The Eighth Plague: Locusts

10 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh, for I have made his heart unyielding, and his officials’ hearts too, so that I may perform these signs of mine in their midst, ² and so that you may tell your children and your grandchildren how harshly I dealt with Egypt and about my signs which I did among them. Then you will know that I am the Lord.”

³ Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and said to him, “This is what the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, says: How long will you refuse to humble yourself before me? Let my people go so that they may serve me. ⁴ But if you refuse to let my people go, watch out, because tomorrow I will bring locusts into your territory. ⁵ They will cover the surface of the ground so that no one will be able to see the ground. The locusts will eat what little you have left after the hail. They will also eat every tree that you have growing in the field. ⁶ Your houses, your officials’ houses, and every Egyptian’s house will be filled with them, something neither your fathers nor your fathers’ fathers have seen, from the day that they settled in this land up to this day.” Then he turned and went out from Pharaoh.

⁷ Pharaoh’s officials said to him, “How long will this man be a snare to us? Let the men go so that they may serve the Lord, their God. Do you not yet realize that Egypt is ruined?”

⁸ So Moses and Aaron were brought back to Pharaoh, and he said to them, “Go, serve the Lord your God. But who exactly would be going?”

⁹ Moses said, “We will go with our young and old, with our sons and daughters. We will go with our flocks and herds, for we are celebrating a festival to the Lord.”

¹⁰ But he said to them, “May the Lord be with you if I would ever let you and your families go! I see you are determined to do evil. ¹¹ No! The men may go and serve the Lord, for that is what you have been asking for!” Then they were driven out from Pharaoh’s presence.

¹² So the Lord said to Moses, “Stretch out your hand over the land of Egypt so that locusts come up over the land and eat every plant in the land, everything left by the hail.”

¹³ Moses stretched out his staff over the land of Egypt, and the Lord made an east wind blow over the land all that day and all through the night. When morning came, the east wind had brought the locusts. ¹⁴ The locusts came up over the entire land of Egypt and settled down in the entire territory of Egypt. There had never been such a large number of locusts before, and there would never be again. ¹⁵ They covered the surface of the ground so completely that the land was dark. They ate every plant of the land and all the fruit of the trees—everything left after the hail. Nothing green was left on the trees or on the plants in the field throughout the entire land of Egypt.

¹⁶ Then Pharaoh quickly summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “I have sinned against the Lord your God and against you. ¹⁷ Now please forgive my sin once more, and plead to the Lord your God so that he may also remove this death from me.”

¹⁸ So Moses went out from Pharaoh and pleaded with the Lord. ¹⁹ The Lord changed the wind to a very strong west wind. That wind lifted up the locusts and drove them into the Red Sea. Not one locust remained in the entire territory of Egypt. ²⁰ But the Lord made Pharaoh’s heart hard, and he did not let the Israelites go.