Exodus 10–12

10Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go and see the king. I have made him and his officials stubborn, in order that I may perform these miracles among them ²and in order that you may be able to tell your children and grandchildren how I made fools of the Egyptians when I performed the miracles. All of you will know that I am the Lord.”

³So Moses and Aaron went to the king and said to him, “The Lord, the God of the Hebrews, says ‘How much longer will you refuse to submit to me? Let my people go, so that they may worship me. ⁴If you keep on refusing, then I will bring locusts into your country tomorrow. ⁵There will be so many that they will completely cover the ground. They will eat everything that the hail did not destroy, even the trees that are left. ⁶They will fill your palaces and the houses of all your officials and all your people. They will be worse than anything your ancestors ever saw.’ ” Then Moses turned and left.

⁷The king’s officials said to him, “How long is this man going to give us trouble? Let the Israelite men go, so that they can worship the Lord their God. Don’t you realize that Egypt is ruined?”

⁸So Moses and Aaron were brought back to the king, and he said to them, “You may go and worship the Lord your God. But exactly who will go?”

⁹Moses answered, “We will all go, including our children and our old people. We will take our sons and daughters, our sheep and goats, and our cattle, because we must hold a festival to honour the Lord.”

¹⁰The king said, “I swear by the Lord that I will never let you take your women and children! It is clear that you are plotting to revolt. ¹¹No! Only the men may go and worship the Lord if that is what you want.” With that, Moses and Aaron were driven out of the king’s presence.

¹²Then the Lord said to Moses, “Raise your hand over the land of Egypt to bring the locusts. They will come and eat everything that grows, everything that has survived the hail.” ¹³So Moses raised his stick, and the Lord caused a wind from the east to blow on the land all that day and all that night. By morning it had brought the locusts. ^14*They came in swarms and settled over the whole country. It was the largest swarm of locusts that had ever been seen or that ever would be seen again. ^15*They covered the ground until it was black with them; they ate everything that the hail had left, including all the fruit on the trees. Not a green thing was left on any tree or plant in all the land of Egypt.

¹⁶Then the king hurriedly called Moses and Aaron and said, “I have sinned against the Lord your God and against you. ¹⁷Now forgive my sin this once and pray to the Lord your God to take away this fatal punishment from me.” ¹⁸Moses left the king and prayed to the Lord. ¹⁹And the Lord changed the east wind into a very strong west wind, which picked up the locusts and blew them into the Gulf of Suez.^j Not one locust was left in all Egypt. ²⁰But the Lord made the king stubborn, and he did not let the Israelites go.

²¹The Lord then said to Moses, “Raise your hand towards the sky, and a darkness thick enough to be felt will cover the land of Egypt.” ^22*Moses raised his hand towards the sky, and there was total darkness throughout Egypt for three days. ²³The Egyptians could not see each other, and no one left his house during that time. But the Israelites had light where they were living.

²⁴The king called Moses and said, “You may go and worship the Lord; even your women and children may go with you. But your sheep, goats, and cattle must stay here.”

²⁵Moses answered, “Then you would have to provide us with animals for sacrifices and burnt offerings to offer to the Lord our God. ²⁶No, we will take our animals with us; not one will be left behind. We ourselves must select the animals with which to worship the Lord our God. And until we get there, we will not know what animals to sacrifice to him.”

²⁷The Lord made the king stubborn, and he would not let them go. ²⁸He said to Moses, “Get out of my sight! Don’t let me ever see you again! On the day I do, you will die!”

²⁹“You are right,” Moses answered. “You will never see me again.”

Moses Announces the Death of the First-Born

11Then the Lord said to Moses, “I will send only one more punishment on the king of Egypt and his people. After that he will let you leave. In fact, he will drive all of you out of here. ²Now speak to the people of Israel and tell all of them to ask their neighbours for gold and silver jewellery.” ³The Lord made the Egyptians respect the Israelites. Indeed, the officials and all the people considered Moses to be a very great man.

⁴Moses then said to the king, “The Lord says, ‘At about midnight I will go through Egypt, ⁵and every firstborn son in Egypt will die, from the king’s son, who is heir to the throne, to the son of the slave woman who grinds corn. The firstborn of all the cattle will die also. ⁶There will be loud crying all over Egypt, such as there has never been before or ever will be again. ⁷But not even a dog will bark at the Israelites or their animals. Then you will know that I, the Lord, make a distinction between the Egyptians and the Israelites.’ ” ⁸Moses concluded by saying, “All your officials will come to me and bow down before me, and they will beg me to take all my people and go away. After that, I will leave.” Then in great anger Moses left the king.

⁹The Lord had said to Moses, “The king will continue to refuse to listen to you, in order that I may do more of my miracles in Egypt.” ¹⁰Moses and Aaron performed all these miracles before the king, but the Lord made him stubborn, and he would not let the Israelites leave his country.

The Passover

12^*The Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron in Egypt: ^2*“This month is to be the first month of the year for you. ^3*Give these instructions to the whole community of Israel: on the tenth day of this month each man must choose either a lamb or a young goat for his household. ^4*If his family is too small to eat a whole animal, he and his next-door neighbour may share an animal, in proportion to the number of people and the amount that each person can eat. ^5*You may choose either a sheep or a goat, but it must be a one-year-old male without any defects. ^6*Then, on the evening of the fourteenth day of the month, the whole community of Israel will kill the animals. ^7*The people are to take some of the blood and put it on the doorposts and above the doors of the houses in which the animals are to be eaten. ^8*That night the meat is to be roasted, and eaten with bitter herbs and with bread made without yeast. ^9*Do not eat any of it raw or boiled, but eat it roasted whole, including the head, the legs, and the internal organs. ^10*You must not leave any of it until morning; if any is left over, it must be burnt. ^11*You are to eat it quickly, for you are to be dressed for travel, with your sandals on your feet and your stick in your hand. It is the Passover Festival to honour me, the Lord.

^12*“On that night I will go through the land of Egypt, killing every firstborn male, both human and animal, and punishing all the gods of Egypt. I am the Lord. ^13*The blood on the doorposts will be a sign to mark the houses in which you live. When I see the blood, I will pass over you and will not harm you when I punish the Egyptians. ^14*You must celebrate this day as a religious festival to remind you of what I, the Lord, have done. Celebrate it for all time to come.”

The Festival of the Unleavened Bread

^15*The Lord said, “For seven days you must not eat any bread made with yeast—eat only unleavened bread. On the first day you are to get rid of all the yeast in your houses, for if anyone during those seven days eats bread made with yeast, he shall no longer be considered one of my people. ^16*On the first day and again on the seventh day you are to meet for worship. No work is to be done on those days, but you may prepare food. ^17*Keep this festival, because it was on this day that I brought your tribes out of Egypt. For all time to come you must celebrate this day as a festival. ^18*From the evening of the fourteenth day of the first month to the evening of the twenty-first day, you must not eat any bread made with yeast. ^19–20*For seven days no yeast must be found in your houses, for if anyone, native-born or foreign, eats bread made with yeast, he shall no longer be considered one of my people.”

The First Passover

²¹Moses called for all the leaders of Israel and said to them, “Each of you is to choose a lamb or a young goat and kill it, so that your families can celebrate Passover. ²²Take a sprig of hyssop, dip it in the bowl containing^k the animal’s blood, and wipe the blood on the doorposts and the beam above the door of your house. Not one of you is to leave the house until morning. ^23*When the Lord goes through Egypt to kill the Egyptians, he will see the blood on the beams and the doorposts and will not let the Angel of Death enter your houses and kill you. ²⁴You and your children must obey these rules for ever. ²⁵When you enter the land that the Lord has promised to give you, you must perform this ritual. ²⁶When your children ask you, ‘What does this ritual mean?’ ²⁷you will answer, ‘It is the sacrifice of Passover to honour the Lord, because he passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt. He killed the Egyptians, but spared us.’ ”

The Israelites knelt down and worshipped. ²⁸Then they went and did what the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron.

The Death of the First-Born

^29*At midnight the Lord killed all the firstborn sons in Egypt, from the king’s son, who was heir to the throne, to the son of the prisoner in the dungeon; all the firstborn of the animals were also killed. ³⁰That night, the king, his officials, and all the other Egyptians were awakened. There was loud crying throughout Egypt, because there was not one home in which there was not a dead son. ³¹That same night the king sent for Moses and Aaron and said, “Get out, you and your Israelites! Leave my country; go and…