So the magicians said to Pharaoh, “This is the finger of God.” But Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he did not listen to them—just as Adonai had said.
When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, Pharaoh and his servants had a change of heart toward the people, and they said, “What is this we have done, that we let Israel go from serving us?”
Adonai said to Moses, “When you go back to Egypt, see that you do all the wonders before Pharaoh that I have put in your hand. Still, I will harden his heart, and he will not let the people go.
But Pharaoh will not listen to you, so I will lay My hand upon Egypt, and bring forth My armies, My people Bnei-Yisrael, out of the land of Egypt by great judgments.
Then Adonai said to Moses, “Rise up early in the morning and stand before Pharaoh. As he comes to the water say to him, This is what Adonai says: Let My people go, that they may serve Me.
Though grace is shown to the wicked, he does not learn righteousness. Even in a land of uprightness he will act wrongly, not perceiving the majesty of Adonai.
People were scorched with fierce heat, and they cursed the name of God—the One who has power over these plagues. But they did not repent, to give Him glory.
So the cows took the way straight toward Beth-shemesh—they kept along the same highway, lowing as they went, and turned aside neither to the right nor to the left. The lords of the Philistines followed them to the border of Beth-shemesh.
So they said, “If you are going to send the ark of the God of Israel back, do not send it empty. For you must surely return it with a guilt offering. Then you will be healed and it will be revealed to you why His hand has not been removed from you.”
Then watch—if it goes up by the way of its own territory to Beth-shemesh, then it was He who inflicted on us this great harm. But if not, then we will know that it was not His hand that struck us; it just happened to us by chance.”