Exodus 10:21

_AND THE LORD SAID UNTO MOSES, STRETCH OUT THINE HAND TOWARD HEAVEN, THAT THERE MAY BE DARKNESS OVER THE LAND OF EGYPT, EVEN DARKNESS WHICH MAY BE FELT._ Stretch out thine hand ... darkness. Whatever secondary means were employed in producing it-whether thick clammy fogs and vapours, according to some, a sand storm, or the chamsin, according to others-it was such that it could be almost perceived by the organs of touch, and so protracted as to continue for three days, which the chamsin does (Hengstenberg, Osburn). 'It was a gross and palpable darkness; the longer night that the book of God specifies-a silent, solitary, melancholy, inexplicable season. No murmur disquiets the air, no man hears his name, no birds sing, except the owl and the night-raven, which creak only dismal things' (Adams)....

21._And the Lord said unto Moses. _God here inflicts the punishment without denouncing it; because Pharaoh had deceitfully broken his promise of being obedient to His word. Since, therefore, he had so wickedly abused God’s clemency, he must needs be suddenly overtaken by a new calamity, that he might in the darkness feel God’s avenging hand, which he had despised. Nor, indeed, would he have been alarmed by menaces; as it will directly appear, that, when he was warned of the death of his first-born, and of the same slaughter both upon the first-born of man and of beast through the whole land, he was unmoved, and in his security provoked God, as if he had heard nothing. There is no wonder, then, that God covered the whole land with darkness before Pharaoh could suspect anything of the kind. At the end of the verse, some translate the word ימש, (125) _yamesh, _passively; a

21-29 The plague of darkness brought upon Egypt was a dreadful plague. It was darkness which might be felt, so thick were the fogs. It astonished and terrified. It continued three days; six nights in one; so long the most lightsome palaces were dungeons. Now Pharaoh had time to consider, if he would have improved it. Spiritual darkness is spiritual bondage; while Satan blinds men's eyes that they see not, he binds their hands and feet, that they work not for God, nor move toward heaven. They sit in darkness. It was righteous with God thus to punish. The blindness of their minds brought upon them this darkness of the air; never was mind so blinded as Pharaoh's, never was air so darkened as Egypt. Let us dread the consequences of sin; if three days of darkness were so dreadful, what will everlasting darkness be? The children of Israel, at the same time, had light in their dwellings. We mu...

_THE_ NINTH _PLAGUE _- THICK DARKNESS Verse Exodus 10:21. _DARKNESS_ WHICH _MAY BE FELT._] Probably this was occasioned by a superabundance of aqueous vapours floating in the atmosphere, which were so thick as to prevent the rays of the sun from penetrating through them; an extraordinarily thick mist supernaturally, i.e., miraculously, brought on. An awful emblem of the darkened state of the Egyptians and their king....

DARKNESS - This infliction was specially calculated to affect the spirits of the Egyptians, whose chief object of worship was the Sun-god; and its suddenness and severity in connection with the act of Moses mark it as a preternatural withdrawal of light. Yet, it has an analogy in physical phenomena. After the vernal equinox the southwest wind from the desert blows some 50 days, not however, continuously but at intervals, lasting generally some two or three days. It fills the atmosphere with dense masses of fine sand, bringing on a darkness far deeper than that of our worst fogs in winter. The consternation of Pharaoh proves that, familiar as he may have been with the phenomenon, no previous occurrence had prepared him for its intensity and duration, and that he recognized it as a supernatural visitation....

EXPOSITION THE NINTH PLAGUE. The ninth plague, like the third and the sixth, was inflicted without special warning. God had announced, after the plague of boils, that he was about to "send all his plagues upon the heart" of the king; and so a succession of inflictions was to be expected. The ninth plague probably followed the eighth after a very short interval. It is rightly regarded as an aggravation of a well-known natural phenomenon—the Khamsin, or "Wind of the Desert"_ _which commonly visits Egypt about the time of the vernal equinox, and is accompanied by an awful and weird darkness. This is caused by the dense clouds of fine sand which the wind brings with it, which intercept the sun's light, and produce a darkness beyond that of our worst fogs, and compared by some travellers to "the most gloomy night." The wind is depressing and annoying to an extreme degree. "While it lasts no m...

AND THE LORD SAID UNTO MOSES,.... About the eleventh day of the month Abib: STRETCH OUT THINE HAND TOWARD HEAVEN; where the luminaries are, and from whence light comes: THAT THERE MAY BE DARKNESS OVER THE LAND OF EGYPT, EVEN DARKNESS WHICH MAY BE FELT; that is, what caused it, the gross vapours and thick fogs; for otherwise darkness itself, being a privation of light, cannot be felt: Onkelos paraphrases it, "after that the darkness of the night is removed;'' so Jonathan; that it might appear to be different from that, and be much grosser....

CHAPTER 10 THE EIGHTH AND NINTH PLAGUES _ 1. The eighth plague: locusts (Exodus 10:1)_ 2. Pharaoh's renewed confession and refusal (Exodus 10:16) 3. The ninth plague: darkness (Exodus 10:21) 4. Pharaoh's anger (Exodus 10:27) The eighth plague is introduced by another warning; the ninth came without it. As a result of the eighth plague, Pharaoh confessed his sin against God and against Moses and Aaron; but after the ninth plague drove Moses from his presence and threatened the divine messenger with death. Locusts covered the face of the whole earth and every green thing was destroyed. On the

EXODUS 7:14 TO EXODUS 12:36. THE TEN PLAGUES. How deeply this series of events imprinted itself on the mind and heart of the nation is shown by the fulness with which the three sources report them. J 1° 2° 4° 5° 7° 8° 9° 10° E 1° 7° 8° 9° 10° P 1° 2° 3° 6° 10° 1°, river turned to blood; 2°, frogs; 3°, fice (gnats); 4°, flies; 5°, murrain; 6°, boils; 7°, hail; 8°, locusts; 9°, darkness; 10°, death of firstborn. A sound historical judgment will conclude, both from this fact and from the nature of the occurrences mentioned, as well as from the need for _some_ such group of causes to account for the escape of the tribes, that the traditions have a firm foothold in real events. But since not less than four centuries intervened between the events and the earliest of our sources, it is not to b

THE LORD (Hebrew. _Jehovah._ said. See note on Exodus 3:7, and compare note on Exodus 6:10. DARKNESS. First of four instances of darkness in judgment. Exodus 10:22.Matthew 27:45.Jude 1:13.Revelation 16:10....