²⁰The Lord told Moses, “Get up early in the morning, and meet the king of Egypt as he goes out to the river. Tell him, ‘This is what the Lord says: Let my people go so they can worship me. ²¹If you don’t let them go, I will send swarms of flies into your houses. The flies will be on you, your officers, and your people. The houses of Egypt will be full of flies, and they will be all over the ground, too. ²²But I will not treat the Israelites the same as the Egyptian people. There will not be any flies in the land of Goshen, where my people live. By this you will know that I, the Lord, am in this land. ²³I will treat my people differently from your people. This miracle will happen tomorrow.’ ”

²⁴So the Lord did as he had said, and great swarms of flies came into the king’s palace and his officers’ houses. All over Egypt flies were ruining the land. ²⁵The king called for Moses and Aaron and told them, “Offer sacrifices to your God here in this country.”

²⁶But Moses said, “It wouldn’t be right to do that, because the Egyptians hate the sacrifices we offer to the Lord our God. If they see us offering sacrifices they hate, they will throw stones at us and kill us. ²⁷Let us make a three-day journey into the desert. We must offer sacrifices to the Lord our God there, as the Lord told us to do.”

²⁸The king said, “I will let you go so that you may offer sacrifices to the Lord your God in the desert, but you must not go very far away. Now go and pray for me.”

²⁹Moses said, “I will leave and pray to the Lord, and he will take the flies away from you, your officers, and your people tomorrow. But do not try to trick us again. Do not stop the people from going to offer sacrifices to the Lord.”

³⁰So Moses left the king and prayed to the Lord, ³¹and the Lord did as he asked. He removed the flies from the king, his officers, and his people so that not one fly was left. ³²But the king became stubborn again and did not let the people go.

The Disease on the Farm Animals

9Then the Lord told Moses, “Go to the king of Egypt and tell him, ‘This is what the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, says: Let my people go to worship me. ²If you refuse to let them go and continue to hold them, ³the Lord will punish you. He will send a terrible disease on your farm animals that are in the fields. He will cause your horses, donkeys, camels, cattle, goats, and sheep to become sick. ⁴But the Lord will treat Israel’s animals differently from the animals of Egypt. None of the animals that belong to the Israelites will die. ⁵The Lord has set tomorrow as the time he will do this in the land.’ ” ⁶The next day the Lord did as he promised. All the farm animals in Egypt died, but none of the animals belonging to Israelites died. ⁷The king sent people to see what had happened to the animals of Israel, and they found that not one of them had died. But the king was still stubborn and did not let the people go.

The Boils

⁸The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Fill your hands with ashes from a furnace. Moses, throw the ashes into the air in front of the king of Egypt. ⁹The ashes will spread like dust through all the land of Egypt. They will cause boils to break out and become sores on the skin of people and animals everywhere in the land.”

¹⁰So Moses and Aaron took ashes from a furnace and went and stood before the king. Moses threw ashes into the air, which caused boils to break out and become sores on people and animals. ¹¹The magicians could not stand before Moses, because all the Egyptians had boils, even the magicians. ¹²But the Lord made the king stubborn, so he refused to listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the Lord had said.

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