Were the Ten Plagues Just Natural Phenomena?
On the dangers of over-enthusiastically embracing evidence
I. The Ten Plagues Phenomena
When I was in High School, one of the teachers showed us a documentary on the Ten Plagues that showed how each of them could be plausibly explained by some natural phenomena in Egypt.
The plague of blood, for example, was not a moment in which the water of the Nile miraculously turned into blood – in which God Himself transformed H2O into a completely difference substance. Rather, the Nile’s color became blood-red, which is a documented issue with the Nile.
In times of severe drought, the argument goes, microscopic “Burgundy Blood” algae will blossom in the Nile, killing all the fish and giving the water a blood-red hue. Indeed, because of this ecological nightmare, infestations of things like frogs and lice will arise and diseases such as pestilence and boils will occur.
And understood this way, the plague of blood is no longer a supernatural miracle but simply one of timing in which God nudged nature. The Nile, already predisposed to algae in times of drought, found itself once again turning blood red as God inflicted a drought upon the Nile.
And at the time that I watched this documentary I was very taken with this line of reasoning. Because turning the Ten Plagues from miraculous supernatural events into well-timed well-known phenomena within Egypt achieves two things that I’ve addressed in past emails.
Because, what’s achieved by the transformation from overt miracle to well-timed natural phenomena is the rationalization of the plagues. To a scientifically-sensitive and supernaturally-skeptical audience, the idea that the Nile didn’t turn to blood but rather “turned to blood” – the quote marks being key here – helps make the Ten Plagues more believable.
Ever since I mentioned last week that the Torah’s narratives might require our suspension of disbelief, I’ve been thinking more and more about it. And while last week I hedged framing things this way – in part because I find it theologically discomforting to use such terms when talking about the Torah – I’ve already come around to how helpful this term is in explaining how we approach the Torah.
Because the plausibility of something like the Ten Plagues can gnaw at us because they feel more Tolkien than Torah – especially when we find ourselves in conversations with skeptics (either imagined or real). The idea of an entire river turning to blood or an all-consuming darkness engulfing the land seems so outlandish that it can be hard to claim in front of someone who refuses to believe it could ever have happened.
But if we can claim that the Nile didn’t literally turn to blood but, instead, metaphorically turned to blood – and, with a flourish, knowingly mention a type of reddish algae that can blossom in the Nile – then our suspension of disbelief is no longer required, and the entire plague becomes somewhat rational.
And yes, there’s still a miracle here but it’s far less supernatural. In fact, to hyperfocus on the word “supernatural” for a moment, it’s literally the opposite: the Ten Plagues become natural. Sure, their timing was miraculous but that’s a much more plausible story to tell – especially when so many of the other plagues are triggered by the algae.
But, as much as I liked the idea of rationalizing the Ten Plagues as a teenager, these days I have tremendous issues with this entire approach. And I have two Big Reasons for this. That, as much as I like a more rationalist Judaism – and as much as I prefer a Torah where the suspension of disbelief is not a prerequisite – I think that there are two fatal flaws with hyper-rationalizing the Ten Plagues.
II. You’re Playing with the Big Boys Now
The more of these emails I’ve written – the more that I’ve been forced to put some of my theological feelings down in writing – the more clarity I’ve gained in my own personal approach to the Torah and Judaism writ large.
And grappling with this topic has forced me to more clearly demarcate the line within my own embrace of Biblical Archeology, Egyptology, and the like. Because I am enthralled by all the information we have on the world of Tanakh.
And take last week’s email as the perfect example of this: it’s only nowadays when we have a better understanding of Egyptian royal naming conventions that we can gain a new appreciation for – and a crucial answer to – an otherwise confusing episode in the Torah.
The more we know about the world in which Avraham lived – the more we know about Egypt during our slavery or Persia during the Purim story – the better understanding we can have of the narratives.
But here is where I take out my pen to draw my line. Because it’s one thing to use this knowledge to explain or enrich episodes in the Torah, but another thing entirely to try and use this information to prove the existence of episodes in the Torah.
And while my second Big Reason for disliking the rationalization of the Ten Plagues will be an illustrative example of this – and one I’ll talk about next week – my first Big Reason is more pressing.
Because, when we embrace Biblical Archaeology to prove the existence of Biblical episodes, we’re doing one of two things: we’re either cherry-picking the archeological findings we like – which is obviously unconstructive – or we’re now playing someone else’s game.
A professor of mine at YU once made a point that reinforces this issue. You could give a great 45-minute shiur, he argued, on all the ways in which the Torah’s description of the Exodus from Egypt is corroborated by archeology, Egyptology, etc. But, as he pointed out, you could also give a great 45-minute lecture – to an obviously completely different audience – on all the ways in which the Torah’s description of the Exodus from Egypt is uncorroborated by archeology, Egyptology, etc.
The actual class you would have to give, he went on to argue, would be an hour and a half long exploration of how we still don’t have anything to say with any confidence about the historicity of the Exodus – as all the evidence we have points in too many directions.
And the danger here, the thing that concerns me, is what happens when we’ve only heard the first 45-minute shiur on how Egyptology proves the Exodus. Because it encourages us to embrace the findings of Biblical Archeology, Egyptology, etc., because we believe that they support the truth of the Torah.
But not only is this not true, but we’ve now started playing a game that follows completely different rules. Because the fields of Biblical Archeology, Egyptology, etc., don’t exist to try and prove anything about the Torah – they exist to just discover stuff. And this means that their findings are agnostic at best.
And all it takes – after you’ve started subscribing to news sources that report all the latest findings in the belief that more and more evidence will trickle in – is for the findings you so strongly anchored your faith in to be dismissed or discredited, or for new findings to appear that raise further questions. Then the entire belief in the Exodus crumbles.
And this is why I hate when people trumpet archeological findings that claim to have discovered things like Noaḥ’s Ark. Because if we oversell the discovery, the moment we learn it’s fraudulent we can all too easily slip into unintentionally implying that the story itself is fraudulent.
The Ten Plagues may be rationalized by appealing to natural phenomena in Egypt – but if we hang too much on a theory that, like so many theories, rests solely on evidence that can be challenged, we may find ourselves worse off.
Instead, there’s another perspective on the plagues – one that celebrates their supernatural nature. And it’s one I’ll, please God, discuss next week.