Study Desk

'This is what the LORD says: "By this you shall know that I am the LORD: behold, I am going to strike the water that is in the Nile with the staff that is in my hand, and it will be turned into blood.

And Moses said to Pharaoh, "The honor is yours to tell me: when shall I plead for you and your servants and your people, that the frogs be destroyed from you and your houses, that they be left only in the Nile?"

Pharaoh said, "I will let you go, so that you may sacrifice to the LORD your God in the wilderness; only you shall not go very far away. Plead for me."

Then the LORD said to Moses and Aaron, "Take for yourselves handfuls of soot from a kiln, and Moses shall toss it toward the sky in the sight of Pharaoh.

"Plead with the LORD, for there has been enough of God's thunder and hail; and I will let you go, and you shall stay no longer."

Then Pharaoh's servants said to him, "How long shall this man be a snare to us? Let the people go, so that they may serve the LORD their God. Do you not yet realize that Egypt is destroyed?"

Moses said, "We shall go with our young and our old; with our sons and our daughters, with our flocks and our herds we shall go, for we must hold a feast to the LORD."

"Therefore, our livestock too shall go with us; not a hoof shall be left behind, for we shall take some of them to serve the LORD our God. And until we arrive there, we ourselves do not know with what we shall serve the LORD."

Then Pharaoh said to him, "Get away from me! Be careful, do not see my face again, for on the day you see my face, you shall die!"

Moses said, "You have spoken correctly; I shall never see your face again!"

and all the firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die, from the firstborn of the Pharaoh who sits on his throne, to the firstborn of the slave girl who is behind the millstones; all the firstborn of the cattle as well.

'So there shall be a great cry in all the land of Egypt, such as there has not been before and such as shall never be again.

"This month shall be the beginning of months for you; it is to be the first month of the year for you.

'Your lamb shall be an unblemished male a year old; you may take it from the sheep or from the goats.

'You shall keep it until the fourteenth day of the same month, then the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel is to slaughter it at twilight.

'Moreover, they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and on the lintel of the houses in which they eat it.

'They shall eat the flesh that same night, roasted with fire, and they shall eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.

'And you shall not leave any of it over until morning, but whatever is left of it until morning, you shall completely burn with fire.

'Now you shall eat it in this way: with your garment belted around your waist, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and you shall eat it in a hurry—it is the LORD'S Passover.

'The blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live; and when I see the blood I will pass over you, and no plague will come upon you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.