Commentaria in Exodum
Nor would God have suffered so great and so long a pertinacity of Pharao, unless from his malice He had thought to elicit the good of vengeance alone; for, as Boethius says, book 4 On Consolation, prose 6: “There is a divine power to which even evils are good, when by using them fittingly it elicits the effect of some good; for a certain order embraces all things, so that what has departed from the assigned course of order, this same, though into another, yet falls back into order: lest anything be allowed to rashness in the realm of providence.” Note: God long sustained Pharao and other hardened, and sustains them daily. First, to show how great an evil hardening is, and how hard and inflexible they are to all things. Secondly, to give them longer space to repent, Rom. 2:4. Thirdly, to show in them His power and long-suffering, Wisdom 12:10. Fourthly, that by comparison with them God’s wonderful mercy toward the elect may appear, Rom. 9:22.
17. DOST THOU STILL HOLD BACK?—The Hebrew is, still thou treadest down, that is, as the Chaldee, thou holdest a subject, dost sit so unjustly and firmly upon him, and press him hard; that thou wilt not even loosen him for three days?
God, the punishment of sin. Behold, the hour of vengeance follows the hour of guilt: therefore every pleasure of sin is for an hour; our life also is for an hour; the occasion and time of meriting eternal rewards is likewise an hour. Hence Hora among the Gentiles was a goddess of providence, who would not suffer men to be negligent and slothful; and from exhorting and inciting she was called also Horta. For the goddess Horta, when she lived, was called Hersilia, and was the wife of Romulus. Plutarch relates that her temple was never wont to be closed, for this reason, that she exhorted that something noble should always be done, and warned that one must never cease. So Giraldus, syntagma 1.
A VERY GREAT HAIL (that is, very much), SUCH AS HATH NOT BEEN IN EGYPT FROM THE DAY THAT IT WAS FOUNDED,—from which it began to be inhabited by Mesraim (whence Egypt is called Mesraim, and today is called Mesra by the Turks and inhabitants), son of Cham, the first founder, or rather colonist, of Egypt. For so it is explained, verse 24, where it is said: “Since that nation was founded,” that is, 627 years ago; for Egypt began to be inhabited soon after the dispersion of the nations made at Babel, Genes. 11. But that dispersion was made about the year 170 from the deluge, as I said there, that is 122 years before the birth of Abraham; for Abraham was born in the year 292 from the deluge; in the year 100 of Abraham Isaac was born; from the birth of Isaac to the going out of the Hebrews from Egypt 405 years passed, as I said Gen. 15:13. Therefore from the dispersion at Babel, when Egypt began to be inhabited, to this year in which the Hebrews went out of Egypt, 627 years have passed. For add the years 405 to the exodus, you will have 627. Moses adds this aptly against the Egyptians; for the Egyptians boasted of their antiquity, and fabulously claimed for themselves an age of thirteen thousand years, and, as Diodorus Siculus says, book 1, chap. 2, they pretended that the first men were created in Egypt, on account of the fertility of the Nile and the mildness of the climate. Some explain thus: never was there such hail in that land since it was called Egypt, and its inhabitants Egyptians; but they err: for that land was called Egypt from Aegyptus, brother of Danaus and son of Belus the Egyptian, to whom, when he died, he succeeded in the kingdom, having cast out his brother Danaus, who went into Greece, and thence the Greeks were called Danai, which Eusebius and St. Augustine, book 18 On the City of God, chap. 11, relate to have happened when Josue, who succeeded Moses, ruled among the Hebrews, that is 800 years after the deluge. Therefore not now, but after these times, was it called Egypt.
Note: Elsewhere, and after these times, hail was not less, but sometimes greater. Ludovicus Clavitellius, fol. 960, relates that in the year of the Lord 1514, on the 5th of August, at Cremona it rained hail of the size of a hen’s egg. In the northern regions it sometimes rains hail like a man’s head, teaches Olaus Magnus book 1, chap. 22, and Coin [?] Meteora, chap. On Hail. Again, Clavitellius writes that in the territory of Bologna, in the year of the Lord 1537, in the month of August, there rained hail mixed with blood, of which the stones, weighed, were found to be 98 pounds.
The Tripartite History, book 7, chap. 23, relates that in the year of the Lord 369, on the fourth of the calends of June, at Constantinople hail rained of the size of rocks.
So in the year of the Lord 406, the last of September, when St. John Chrysostom was driven into exile, terrible hail fell on Constantinople. So the Tripartite, book 10, chap. 20.
At the end of the world hail great as a talent, which contains 1500 ounces, will fall, Apoc. 16:21. So the Amorrhites were crushed with hailstones in the time of Josue, chap. 10, verse 11.
19. GATHER TOGETHER THY CATTLE.—Behold the clemency of God, who even in anger dilutes anger with clemency, and tempers and mitigates the punishment with it. So St. Augustine, Quest. 33.
23. AND THE LORD SENT THUNDER.—“The Lord” not by Himself, but by an angel; for the sweet disposition of divine providence rejoices in its order, to use ministering spirits, namely angels, as far as their powers bear, that is, where He wills something to be done that does not exceed the limits of nature, such as this thunder, hail and lightning, to effect by natural causes, or by applying active things to passive. For when a hot and dry exhalation meets a moist and cold one in the clouds, it bursts it by a violent eruption, and from this collision arises a crash, which is called thunder, and the kindling and inflaming of the exhalation, which is named lightning. So Aristotle, book 2 Meteorologics, chap. 1 and 7.
AND HAIL AND LIGHTNINGS RUNNING ALONG THE GROUND.—This was the seventh plague in Egypt, of hail; for as it is said Psalm 148: “Fire, hail, snow, ice, stormy winds, which fulfil his word”; and although these come from natural causes, yet often, the angry Deity ordering and sharpening those causes, they rage more fiercely.
Note: For lightnings the Hebrew is esh, that is, fire, by which understand fiery exhalations, also lightnings, which, flashing, burning, melting, dividing, overthrowing everything in the way, wrought most grievous harm to Egypt. Hence Ovid calls lightnings three-forked and three-pronged, as though they had three points with which they cut and cleave all things, in Metam. 2:
That Father and Ruler of the gods, whose right hand is armed with three-pronged fires, who shakes the world with his nod.
AND FIRE MINGLED WITH THE HAIL.—The Hebrew is, there was fire taking itself, or received, in the hail; the Septuagint, there was hail and fire burning in the hail. This then was a notable prodigy, that together with hail and rain, as is said verse 34, fire was mingled. Whence Wisdom 16 says of it: “It was wonderful, that in water, which quenches all things, the fire had more force, and burned above its power; but snow and ice endured the force of fire, and melted not.”
In this plague therefore three elements raged against the Egyptians, air by thunder, water by hail, fire by lightnings, so that the Egyptians were forced, even unwilling, to acknowledge that they were struggling against the all-powerful Lord of the elements and of the world. For, according to the saying of Wisdom 5, the whole world fought for God against the unwise, and every creature armed itself against the impious; God therefore here showed that there are not some gods heavenly, others of the air, others of the water, others of the earth, as the Gentiles thought, and the Syrians, saying that the God of Israel was the God of the mountains, not of the valleys; but that He is the true creator and Lord of all, says Theodoret.