

(2Ti 3:8),

were called in on this occasion. They had time after the summons to make suitable preparations--and so it appears they succeeded by their "enchantments" in practising an illusion on the senses.

12. but Aaron's rod swallowed up their rods--This was what they could not be prepared for, and the discomfiture appeared in the loss of their rods, which were probably real serpents.