4. MOSES BEFORE PHARAOH.
One day that Moses was keeping sheep, his father-in-law, Jethro, came to him and demanded back the staff that he had given him. Then Moses cast the staff from him among a number of other rods, but the staff ever returned to his hand as often as he cast it away. Then Jethro laid hold of the rod, but he could not move it. Therefore he was obliged to let Moses retain it. But he was estranged from him.
Now Pharaoh was dead. And when the news reached Moses in Midian, he gat him up, and set his wife Zipporah and his son Gershom on an ass, and took the way of Egypt.
And as they were in the way, they halted in a certain place; and it was cloudy, and cold, and rainy. Then they encamped, and Zipporah tried to make a fire, but could not, for the wood was damp.
Moses said, “I see a fire burning at the foot of the mountain. I will go to it, for there must be travellers there; and I will fetch a brand away and will kindle a fire, and be warm.”
Then, he took his rod in his hand and went. But when he came near the spot, he saw that the fire was not on the ground, but at the summit of a tree; and the tree was a thorn. A thorn-tree was the first tree that grew, when God created the herb of the field and the trees of the forest. Moses was filled with fear, and he would have turned and fled, but a voice[[488]] called to him out of the fire, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here am I.” And the voice said again, “Put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.” This was the reason why he was bidden put off his shoes; they were made of asses’ hide, and Moses had trodden on the dung of his ass as he followed Zipporah and Gershom.
Then God gave Moses his commission to go into Egypt, and release His captive people. But Moses feared, and said, “I am of slow lips and tongue!” for he had burnt them, with his finger, when he took the live coal before Pharaoh, as already related. But God said to him, “I have given thee Aaron thy brother to speak for thee. And now, what is this that thou hast in thy hand?”
Moses answered, “This is my rod.”
“And to what purpose dost thou turn it?”
“I lean on it when I am walking, and when I come where there is no grass, I strike the trees therewith, and bring down the leaves to feed my sheep withal.” And when he had narrated all the uses to which he put the staff, God said to him, “With this staff shalt thou prevail against Pharaoh. Cast it upon the ground.” And when he cast it down, it was transformed into a serpent or dragon, and Moses turned his back to run from it; but God said, “Fear not; take it up by the neck;” and he caught it, and it became a rod in his hands. Then said the Most Holy, “Put thy hand into thy bosom.” And he did so, and drew it forth, and it was white, and shining like the moon in the dark of night.
Then Moses desired to go back to Zipporah his wife, but the angel Gabriel retained him, saying, “Thou hast higher duties to perform than to attend on thy wife. Lo! I have already reconducted her to her father’s house. Go on upon thy way to Pharaoh, as the Lord hath commanded thee.”
The night on which Moses entered Egyptian territory, an angel appeared to Aaron in a dream, with a crystal glass full of good wine in his hand, and said, as he extended it to him:—
“Aaron, drink of this wine which the Lord sends thee as a pledge of good news. Thy brother Moses has returned to Egypt, and God has chosen him to be His prophet, and thee to be his spokesman. Arise, and go forth to meet him!”
Aaron therefore arose from his bed and went out of the city to the banks of the Nile, but there was no boat there by which he could cross. Suddenly he perceived in the distance a light which approached; and as it drew nearer he saw that it was a horseman. It was Gabriel mounted on a steed of fire, which shone like the brightest diamond, and whose neighing was hymns of praise, for the steed was one of the cherubim.
Aaron at first supposed that he was pursued by one of Pharaoh’s horsemen, and he would have cast himself into the Nile; but Gabriel stayed him, declared who he was, mounted him on the fiery cherub, and they crossed the Nile on his back.
There stood Moses, who, when he saw Aaron, exclaimed, “Truth is come, Falsehood is passed.” Now this was the sign that God had given to Moses, “Behold he cometh to meet thee.”[[489]] And they rejoiced over each other.
But another account is this: Moses entered Memphis with his sheep, during the night. Now Amram was dead, but his wife Jochebed was alive. When Moses reached the door, Jochebed was awake. He knocked at the door; then she opened, but knew him not, and asked, “Who art thou?”
He answered, “I am a man from a far country; I pray thee lodge me, and give me to eat this night.”
She took him in, and brought him some meat, and said to Aaron, “Sit down and eat with the guest, to do him honour.” Aaron, in eating, conversed with Moses and recognized him.
Then the mother and sister knew him also. And when the meal was over, Moses acquitted himself of his mission to Aaron, and Aaron answered, “I will obey the will of God.”[[490]]
Moses spent the night, and the whole of the following day, in relating to his mother the things that had befallen him.
And on the second night, Moses and Aaron went forth to Pharaoh’s palace. Now the palace had four hundred doors, a hundred on each side, and each door was guarded by sixty thousand fighting men. The angel Gabriel came to them and led them into the palace, but not by the doors.
When they appeared before Pharaoh, they said: “God hath sent us unto thee to bid thee let the Hebrews go, that they may hold a feast in the wilderness.”
But Pharaoh said, “Who is the Lord, that I should obey His voice to let Israel go? I know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go.”[[491]]
Tabari tells a different story. Moses and Aaron sought admittance during two years. Now Pharaoh gave himself out to be a god.
But Moses and Aaron, when they spake at the door with the porters, said, “He is no god.” One day the jester of Pharaoh heard his master read the history of his own life, and when he came to the passage which asserted he was a god, the jester exclaimed, “Now this is strange! For two years there have been two strangers at thy gate denying thy divinity.”
When Pharaoh heard this, he was in a fury, and he sent and had Moses and Aaron brought before him.
But to return to the Rabbinic tale. Moses and Aaron were driven out from the presence of Pharaoh; and he said, “Who admitted these men?” And some of the porters he slew, and some he scourged.
Then two lionesses were placed before the palace, to protect it, and the beasts suffered no man to enter unless Pharaoh gave the word.
And the Lord spake to Moses and Aaron, saying, “When Pharaoh talketh with you, saying, Give us a miracle, thou shalt say to Aaron, Take thy rod and cast it down, and it shall became a basilisk serpent; for all the inhabitants of the earth shall hear the voice of the shriek of Egypt when I destroy it, as all creatures heard the shriek of the serpent when I stripped it, and took from it its legs and made it lick the dust after the Fall.”[[492]]
On the morrow, Moses and Aaron came again to the king’s palace, and the lionesses would have devoured them. Then Moses raised his staff, and their chains brake, and they followed him, barking like dogs, into the house.[[493]]
When Moses and Aaron stood before the king, Aaron cast down the rod before Pharaoh, and before his servants, and it became a serpent, which opened its jaws, and it laid one jaw beneath the throne, and its upper jaw was over the canopy above it; then the servants fled from before it, and Pharaoh hid himself beneath his throne, and the fear it caused him gave him bowel-complaint for a week. Now before this Pharaoh was only moved once a week, and this was the occasion of his being lifted up with pride, and giving himself out to be a god.[[494]]
Pharaoh cried out from under the throne, “O Moses, take hold of the serpent, and I will do what you desire.”[[495]]
Moses took hold of the serpent, and it became a rod in his hands. Then Pharaoh crawled out from under his throne, and sat down upon it. And Moses put his hand into his bosom, and when he drew it forth, it shone like the moon.
The king sent for his magicians, and the chief of these were Jannes and Jambres. He told them what Moses had done.
They said, “We can turn a thousand rods into serpents.”
Then the king named a day when Moses and Aaron on one side should strive with Jannes and Jambres[[496]] and all the magicians on the other; and he gave them a month to prepare for the contest.
On the day appointed—it was Pharaoh’s birthday—all the inhabitants of Memphis were assembled in a great plain outside the city, where lists were staked out, and the royal tent was spread for the king to view the contest.
Moses and Aaron stood on one side and the magicians on the other.
The latter said, “Shall we cast our rods, or will you?”
Moses answered, “Do you cast your rods first.”
Then the magicians threw down a hundred ass-loads of rods, tied the rods together with cords, and by their enchantment caused them to appear to the spectators like serpents, leaping and darting from one side of the arena to the other.
And all the people were filled with fear, and the magicians said, “We have this day triumphed over Moses.”
Then the prophet of God cast his rod before Pharaoh, and it became a mighty serpent. It rolled its tail round the throne of the king, and it shot forth its head, and swallowed all the rods of the enchanters, so that there remained not one.
After that all had disappeared, Moses took the serpent, and it became a rod in his hand again, but all the rods of the magicians had vanished.
And when the magicians saw the miracle that Moses had wrought, they were converted, and worshipped the true God. But Pharaoh cut off their hands and feet, and crucified them; and they died. Pharaoh’s own daughter Maschita believed; and the king in his rage did not spare her, but cast her into a fire, and she was burnt. Bithia was also denounced to him, and she was condemned to the flames, but the angel Gabriel delivered her. The Mussulmans say that he consoled her by telling her that she would become the wife of Mohammed in Paradise, after which he gave her to drink, and when she had tasted, she died without pain.
Then Moses and Aaron met Pharaoh in the morning as he went by the side of the river, and Moses said to the king, “The Lord of the Hebrews hath sent me unto thee, saying, Let My people go, that they may serve Me in the wilderness.”
But Pharaoh would not hearken to him. Then Aaron stretched out his rod over the river, and it became blood.
All the water that was in the vessels also became blood, even the spittle that was in the mouth of the Egyptians. The Rabbi Levi said that by this means the Israelites realized large fortunes; for if an Israelite and an Egyptian went together to the Nile to fetch water, the vessel of the Egyptian was found to contain blood, but that of the Israelite pure water; but if an Israelite brought water to the house of an Egyptian and sold it, it remained water.[[497]]
But Pharaoh’s heart was hard; and seven days passed, after that the Lord had smitten the river.
Then went Moses and Aaron to him. But the four hundred doors of the palace were guarded by bears, lions, and other savage beasts, so that none might pass, till they were satisfied with flesh. But Moses and Aaron came up, collected them together, drew a circle round them with the sacred staff, and the wild beasts licked the feet of the prophets and followed them into the presence of Pharaoh.[[498]]
Moses and Aaron repeated their message to Pharaoh, but he would not hearken to them, but drove them from his presence. Aaron smote the river; but Moses on no occasion smote the Nile, for he respected the river which had saved his life as a babe.[[499]] Then the Lord brought frogs upon the land, and filled all the houses; they were in the beds, on the tables, in the cups. And the king sent for Moses and said: “Intreat the Lord, that He may take the frogs from me and from my people.” So the Lord sent a great rain, and it washed the frogs into the Red Sea.
The next plague was lice.[[500]]
The fourth plague was wild beasts.
The fifth was murrain.
The sixth was boils and blains upon man and beast.[[501]]
The seventh was hail and tempest. Now Job regarded the word of Moses, and he brought his cattle within doors, and they were saved; but Balaam regarded it not, and all his cattle were destroyed.[[502]]
The eighth was locusts; these the Egyptians fried, and laid by in store to serve them for food; but when the west wind came to blow the locusts away, it blew away also those that had been pickled and laid by for future consumption.[[503]]
The ninth plague was darkness.
The tenth was the death of the first-born.
The Book of Jasher says that, the Egyptians having closed their doors and windows against the plagues of flies, and locusts, and lice, God sent the sea-monster Silinoth, a huge polypus with arms ten cubits long, and the beast climbed upon the roofs and broke them up, and let down its slimy arms, and unlatched all the doors and windows, and threw them open for the flies and locusts and lice to enter.[[504]]
But the Mohammedans give a different order to the signs:—(1) the rod changed into a serpent; (2) the whitened hand; (3) the famine; (4) a deluge, the Nile rose over the land so that every man stood in water up to his neck; (5) locusts; (6) anommals,—these are two-legged animals smaller than locusts; (7) blood; (8) frogs; (9) every green thing throughout the land, all fruit, all grain, eggs, and everything in the houses were turned to stone.[[505]]
After the plague of the darkness, Pharaoh resolved on a general massacre of all the children of the Hebrews. The Mussulmans put the temporary petrifaction of all in the land in the place of the darkness. The Book of Exodus says that during the darkness “they saw not one another, neither rose any from his place;” but the Arabs say that they were turned to stone. Here might be seen a petrified man with a balance in his hand sitting in the bazaar; there, another stone man counting out money; and the porters at the palace were congealed to marble with their swords in their hands.[[506]] But others say that this was a separate plague, and that the darkness followed it.
And now Gabriel took on him the form of a servant of the king, and he went before him and asked him what was his desire.
“That vile liar Moses deserves death,” said Pharaoh.
“How shall I slay him?” asked Gabriel.
“Let him be cast into the water.”
“Give me a written order,” said the angel. Pharaoh did so.
Then Gabriel went to Moses and told him that the time was come when he was to leave Egypt with all the people, for the measure of the iniquity of Pharaoh was filled up, and the Lord would destroy him with a signal overthrow.