Evening shadows were beginning to creep over the land of Goshen and across the barren fields of Egypt. Everything had grown quiet around the walls and buildings where the Israelites had toiled. Never again would the men return to pick up their tools and work for Pharaoh. The time had come when they were going to leave Goshen.
Before this God had told Moses that one more plague was coming upon Pharaoh and upon Egypt. So terrible should it be that Pharaoh would want to drive the Israelites out of the land. “Tell the people to get ready to leave quickly,” the Lord had said; “for they must start at once when Pharaoh’s messenger comes.”
And the Israelites believed now that God had sent Moses to help them. “They honored him as a great man, indeed, and were ready to obey him because they saw the wonders that God brought upon Egypt through Moses’ words. Many of the Egyptians, too, honored Moses as a great man, and became friendly toward the Israelites. They even seemed eager to please the people whom they once hated and scorned as slaves. They had seen how God protected his people from the troubles that came upon Egypt.
On this evening every household in Goshen was very busy. Instead of preparing for a restful night of sleep, every man, woman, and child was wide awake and very much excited about something. They were obeying the command that Moses had given them from God.
Every father was killing a lamb and sprinkling blood upon the door-frame of his dwelling. Every mother was preparing vegetables to cook with the roasted lamb. Every boy and girl was helping to gather the flocks and herds from the scattered pasture-lands of Goshen, or to run errands for his parents.
“Tonight at midnight,” Moses had said, “God will send an angel through the land, and every house where blood is not sprinkled upon the door-frame this angel will enter. And he will bring death to the eldest child in that home.” Moses told the Israelites to kill a lamb for each family, and sprinkle their door-frames with blood. “Then,” said Moses, “roast the lamb and with it cook vegetables, and prepare for a midnight supper. For when the death-angel passes over the land you must be dressed and ready to start on a journey. You must eat your supper standing around the table. Neither shall any of you go out into the darkness, lest the angel meet you there and you die.”
This midnight supper was called the “Pass-over” supper, because the angel passed over the houses of the Israelites when he saw their blood-sprinkled door-frames. And God commanded that the Israelites should eat such a supper once each year, at the same time, in memory of the night when he kept them from death in Egypt.
Now, the Egyptians did not sprinkle blood on their door-frames, nor prepare a midnight meal. Every one of them had gone to bed as usual, expecting to sleep soundly until the next daydawn. But at mid-night they were awakened. Even Pharaoh was aroused. He hurried to the bedside of his eldest son—and found him dead. What a terrible plague! Pharaoh knew God had done this, and he cried aloud. In every home in Egypt the same sad cry arose, “Our eldest child is dead!” What a hitter time!
Not waiting until morning should come, Pharaoh sent a swift messenger to Goshen in search of Moses and Aaron. There he found every one wide awake, all of them ready to start on their journey. “Pharaoh has sent word that you and all your people must leave Goshen at once,” the messenger said. “And he demands that you take everything with you just as you have requested. Do not leave anything behind.” The Egyptians, too, sent messengers to Goshen and urged the Israelites to hurry out of the land. “We shall, all die if you stay here longer,” they said.
For many years the Israelites had been slaves. They had no money and they had nothing that could be used as money. Now, at God’s command, Moses told the people to ask their Egyptian neighbors for jewels of silver and of gold. And the Egyptians opened their treasure-boxes and gave freely to the Israelites. So eager were they for the Israelites to go away that they were willing to give them anything for which they asked.
And very early in the morning, without waiting to eat breakfast, the Israelites began to leave Goshen. “Like a great army, six hundred thousand men with their wives and children marched out of Egypt. They took also their flocks of sheep and herds of cattle. The women had mixed dough in their pans for bread but had not put leaven, or yeast, in it to make it rise. They carried the pans on their heads, as people carry loads in that country. When they stopped to eat, they baked the dough in cakes over coals of fire, and this was called unleavened bread. And a rule was made that for one week in every year the Israelites should eat bread without leaven, or yeast, in it. This week was afterwards celebrated as a feast, and was called the Feast of the Unleavened Bread.
Moses and Aaron led the people out of Egypt just as shepherds lead their sheep to fresh pasture-lands. But they did not choose the way to go; for God went with them, and he chose the way. In the day-time he concealed his presence in a great cloud, which moved slowly before the people, and at night, when they rested, he watched over them through a pillar of fire. By day and by night the Israelites could look upon the cloud and the pillar and say, “Our God is going with us, and he is leading the way.”
Among the things that the Israelites carried out of Egypt was a stone coffin. In this coffin the body of Joseph had rested for hundreds of years. You remember that before Joseph died he commanded the Israelites not to bury him in Egypt, but to place his body in a stone coffin and carry it back to Canaan when they should return some day to live again in that land. He asked to be buried in the cave where Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, his father, had been buried. And now, though long years had passed, the men who were the great, great-grandsons of this mighty prince in Egypt were now carrying his bones back to be buried in the land God had promised to his people.