How did the pharoe's magicians create serpents?

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8 And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron: 9 When Pharao shall say to you, Show signs; you shall say to Aaron: Take your rod, and cast it down before Pharao, and it shall be turned into a serpent. 10 So Moses and Aaron went in unto Pharao, and did as the Lord had commanded. And Aaron took the rod before Pharao and his servants, and it was turned into a serpent. 11 And Pharao called the wise men and the magicians; and they also by Egyptian enchantments and certain secrets, did in like manner. 12 And they every one cast down their rods, and they were turned into serpents: but Aaron’s rod devoured their rods. 13 And Pharao’s heart was hardened, and he did not hearken to them, as the Lord had commanded
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How did they have to power to create serpents? Isn’t that the same as saying that they can perform miracles?
 
Magic is real, and it is done by demonic power. I’m not talking about the fake magic that we see a lot of, but there is the real stuff. Its witchcraft, and is totally forbidden by the Church.
 
Witchcraft probably. Miracles by defenition can only be attributed to God I believe (may be wrong.) But they can only imitate, not create/do something as great as God can . Notice that what the Pharaoh’s magicans could never do something as great as what God had done (how God’s serpant ate Pharaoh’s, etc.)

This reminds me of Tolkien’s Middle Earth, in which evil can only imitate and mock what is created. i.e. Some elves that were corrupted became orcs. Sorry I had to throw that in there. 😃
 
Simple answer, no one is certain. Scripture is silent on that.

But I’ve always believed they did it the same way David Cooperfield made things appear and disappear. Slight of hand and illusion. Although I certainly wouldn’t discount the other possibilities given so far in this thread.

God bless
 
I tend to believe that they were filled with the evil one and that was the source of their power.

Moses and Aaron were filled with the Lord and we know the rest of that story. Amen
 
Myqyl said:
Simple answer, no one is certain. Scripture is silent on that.

But I’ve always believed they did it the same way David Cooperfield made things appear and disappear. Slight of hand and illusion. Although I certainly wouldn’t discount the other possibilities given so far in this thread.

God bless
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I agree. Illusionists need not make a pact with the devil in order to perform. And some of the most effective illusions are the most simple.
 
I can think of two possibilities:

1.) Sleight-of-hand
2.) Real magic

If we’ll look at the word used, we’ll find that the magicians were able to replicate it through b’lahatehem (from the plural of lut ‘to enwrap’). This word is actually a hapax legomenon, a word that only appears once in the OT. It need not necessarily refer to nonhuman “powers” (the Greek renders it as pharmakeiais, literally ‘drugging’ but also ‘sorcery’; other Jewish sources understand it as ‘dazzling display’ or ‘demons’) but could also imply trickery or sleight-of-hand.

BTW, there’s a suggestion that the word tannin here should be understood as referring to, not to a snake (nachash; cf. Exodus 4:3), but to another creature such as a crocodile, since the word tannin refers to a larger reptile (in some texts large river or sea or land creatures!) The Greek also makes this distinction: Moses’ staff turns into an ophis (snake) but Aaron’s turns into a drakōn!

Crocodiles are actually both deeply feared and worshipped (cf. the god Sobek) in the nation so dependent on the Nile River, regarded simultaneously as a voracious devourer (think for example of Ammit of Egyptian mythology, who has a body that was part lion and part hippopotamus, with the head of a crocodile) and a warder of evil in ancient Egyptian thought, so the imagery might be quite fitting. Imagine: Aaron throws his rod, which turns into this crocodile which eats up all the staves of the diviners of Egypt! 😃

http://img69.imageshack.us/img69/6595/stavesv.jpg
 
I have read that according to an early Church writer from the east that the magicans simply used specially made sticks made of rope and filled them with a liquid similar to mercury. When the “magic” potion heated from the hot desert sun the “rods” began to move and wiggle like snakes. They were magicans, after all, and had many illusions.
 
My vote would be not real black magic but a trick, a David Copperfield type trick. It has been around forever,since people entertained their kings/rulers.
 
iI would say real magic, since the plagues mocked the Egyptian gods.
 
I thought back to the first serpent created and wondered the same thing.
Not sure how fitting the punishment was in the garden.
You will crawl on your belly all the days of your life (paraphrase)
Not sure what it did before then.
 
an explanation from another site:

“The wise counsel employed by Pharaoh were using brown Nile Snakes for the trick. As long as they held and squeezed the snakes behind the head, the snakes were paralyzed and stiff as staffs. Once they released them on the ground, the snakes would revive and could slither again.”

“That is why God told Aaron to pick up his snake by the tail. It would prove that there was no trickery, but the power and miracle of God causing the staff to turn into a snake, eat up the other snakes and again to a staff.”

“Pharaohs employees were really upset and knew then it was Moses’s and Aaron’s God that did the miracle.”
 
Ron_Conte said:
an explanation from another site:

“The wise counsel employed by Pharaoh were using brown Nile Snakes for the trick. As long as they held and squeezed the snakes behind the head, the snakes were paralyzed and stiff as staffs. Once they released them on the ground, the snakes would revive and could slither again.”

“That is why God told Aaron to pick up his snake by the tail. It would prove that there was no trickery, but the power and miracle of God causing the staff to turn into a snake, eat up the other snakes and again to a staff.”

“Pharaohs employees were really upset and knew then it was Moses’s and Aaron’s God that did the miracle.”
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What site?
 
I’ll go with trickery since magic would have to have some force behind it. What force would that be? It wouldn’t make sense.
 
I also can’t find out about paralyzing snakes. This would be the least troubling answer.
 
adstrinity said:
What site?
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here:
answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080913232033AAtJkTA

But a better source is here:
viewzone.com/israel.html
Reptiles Throughout Mythology
by Norman A. Rubin
“An interesting observation is that, as pointed out by naturalists, several species of snake, including young cobras, will play dead when threatened. Other species can be temporarily paralyzed by pinching the snake on the neck or merely turning it on its back. There is the story of Aaron’s rod that turned into a serpent and swallowed the serpents of the Pharoe’s sorcerers… Many snakes and crocodiles are cannibalistic and, if sufficiently hungry, will eat their own species. Thus, if Aaron’s rod were actually a paralyzed snake or crocodile this phenomenon could have some possibility.”
 
I’m going to go with the cool illusionist theory. As a reasonably accomplished worker of “real magick” myself and one who has studied under some much more advanced folks, I can say I have never seen or heard of a spell to create snakes out of thin air or transmuting wood to a live animal. Then again, we have little use for such a thing. We never enslaved the Jews or faced the prospect of a magickal contests with their prophets. I’ll ask some kemetic magicians next time I see them and let you know if I turn anything up…😃
 
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