“And the hail smote throughout all the land of Egypt all that was in the field, both man and beast; and the hail smote every herb of the field, and brake every tree of the field.”
Throughout Egypt hail struck everything in the fields — both people and animals; it beat down everything growing in the fields and stripped every tree. The damage is comprehensive across three categories: people, animals, and vegetation. Every tree stripped of its leaves and branches. Every crop beaten into the ground. The agricultural calendar of Egypt — the planting, growing, harvesting that the Nile's annual flood made possible — is devastated in a single storm. Amos 4:9 records God saying: many times I struck your gardens and vineyards, destroying them with blight and mildew. The hail of Exodus is the most concentrated version of the agricultural judgment that runs through the prophetic announcements of God's discipline. Egypt's fertility, its gift from the Nile and the sun, is being systematically withdrawn.
COMMUNITY REFLECTIONS
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