[net.religion] The Egyptian Plagues in Exodus

tim@unc.UUCP (01/09/84)

Actually, this is a response to two separate articles, both of which concern
the visitation of plagues on Egypt by Yahweh in the Book of Exodus.  The
first article was by Dave Norris, a supposed refutation of my position on
the cruelty of Yahweh in the incident.  (This article you are reading is the
first of a series of replies to Dave's article.)  Breaking my usual
indentation conventions, the following uses the left-hand border to identify
the writer.

T  I don't think the firstborn
I  in Egypt during the captivity would have agreed with the verdict of
M  compassion and mercy (Ex. 11:5,12:29), particularly since it was due to
.  Yahweh's hardening of Pharoah's heart in the first place that made this
T  neccessary.  Also, with omnipotence, Yahweh could have teleported the Jews
I  out of captivity without bloodshed, or put the Egyptians to sleep while
M  they left, but no.  That wouldn't be gory and exciting enough for him.

D  I have discussed Pharaoh and Moses in another article.  Briefly, of
A  the times it was mentioned that Pharaoh's heart was hardened, only
V  the first time does it indicate that God intervened.  And it does not
I  imply divine intervention; God probably allowed his heart to harden
D  by "not softening it"; that is, to let man's own sinful nature take
.  its course.

First, it is obvious that this is completely off the point.  The statement
about the hardening of the heart in my article is in a "particularly"
clause.  As most English speakers know, this means that it is not of central
value to the argument, but only adds force.  If it is removed, the argument
still stands by itself.  Therefore, even if David Norris does manage to
prove that Yahweh didn't cause the hardening, the point that affair was
carried out in an unacceptably cruel fashion still stands.

This trick of sophistry -- that is, ignoring main points -- is
characteristic of Dave in his response: I have counted no fewer than ten
instances of it.  He also uses the discussion of a peripheral point to act
as a smokescreen for this tactic, in this particular case.

When I point out these fallacious forms of argument and their frequency, it
is not meant to reflect badly on David's character, only on his means of
argument.  Please, readers, take these in the way they are proferred.

Second, Dave's assertion about the Biblical account is false.  In fact, I
have found seven places in which it mentions that the hardening is a
deliberate act of Yahweh.  These are all in Exodus, of course, so I'll just
give the numbers: 4:21, 7:3, 9:12, 10:1, 10:20, 10:27, 11:10.  These verses
are easily verifiable by the reader, and form a complete disproof of David's
assertion.  I would not make such a big deal over this if it were not for
this piece of arrogant breast-beating on David's part later on, which fairly
cries out for refutation:

D  Unfortunately, Tim's knowledge of the Scripture is extremely weak
A  (compared to Satan's) and so it is easy for a layman like me to
V  refute Tim's arguments (especially when he makes such gross errors
E  in Scriptural references).

By the way, the "gross error" that he is referring to is the typographical
error I made in referring to Mat. 25:35 as 26:35.  Gee, what a proof of my
ignorance of Scripture, that I should not type with perfection.  This sort
of personal attack is also characteristic of Dave's response.  My count of
personal attacks against me in his article is fifteen; I will list these in
a later article, perhaps.  I am excluding from this a few questionable
cases, or the number would be roughly half again that.

It should again be noted that the above is not meant to reflect badly on
Dave's character, only on his form of argument.  I will try my best to avoid
emitting personal attacks of my own to counter Dave's (although it may not
be easy).

D  But the concentration on doing it better takes away from the real
A  purpose of God's chosen people and the Old Testament.  The OT is not
V  just a history book; it is a lesson on the nature of man's evil
I  heart.  The ten commandments are not just a good set of moral rules;
D  they are designed to show men that, no matter how hard they try, they
.  can't make it without God's help.  They don't make the grade. Thus,
   Jesus Christ was the ultimate fulfillment of the Old Testament.

That first sentence is an excuse to ignore the point again -- in this case,
the point is the fact that omnipotence makes the slaughter of the firstborn
unneedful, and therefore morally unjustifiable.  David simply ignores this
point, raising no objection or disproof.  Also, once again, he uses the
introduction of material irrelevant to the main point as a smokescreen.
Here is another of those ten instances of this deceitful tactic of sophistry
which I have mentioned above.

Those two paragraphs of Dave's are his complete response to the paragraph of
mine; not one phoneme has been removed.  It is clear to anyone who has had
it pointed out to them, and who has examined the paragraghs in this light,
that they do not even marginally refute me, since the same tactic (ignoring
the point) is used in both.  On the other hand, if you do not look at the
evidence above, in an impartial fashion, because you "know" that I am wrong
and must be wrong because what I say is not what you believe, then you will
most certainly think that I am slinging mud at Dave and that I am an evil
man.  I mention this because I have been thinking lately about the
impossibility of perfection in any argument.  Any argument, even if
completely unassailable by reason, can still be ignored or denied on
emotional grounds by those who are prejudiced, or it can be "refuted" by the
techniques of sophistry.  These are things I cannot control; it is every
readers' responsibility to assure that these things do not happen, that
rational arguments are interacted with solely on rational grounds.

On to my second response, this time to an article of Karl Kleinpaste's,
dealing with the Egyptian Plagues.  Karl says:

K  I discussed this with an Orthodox Jew with whom I work, and his
A  description was this: the first 5 plagues were inflicted on the
R  Egyptians with the Pharoah letting his own will run the show.  Then,
L  after the fifth plague, "the will of Pharoah was known," which is to
.  say that it had become obvious that Pharoah wasn't interested in the
K  least in letting the people go.  During this time, Pharoah hardened
A  his own heart.  Once his will was known, and he was in a sense
R  beyond hope, God continued to use the situation.  In this instance,
L  God maintained the hardening of his heart, but this was only after
.  the Pharoah's own free will had been fully expressed.  When the last
K  5 plagues had come and gone, and Pharoah's son had died, his will
A  was broken.  He could have used his free will any time up to the
R  fifth plague, but chose not to; at that time, God took over the
L  situation.

Hmm.  Perhaps; that is at least mostly consistent with the text.  However,
Pahroah's son is not killed until the tenth and final curse; he is
apparently in fine health at the time you claim he's dead.  That is not the
point of my response, though.  Pharoah was NOT beyond hope.  In fact, he
actually recanted, completely willing to let the tribes of Israel leave
Egypt, and Yahweh then hardened his heart, forcing the remaining plagues to
be used!  If Yahweh had simply not performed the actions of Ex. 10:20, the
Israelites would likely have been freed without fuss.  Pharoah says in Ex.
10:16-17, "I have sinned against Yahweh your God, and against yourselves
[Moses and Aaron].  Forgive my sin, I implore you, this once, and entreat
Yahweh your God just to rid me of this deadly plague."  It is clear that
Pharoah is repentant, ready to bargain.  But in Ex. 10:20, Yahweh himself
hardens Pharoah's heart, meaning that the darkness and the killing of the
first-born must proceed.  Why?  Ex. 11:9 has Yahweh saying "Pharoah will not
listen to you; so that my wonders may be multiplied in the land of Egypt."
This hardly seems sufficient motivation for wholesale slaughter such as that
of Ex. 12:29, in which "Yahweh struck down all the first-born in the land of
Egypt: the first-born of Pharoah, heir to his throne, the first-born of the
prisoner in his dungeon, and the first-born of all the cattle."  All those
children and adults killed, for apparently the same reason that would lead
one of us today to set off fireworks.  This is immorality, pure and simple.

There is one possible objection to this.  Even after the penultimate plague,
Pharoah was unwilling to let the descendants of Israel take their flocks and
herds with them.  This was unacceptable, because at the time Yahweh enjoyed
having butchered animals sacrificed to him, and the Israelites knew that
Yahweh would certainly do terrible things to them if Yahweh wasn't fed.
Thus, one might say, Yahweh had no alternative but to use the final plague.
However, this does not hold up.  Perhaps it would have been immoral in some
way for Yahweh to force Pharoah to accept his terms by using his
omnipotence, but Yahweh could just as easily have led the Israelites to find
herds of suitable animals in the wilderness, or commanded the animals to go
to a certain place.  (Animals are not commonly held to have free will, so
there would be no moral problem with the latter, and obviously there is none
with the former.)  Rather than this compassionate miracle, which is wholly
consistent with his powers and moral requirements, he decided to kill all
the first-born of the Egyptians.  And this is a being you say deserves my
worship?  A willful mass murderer, even when not to murder would have been
just as easy and effective?  Ever hear of a place called Nuremburg?

I would like to thank both David Norris and Karl Kleinpaste for helping me
to understand the Plagues.  You may rest assured that the next version of
the essay "Even If I DID Believe ..." will contain a longer and far more
condemnatory treatment of the killing of the first-born, thanks to you.
--
Tim Maroney, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
duke!unc!tim (USENET), tim.unc@csnet-relay (ARPA)