Chapter 10: At Midnight

At midnight, the LORD struck every firstborn in the land of Egypt. From Pharaoh's own son to the child of the lowest prisoner in the dungeon. Even the firstborn of the livestock.

Pharaoh rose in the night. His servants rose. All of Egypt rose. A cry of grief filled the land, because there was not a single house where someone had not died.

Pharaoh called for Moses and Aaron by night.

PHARAOH“Rise, go out from among my people, both you and the children of Israel. And go, serve the LORD as you have said. Also take your flocks and your herds, as you have said, and be gone; and bless me also.”— Exodus 12:31-32

The man who once asked "Who is the LORD?" was now asking the shepherd from Midian for a blessing.

The Egyptians urged the Israelites to leave immediately.

THE EGYPTIANS“We shall all be dead.”— Exodus 12:33

The Israelites asked the Egyptians for silver, gold, and clothing, and the LORD gave them such favor that the Egyptians handed over whatever they asked.

They left Rameses, the city they had built with their own hands. The road cut through the green fields of the Nile Delta, the only land most of them had ever known. Six hundred thousand men walked on foot, and with them their wives and children. A mixed multitude of non-Israelites joined them, and the crowd stretched so far along the road that the front could not see the back. By the time they reached Succoth, the green of Egypt was behind them and the desert spread out ahead. After four hundred and thirty years, an entire nation walked out in a single night. And that night has been remembered ever since.