The ninth plague was to teach both the Jews and the Egyptians that idolatry is darkness while the Torah is light. When we stray from the Torah we enter into darkness.
Parashat Bo: From Economic Collapse to Spiritual Darkness
This week’s parashah, Parashat Bo, brings us to the final three plagues—the decisive blows that dismantle Egypt entirely. What is striking is that these plagues are not random acts of destruction; they are systematic. They unravel Egypt layer by layer: its economy, its ideology, and finally its continuity as a civilization.
The first of these plagues is locusts, which utterly destroy the Egyptian economy. Every remaining crop is consumed. Egypt is left with nothing. This is not accidental. There is a profound measure-for-measure (middah k’neged middah) at work here. Egypt survived the great famine years earlier only because of Joseph, who saved the country through careful planning and foresight. Yet Pharaoh later chose to “forget” Joseph—to erase history when it no longer suited his narrative.
God’s response is clear: You forgot how you were saved from famine? Then you will experience a famine with no rescue. Egypt’s economy collapses completely.
Next comes the plague of darkness, and this plague is fundamentally different. It follows the destruction of Egypt’s material strength, but it precedes the final blow—the death of the firstborn, which will sever Egypt’s future. Darkness is not about physical survival; it is about meaning, belief, and identity.
Egypt was an intensely ideological civilization. Among its central objects of worship was the sun, embodied in the god Ra. As long as the sun rose each day, Egypt believed its worldview was validated. Power, permanence, and divinity all flowed from that light.
Then God removes it.
This darkness was not merely the absence of light. It was a spiritual paralysis. People could not see one another. They could not move. They could not communicate. Society itself ceased to function. A civilization that had worshiped light discovered that it was, at its core, a civilization of darkness.
And yet, in the very same space, the Israelites had light. The Torah tells us explicitly: “For all the children of Israel there was light in their dwellings.” This is not just a physical distinction—it is a philosophical one. Torah is light. Idolatry is darkness.
Rashi reminds us that the light created on the first day of Creation was not the sun. The sun came later. The original light was a deeper illumination—a moral and spiritual clarity, a light reserved for the righteous. That is the light the Israelites possessed in Egypt.
During this plague, the Israelites were able to see everything. They could see where the Egyptians had hidden the wealth they had stolen from Jewish slave labor. Later, when the Jews demanded payment before leaving Egypt, the Egyptians could not deny it. “We have nothing,” they said.
“Yes, you do,” the Jews replied—and they knew exactly where it was.
But this plague was not only about justice or punishment. It was a lesson—primarily for the Jews themselves.
If you follow the Torah, you walk in light.
If you abandon it, you walk in darkness.
History bears this out repeatedly. Secular ideologies often promise enlightenment and progress, but they consistently lead to oppression and despair. One powerful modern expression of this idea appears in Darkness at Noon, written by Arthur Koestler after his imprisonment by the Soviet regime. The title alone captures the paradox: a movement that claimed to bring light instead delivered darkness at the height of the day.
The message of the plague of darkness is timeless. True enlightenment does not come from power, ideology, or human systems. It comes from Torah. Anything else, no matter how persuasive it sounds, eventually leads to blindness.
That is the choice placed before us—not only in Egypt, but in every generation:
Light or darkness.
Torah or illusion.
Something to think about.
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