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 in Egypt and Egyptian Legends Dr. Nahum Sarna, in Exploring Exodus, Ch. 4, identifies connections between the miracles performed by Moshe and Aharon and parallels in Ancient Near Eastern legend, including the following: 

• The sign of the 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.