Portal:Bible/Featured article/February, 2009

The Plagues of Egypt are the ten calamities imposed upon Egypt by God in the Bible (as recounted in the Book of Exodus, chapters 7–12), in order to convince Pharaoh to let the poorly treated Israelite slaves go. The Plagues of Egypt are recognized by Jews, Christians, and Muslims. The plagues as they appear in the Bible are:

1. Rivers and other water sources turned to blood. (Dam)
2. Amphibians (commonly believed to be frogs) (Tsfardeia)
3. Lice or gnats (Kinim)
4. beasts or flies (Arov)
5. disease on livestock (Dever)
6. Unhealable boils (Shkhin)
7. Hail mixed with fire (Barad)
8. locusts (Arbeh)
9. Darkness (Choshech)
10. Death of the first-born of all Egyptian families. (Makat Bechorot)

The first three plagues seemed to affect "all the land of Egypt", while the 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 9th did not affect the children of Israel. 8th is unclear. They were only spared from the final plague by sacrificing the Paschal lamb, marking their doorpost with the lamb's blood, and eating the sacrifice in a celebratory feast. The Torah describes the angel of death as killing all firstborn in Egypt, but passing over (hence "Passover") houses with lambs' blood on the doorpost. It was this plague which resulted in Pharaoh finally sending the Israelites away. (more...)