Midrasz do Wyjścia 9:16

And it came to pass in the middle of the night, that the Lord smote all the firstborn in the land of Egypt (Exod. 12:29). The Creator of the night divided the night precisely. The Lord smote all the first born. It was the Lord Himself who smote the firstborn and not His emissary (Moses). In fact, even though a man was elsewhere, and his firstborn was in Egypt, he died. How do we know that the firstborn of the Cuthites, Puthites, and Ludites were also slain? It is said: And smote all the firstborn in Egypt, the first fruits of their strength in the tents of Ham (Ps. 78:51).⁸Ham was the ancestor of Cush, Put, and Lud (Gen. 10:15). Only the firstborn of the Pharaoh remained alive in fulfillment of the verse However, it was for this that I raised you up (Exod. 9:16). And Ba’al Saphon was the only idol remaining, to mislead them, in fulfillment of the verse He increaseth the nations, and destroyeth them (Job 12:23). Unto the firstborn of the captives (Exod. 12:29). Why were the firstborn of the captives punished? Because they had rejoiced in the decrees promulgated against Israel. Hence it is written: He that is glad at calamity shall not be unpunished (Prov. 17:5). You must not be of the opinion that only the captives reacted in that manner, for the slaves and handmaidens did likewise, as is said: Even unto the firstborn of the maidservants that is behind the mill (Exod. 11:5); that is, even those who were legally bound to the millers. Even their firstborn cattle were destroyed lest the people assert: “Our deities are powerful, and that is why punishment was imposed upon them (and not upon us).”

(Exod. 31:18:) WHEN HE HAD FINISHED <SPEAKING WITH HIM ON MOUNT SINAI, > HE THEN GAVE UNTO MOSES. Rav Huna said: Resh Laqish said: Just as the bride adorns herself in twenty-four ornaments; so a wise student needs to be versed in twenty-four books (of the Bible).³¹Tanh., Exod. 9:16; Exod. R. 41:5. R. Levi said: What (in Exod. 31:18) is the meaning of WHEN HE HAD FINISHED (rt.: KLH)? Just as the bride (KLH) secludes herself all the time that she is in her father's house so that no one knows her, <and only> when she is about to enter the wedding canopy, does she reveal her face, saying: Whoever knows of testimony against me, let him come and testify against me; so a wise student must be modest like a bride and be famous³²mefursemet, rt.: PRSM; cf. Gk.: parresia (“outspokenness”). through his good deeds like the bride who is famous. (Exod. 31:18:) AS UNTO HIS BRIDE,³³So the midrash interprets WHEN HE HAD FINISHED (KKLWTW). HE THEN GAVE UNTO MOSES.

[(Exod. 31:18:) WHEN HE HAD FINISHED <SPEAKING WITH HIM ON MOUNT SINAI,> HE THEN GAVE UNTO MOSES <THE TWO TABLETS OF THE TESTIMONY>.] R. Abbahu said: The whole forty days that Moses spent on high, he was learning Torah and forgetting it.³⁴Tanh., Exod. 9:16; Exod. R. 41:6; Ned. 38a. Moses said to him: Sovereign of the World, here I have <spent> forty days, and I do not know anything! What did the Holy One do when he had completed the forty days? He gave him the Torah as a gift. HE THEN GAVE UNTO MOSES.

(Exod. 31:18, cont.:) THE TWO TABLETS OF THE TESTIMONY correspond to heaven and earth, to groom and bride, to the two wedding attendants, to this world and the world to come.³⁵Tanh., Exod. 9:16; ibid., Deut. 3:10; Deut. R. 3:16. Ergo: THE TWO TABLETS OF THE TESTIMONY.

(Exod. 9:22:) THEN THE LORD SAID UNTO MOSES: HOLD OUT YOUR ARM <TOWARD THE HEAVENS > [THAT THERE MAY BE HAIL IN ALL THE LAND OF EGYPT]. Why did he smite them with hail? Because the Egyptians thought that the Israelites were their vinedressers.¹⁰⁵Since the vines of the Israelites would also have been subject to hail damage, the Egyptians believed that the Holy One would not send hail; but the Holy One did send hail and further demonstrated his power by sparing Israel’s vines in the land of Goshen. See Exod. 9:25. David said (in Ps. 78:47): HE KILLED THEIR VINES WITH HAIL, AND THEIR SYCAMORES WITH HANAMAL.¹⁰⁶Several English versions translate hanamal as “frost”; but since the word appears nowhere else in Scripture, it is well suited to speculation concerning its meaning. And how did it come down? R. Pinhas and R. Judah bar Shallum the Levite differ.¹⁰⁷Exod. R. 12:4, 6; cf. Cant. R. 3:11:1; M. Pss. 78:13; 105:10. The first of them said: It came down like the worm and cut down the trees. (Ps. 78:47:) HE KILLS THEIR VINES WITH HAIL,… And the other said: It came down like the hanamal. (Ps. 78:47:) AND THEIR SYCAMORES WITH HANAMAL.¹⁰⁸According to Exod. R. 12:4, R. Judah bar Shallum derived the meaning from the phrase WITH HANAMAL (bahanamal), which he interprets to mean, “It came (ba), it came to rest (nah), it cut off (mal)”; but R. Pinhas believed that the hail came down like an axe (pilqin, from the Gk.: pelekus) and cut down the trees. Similarly Tanh., Exod. 2:14. Cf. Yalqut Shim‘oni, Pss. 820, where these two views are attributed to other authorities. It is written (in Exod. 9:32): BUT THE WHEAT AND THE SPELT WERE NOT HURT.¹⁰⁹See Exod. R. 12:6. It is simply that it came down upon each and every thing according to its power (to exhibit the wondrous works of Holy One): upon the cattle according to their power, upon the herbage according to its power, and upon humanity according to its power. What is written above on the matter (in Exod. 9:16)? BUT NEVERTHELESS, FOR THIS REASON I HAVE PRESERVED YOU,… I have preserved you to recount my wondrous works. Thus I did not cause you to die in the first plagues, (ibid., cont.:) IN ORDER TO SHOW YOU MY POWER AND IN ORDER FOR MY NAME TO RESOUND IN ALL THE WORLD.

Rabbi Nechunia, son of Haḳḳanah, said: Know thou the power of repentance. Come and see from Pharaoh, king of Egypt, who rebelled most grievously against the Rock, the Most High, as it is said, "Who is the Lord, that I should hearken unto his voice?" (Ex. 5:2). In the same terms of speech in which he sinned, he repented, as it is said "Who is like thee, O Lord, among the mighty?" (Ex. 15:11). The Holy One, blessed be He, delivered him from amongst the dead. Whence (do we know) that he died? Because it is said, "For now I had put forth my hand, and smitten thee" (Ex. 9:15). He went and ruled in Nineveh. The men of Nineveh were writing fraudulent deeds, and everyone robbed his neighbour, and they committed sodomy, and such-like wicked actions. When the Holy One, blessed be He, sent for Jonah, to prophesy against (the city) its destruction, Pharaoh hearkened and arose from his throne, rent his garments and clothed himself in sackcloth and ashes, and had a proclamation made to all his people, that all the people should fast for two days, || and all who did these (wicked) things should be burnt by fire. What did they do? The men were on one side, and the women on the other, and their children were by themselves; all the clean animals were on one side, and their offspring were by themselves. The infants saw the breasts of their mothers, (and they wished) to have suck, and they wept. The mothers saw their children, (and they wished) to give them suck. By the merit of 4123 children more than twelve hundred thousand men (were saved), as it is said, "And should not I have pity on Nineveh, that great city; wherein are more than six score thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?" (Jonah 4:11); "And the Lord repented of the evil, which he said he would do unto them" (Jonah 3:10). For forty years was the Holy One, blessed be He, slow to anger with them, corresponding to the forty days during which He had sent Jonah. After forty years they returned to their many evil deeds, more so than their former ones, and they were swallowed up like the dead, in the lowest Sheol, as it is said, "Out of the city of the dead they groan" (Job 24:12).

Then Pharaoh, king of Egypt, approached Moses and Aaron and part of the children of Israel ‎that were with them in that place, and he entreated them, saying: Rise up and get you forth ‎from among my people, and take your brethren, all the children of Israel that are in the land, ‎with their sheep and oxen, and all belonging unto them, leave nothing here, but pray ye unto ‎the Lord in my behalf. And Moses said unto Pharaoh: Behold, thou art the first born of thy ‎mother, but fear thou not as thou shalt not die, for the Lord hath commanded that thou ‎shouldst live, in order to show unto thee his great might and his outstretched arm. And ‎Pharaoh commanded that all the children of Israel be sent away, and the Egyptians were ‎urgent upon the people to send them away in haste, for they said: We be all dead men. And all ‎the Egyptians sent the children of Israel away with great riches, with sheep, and oxen, and ‎valuables, according to the oath of our Lord between him and Abraham our father. But the ‎children of Israel were unwilling to depart at night, and when the Egyptians came to cause ‎them to leave they said unto them: Are we thieves to leave at night? And the children of Israel ‎asked of the Egyptians jewels of silver and jewels of gold and raiment, and they spoiled the ‎Egyptians. And Moses hastened and brought up from the river of Egypt the coffin of Joseph, ‎and he took it with him, and the children of Israel brought up likewise every one of them the ‎coffins of his ancestors, and the coffins of the tribe of his people. And the children of Israel ‎from Rameses to Succoth, about six hundred thousand on foot that were men, beside their ‎children and wives. And a mixed multitude went up also with them, and flocks and herds, even ‎very much cattle. Now the sojourning of the children of Israel who dwelt in Egypt in servitude ‎was two hundred and ten years, and at the end of two hundred and ten years the Lord ‎delivered them from Egypt with a strong hand, and the children of Israel journeyed from ‎Egypt, and from Goshen and from Rameses, and they encamped in Succoth on the fifteenth ‎day of the first month. And the Egyptians buried all the first born whom the Lord had slain, and ‎the Egyptians buried their dead for three days. And the children of Israel journeyed from ‎Succoth and encamped in Etham, at the end of the wilderness. And on the third day, after the ‎Egyptians had buried all their first born, many men among the Egyptians rose up and they ‎went after the children of Israel to bring them back into Egypt, for they were sorry to have ‎sent away the children of Israel from their servitude, and they said to each other: Surely, ‎Moses and Aaron spoke unto Pharaoh, saying: Only a three days journey will we go into the ‎wilderness, and we will bring sacrifices to the Lord our God. Let us therefore rise up in the ‎morning to bring them back, and if they actually return unto Egypt to their masters, then will ‎we know that there is faith in them, but should they refuse to return, then we will cause them ‎to come back, with great force and with a powerful arm.‎

"And the waters will came back and cover the chariot and the horsemen" (Exodus 14:26) And even Par'oh, according to Rabi Yehuda, as it says "the chariots of Phar'oh and his army" (15:4). Rabi Natan says Par'oh was the exception, since we have this verse about him: "maybe for this I made you stand up"(Exodus 9:16). And there are those who say that at the end Par'oh went down and drowned, as it says "and the horse of Par'oh came" (Exodus 15:19). "And the children of Israel went into the sea in dry ground" - the angels of service were astounded, saying: 'the children of Israel, idolaters that they are, are coming on dry land?!' And from where do we know that even the sea was filled with rage from Above? Because the text says "and the waters were like rage to them" [since the vav is missing to the word chomah, wall, it can be read as chema, rage; so you can re-read the verse as "the water was like anger on their right and on their left"]. And what caused them to be saved from their right and their left? From the right, it was Torah, which they would receive later on, as it says "From His right, [He gave] a fiery law to them". And left? This is tefilin.