Chapter Overview
Summary
Exodus 9 covers the fifth (livestock), sixth (boils), and seventh (hail) plagues. The chapter's most consequential LXX verse is 9:16, which Paul quotes verbatim at Romans 9:17 as the scriptural anchor of his argument that God hardens whom he wills. Pharaoh's 'I have sinned' confession at 9:27 — the first use in Exodus of the standard Hebrew-Bible sin-confession formula — supplies LXX vocabulary that NT penitence texts (Luke 15:18, 21; Luke 18:13) will echo.
Notable Variants
The 'for this very purpose I have raised you up' formula at 9:16 that Romans 9:17 quotes in LXX form; Pharaoh's LXX 'I have sinned' confession at 9:27 using the standard hēmartēka formula; the distinction-between-Israelite-and-Egyptian-livestock at 9:4 and 9:6 continuing the 8:18–19 'distinction' theme; the fearing-the-word-of-the-LORD servants at 9:20 as the first Egyptian converts.
Structural Notes
LXX Exodus 9 preserves MT's 35-verse structure.
Then the LORD said to Moses, "Go in to Pharaoh and say to him, 'Thus says the LORD, the God of the Hebrews: Let My people go, so that they may serve Me.
The standard commission formula ('Thus says the LORD, the God of the Hebrews: let my people go') recurs. The 'God of the Hebrews' title that the LXX preserves becomes the Septuagint's consistent designation throughout Exodus.
For if you refuse to let them go and still hold them,
The conditional threat structure ('if you refuse … then') tracks MT.
the hand of the LORD will fall on your livestock in the field — on the horses, the donkeys, the camels, the herds, and the flocks — with a very severe pestilence.
The enumeration of Egyptian livestock (horses, donkeys, camels, herds, flocks) tracks MT. LXX's pestilence (thanatos megas, 'a great death') is the vocabulary that recurs in later LXX plague-narratives and in Revelation 6:8.
But the LORD will make a distinction between the livestock of Israel and the livestock of Egypt, and nothing that belongs to the sons of Israel shall die.'"
The distinction between Israelite and Egyptian livestock continues the 8:19 diastolē motif.
The LORD set an appointed time, saying, "Tomorrow the LORD will do this thing in the land."
The appointed time ('tomorrow') tracks MT. The fixed-time announcement distinguishes this plague from the more immediate ones.
The LORD did this the next day, and all the livestock of Egypt died. But not one of the livestock of the sons of Israel died.
The fifth plague's fulfillment and the preservation of Israel's livestock tracks MT.
Pharaoh sent and inquired, and not even one of the livestock of Israel had died. But Pharaoh's heart was heavy, and he did not let the people go.
Pharaoh's investigation and continued hardening tracks MT. 'Heart was heavy' uses ebarynthē — the kaved branch of the hardening-verb family.
Then the LORD said to Moses and Aaron, "Take handfuls of soot from a kiln, and let Moses throw it toward the sky in Pharaoh's sight.
The command to take handfuls of soot (aithalē kaminaias, 'soot from a kiln') tracks MT. The LXX's specific vocabulary for the furnace-soot is preserved.
It will become fine dust over all the land of Egypt, and it will produce boils breaking out in sores on man and beast throughout the land of Egypt."
The fine-dust-to-boils transformation ('boils breaking out in sores,' phlyktides anazeousai helkōn) uses medical vocabulary that circulates in LXX healing texts. The combination of boils and sores becomes a fixed description in Job 2:7 and Revelation 16:2.
So they took soot from a kiln and stood before Pharaoh. Moses threw it toward the sky, and it produced boils breaking out in sores on man and beast.
The execution of the boils-plague tracks MT.
The magicians were unable to appear before Moses on account of the boils, because the boils had broken out on the magicians just as on all the Egyptians.
The magicians' inability to appear before Moses 'on account of the boils' tracks MT. This marks the final defeat of the Egyptian sorcerers in the plague cycle.
But the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he did not listen to them, just as the LORD had spoken to Moses.
The LORD's hardening of Pharaoh (using sklēryno, the main Greek verb) tracks MT.
Then the LORD said to Moses, "Rise early in the morning and stand before Pharaoh and say to him, 'Thus says the LORD, the God of the Hebrews: Let My people go, so that they may serve Me.
The command to confront Pharaoh early in the morning tracks MT. The seventh plague receives an unusually formal divine speech introduction.
For this time I will send all My plagues on your heart and on your servants and on your people, so that you may know that there is no one like Me in all the earth.
'All my plagues on your heart' tracks MT. The escalation signals the move from particular plagues to comprehensive judgment.
For by now I could have stretched out My hand and struck you and your people with pestilence, and you would have been wiped from the earth.
The hypothetical 'I could have stretched out my hand' signals divine restraint — Pharaoh's survival is by grace, not impotence.
But for this very reason I have raised you up: to show you My power, so that My name may be proclaimed in all the earth.
Masoretic (WLC)
וְאוּלָם בַּעֲבוּר זֹאת הֶעֱמַדְתִּיךָ בַּעֲבוּר הַרְאֹתְךָ אֶת־כֹּחִי וּלְמַעַן סַפֵּר שְׁמִי בְּכָל־הָאָרֶץ
But for this very reason I have raised you up: to show you My power, so that My name may be proclaimed in all the earth
Septuagint (LXX)
καὶ ἕνεκεν τούτου διετηρήθης ἵνα ἐνδείξωμαι ἐν σοὶ τὴν ἰσχύν μου καὶ ὅπως διαγγελῇ τὸ ὄνομά μου ἐν πάσῃ τῇ γῇ
And for this reason you have been preserved, so that I might demonstrate my power in you, and so that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth
Romans 9:17 cites this verse as the climactic scriptural proof of God's sovereign hardening: "For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, 'For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.'"
Paul's citation follows the LXX's structure but adjusts the first verb from dietērēthēs ('you have been preserved') to exēgeira se ('I raised you up'). The MT's he'emadtikha ('I have caused you to stand / raised you up') fits Paul's verb better than the standard LXX's diatēreō. Paul either works from a Greek revision or adjusts from MT.
The verse is one of the clearest cases where an OT text acquires its full theological weight only through its NT citation. In isolation, Exodus 9:16 is a Pharaoh-specific declaration. In Romans 9:17, it becomes the Archimedean point for a universal doctrine of divine election. The LXX's ho theos paradidōsin ('God hands over') arc of Romans 1:24, 26, 28 is prepared by this Exodus hardening-theology.
You are still exalting yourself against My people and will not let them go.
Pharaoh's self-exaltation against God's people tracks MT. The verb hyperēphaneuō becomes a signature Hebrew-Bible charge (Psalm 17/18:27 LXX, Proverbs 3:34 LXX) that James 4:6 and 1 Peter 5:5 cite: 'God opposes the proud.'
Tomorrow at this time I will rain down the heaviest hail that has ever fallen on Egypt from the day it was founded until now.
The hail-threat with superlative framing ('the heaviest hail') tracks MT.
Now send and bring your livestock and everything you have in the field to safety. Every man and beast that is found in the field and is not brought inside will die when the hail falls on them.'"
The warning to bring in livestock tracks MT. The divine provision of advance warning marks this as a plague offering conditional mercy — an element absent from most earlier plagues.
Those among Pharaoh's servants who feared the word of the LORD hurried to bring their servants and their livestock inside.
Masoretic (WLC)
הַיָּרֵא אֶת־דְּבַר יְהוָה
Those among Pharaoh's servants who feared the word of the LORD
Septuagint (LXX)
ὁ φοβούμενος τὸ ῥῆμα κυρίου
The one fearing the word of the Lord
Hoi phoboumenoi ton kyrion ('those who fear the Lord') becomes a LXX-Jewish technical term for Gentiles attached to Jewish worship. Acts 10:2, 10:22 (Cornelius the centurion, 'a devout man, fearing God'), Acts 13:16, 26 (Paul addressing synagogue audiences: 'Men of Israel and those who fear God') all use this formula.
The Egyptian servants who fear the word of the LORD at 9:20 are the LXX's first instance of the 'god-fearer' category — Gentiles who have come to respect Israel's God enough to obey his word. The NT's phoboumenoi ton theon category has this Exodus-Egyptian origin.
But those who did not take the word of the LORD to heart left their servants and their livestock in the field.
The other Egyptians who ignored the word and left their servants and livestock exposed tracks MT.
Then the LORD said to Moses, "Stretch out your hand toward the sky, so that hail may fall on all the land of Egypt — on man and beast and every plant of the field in the land of Egypt."
The command to stretch out the hand toward the sky for hail tracks MT.
Moses stretched out his staff toward the sky, and the LORD sent thunder and hail, and fire ran along the ground. The LORD rained hail on the land of Egypt.
The thunder, hail, and 'fire ran along the ground' (pyr errhagē epi tēs gēs) tracks MT. The LXX's pyr errhagē is striking imagery — lightning fire breaking out over the earth. Revelation 8:7 ('hail and fire mixed with blood') echoes the Exodus seventh-plague imagery directly.
There was hail, and fire flashing continually in the midst of the hail — very severe, such as had never been in all the land of Egypt since it became a nation.
The continuous flashing fire within the hail tracks MT.
The hail struck down everything in the field throughout the land of Egypt, both man and beast. The hail struck every plant of the field and shattered every tree of the field.
The devastation of field plants and trees tracks MT. The ecological destruction motif will recur at the locust plague (10:15).
Only in the land of Goshen, where the sons of Israel lived, was there no hail.
The exemption of Goshen from the hail continues the distinction-motif.
Then Pharaoh sent and called Moses and Aaron and said to them, "This time I have sinned. The LORD is in the right, and I and my people are in the wrong.
Masoretic (WLC)
חָטָאתִי הַפָּעַם יְהוָה הַצַּדִּיק וַאֲנִי וְעַמִּי הָרְשָׁעִים
This time I have sinned. The LORD is in the right, and I and my people are in the wrong
Septuagint (LXX)
ἡμάρτηκα τὸ νῦν ὁ κύριος δίκαιος ἐγὼ δὲ καὶ ὁ λαός μου ἀσεβεῖς
I have sinned this time. The Lord is righteous; I and my people are ungodly
Pharaoh's hēmartēka ('I have sinned') is the single most important LXX penitence-formula. It recurs at Achan's confession (Josh 7:20), Saul's confession (1 Sam 15:24, 30), David's confession (2 Sam 12:13, 'hēmartēka tō kyriō'), and — most famously — the prodigal son's planned confession (Luke 15:18, 21: pater, hēmarton).
The LXX's asebēs ('ungodly, impious') for Hebrew rasha ('wicked') is the vocabulary of Romans 4:5 ('the one who justifies the asebē, the ungodly') and Romans 5:6 ('Christ died for the asebōn, the ungodly'). The LXX's moral-theological vocabulary of righteous vs. ungodly runs directly from Pharaoh's confession into Paul's justification-language.
Pharaoh's confession is false — he quickly hardens again. But the vocabulary he uses becomes the authentic vocabulary of true penitence in the rest of the biblical tradition.
Plead with the LORD, for there has been enough of God's thunder and hail. I will let you go, and you shall stay no longer."
Pharaoh's plea for relief and pledge to release Israel tracks MT.
Moses said to him, "As soon as I leave the city, I will spread out my hands to the LORD. The thunder will cease, and there will be no more hail, so that you may know that the earth belongs to the LORD.
Moses' 'I will spread out my hands' gesture of intercession tracks MT. The hand-extension as prayer-posture is LXX's preferred physical-prayer vocabulary (recurring at 1 Kgs 8:22, Isa 1:15, Ps 141:2).
But as for you and your servants, I know that you do not yet fear the LORD God."
Moses' prediction that Pharaoh still does not fear the LORD tracks MT.
The flax and the barley were struck down, for the barley was in the ear and the flax was in bud.
The botanical detail ('flax and barley destroyed because at critical stages') is rendered closely in LXX.
But the wheat and the emmer were not struck down, for they ripen later.
The wheat and emmer's escape ('they ripen later') tracks MT.
Moses left Pharaoh and went out of the city and spread out his hands to the LORD. The thunder and the hail ceased, and rain no longer poured on the earth.
Moses' exit, prayer, and the cessation of hail tracks MT.
When Pharaoh saw that the rain and the hail and the thunder had ceased, he sinned again and hardened his heart — he and his servants.
Pharaoh's renewed sin and hardening — 'he and his servants' — tracks MT. The Egyptian court shares in the hardening, not just Pharaoh alone.
Pharaoh's heart was hard, and he did not let the sons of Israel go, just as the LORD had spoken through Moses.
The closing statement of Pharaoh's refusal to release Israel tracks MT. The chapter's structural parallel to chapter 8 is complete: plague → concession → relief → hardening.