Ancient Near Eastern Index – Parashat Vaera/0

Ancient Near Eastern Index – Parashat Vaera

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The Plagues and Egyptian Deities

Both Shemot 12:12 and Bemidbar 33:4 explicitly state that the Plague of the Firstborn executed a "judgment against the [Egyptian] gods". Both Midrashim and scholars have suggested that the other plagues as well might have targeted what were believed to be Egyptian deities.

• Primary sources – See Tanchuma Vaera 13, Midrash Aggadah Shemot 7:15, and Shemot Rabbah 9:9 that the Nile was viewed as a deity and was thus struck first with the plague of blood.
• See “And Upon All the Gods Of Egypt I Will Execute Judgment”: The Egyptian Deity in the Ten Plagues, by Ira Friedman, for analysis of the meaning and symbolism of the ten plagues against the context of Egyptian religious beliefs.
• See Z. Zevit, "Three Ways to Look at the Ten Plagues: Were They Natural Disasters, a Demonstration of the Impotence of the Egyptian Gods, or an Undoing of Creation?" BR 6 (1990): 16-23, 42.

The Wonders and Egyptian Legends Dr. Nahum Sarna, in Exploring Exodus (New York, 1996): 66-70, identifies connections between the miracles performed by Moshe and Aharon and parallels in Ancient Near Eastern legend, including the following: 

• The sign of the staff turning into a crocodile can be more fully understood against the context of the Egyptian legend of Khufu, narrated in brief here as Story 2 on the Westcar Papyrus. 
• The Sumerian legend of Inanna and Su-Kale-Tuda, narrated in brief here, tells of a plague of water being turned to blood. 
• The Egyptian text The Prophecies of Neferti describes wild animals overrunning the land as a symbol of destruction and chaos.