Egypt’s Natural Plagues

Overview

Egypt had many plagues during the Exodus, but do those plagues all have natural explanations? Could the miracle simply have been them all happening at once?

This article was written after watching Exodus: God and Kings.

First, I must say that this post is not to say that God did not send the plagues upon Egypt. It’s very clear that He did. However, whether He did it through means of supernatural power working counter to nature, or simply by using process He already established within the natural order to work out His plans. We simply don’t know. What I do know, however, is that most Christians are too afraid to even think about God uses nature to do things (even though He put it into being) that they’ve never even heard this theory. And I think that’s problematic.

1. River of Blood
The first plague turns the Nile river into blood. The movie uses crocodiles attacking humans and each other (in an all out massacre) to do this. They also describe it in the movie as the crocs riling up clay in the river that turns it red. I find this to be a rather unlikely possibility. However, red tide is a complete possibility. Even today we see red tide, which is basically just a large scale algae bloom that kills off many of the wildlife (including fish) in whatever body of water it occurs and turning it red as blood.

2. Frogs
Unlike fish, frogs are able to leave the river. So, when the water becomes uninhabitable for them, they do just that. They invade the city, looking for new sources of water as they can’t live on land forever, and they eventually die off.
 
3/4. Gnats and Flies
These are combined because they’re very similar and stem from the same place. At this point Egypt is surrounded by dead fish floating in the river, plants dying on the shores, and frogs rotting in their city streets. What does rotting life (both animal and plant) attract? Bugs. All the death is the perfect cesspool for flies and gnats to breed and grow and breed and grow until we find them swarming around the city in plague-like numbers.
 
5. Death of livestock
All of these flies and gnats are flying around annoying and biting anything they can (because, as far as we can tell, that’s their entire purpose in life). Unfortunately, animals carry diseases. Sometimes, these diseases only affect certain types of animals (such as livestock) and cause them to fall ill and die.
 

6. Boils
Other types of diseases that these insects carry can harm humans but in different ways. For instance, fly bites can cause infections that lead to boils.

 
7. Fire/Hail
There are two theories for this one. One is that it’s solely a hail storm. While not common, there have been large storms in the Egyptian region that create large hail balls falling from the sky. Scientists have also discovered pumice rock in Egypt, even though there are no volcanoes in the near vicinity. So where did it come from? Volcanoes in the Mediterranean did erupt around the same time and could have sent fiery rock raining down on upon the Egyptians.
 

8. Locusts
With large volcanic eruptions comes large-scale weather changes. Large scale weather changes cause differences in animal behavior. For instance, locusts could have been attracted to higher precipitation and humidity in Egypt that was caused by the volcanic fallout.

9. Darkness
With volcanic eruptions comes ash clouds. Ash clouds block out the sun and all other light, spreading darkness on the world.

10. First Born Son
With all the bugs, disease, and weather changes, it should be as no surprise other diseases would make their way into the city. There are fungi that invade stored grains and can be very dangerous to humans. Things that increase the likelihood of this fungi growing on stored grain is high moisture, high temperature, and extensive insect activity. Egypt has seen all three of these at this point in Egypt so the likelihood of the fungi having grown is rather high. But why just the first born son? Well, the fungi would most likely only be present on the top few layers of the grain, and because Egyptians thought continuing their legacy was very important they always gave their first born son the first portion of food- right off the top of the grain storage.

Red Sea

There’s a scientific explanation for this as well. Because the reef off the sea was closer to the service during this time, it would be easier for it to be exposed. Scientists found that a constant wind of 67mph blowing all night could expose the reef and allow the Hebrews to walk across. They figured it would take about 4 hours for all of them to cross, and then within 30 minutes after the wind ended the water would return to normal.

Now, there are some people who think that God used a mix of natural and supernatural causes for the plagues. For instance, they think plagues 1, 7, 9, and 10 are all direct acts of God, and then the other plagues represent the natural consequences that come along with the previous plagues. Perhaps this is the way God worked out the plagues. We will just never know, but it is important to look at all the different options without excluding any.
Do these natural events make the events any less miraculous? Most would argue no. God is perfectly within his limits to use the natural events that He set up to go through with his works. Furthermore, one professor at Cambridge said-

I still think they’re miracles. But I think the miracle is in the timing. – Colin Humphreys

Nick Scarantino