I turned on the TV tonight to see what was on. There was a program called “Biblical Mysteries Explained” on Science channel.  I don’t usually watch these shows, but it sucked me in.  Did you know the first six plagues were natural disasters that logically followed one another? That’s what the scientists say. The hail was really bad (but they didn’t say anything about the fire that the Bible says came with the hail).  They did not explain how most of these plagues have never happened since. I mean, so many frogs it drives you nuts?  River turning to blood?  I’m sure that happens every other year, right?

I waited with bated breath to see what they would say about plague ten, the only one that (arguably) was completely supernatural. How did the science channel explain the killing of the firstborn? Hold onto your hats, people.

According to the expert on the Science Channel, the killer of plague ten was in the food supply. Because their crop supply was damaged through the other plagues, they stored the grain underground. There it fermented and produced a poison called mycotoxin. He then stated that only the top layer would be infected with this toxin, and he says ancient Egyptians fed their eldest the double portion of food at every meal (what?). That is why (he says) only the firstborn died.  And the firstborn of the animals died because the firstborn was the biggest and strongest.

That has got to be the most convoluted attempt to explain away God’s direct involvement in the events of the Exodus I’ve ever seen. As Billy Mays would say, but wait, there’s more!

They then explain that the Hebrews didn’t cross the Red Sea, they crossed the Gulf of Aqaba (on the eastern border of the Sinai Peninsula).  So the Bible is wrong, evidently. Scientists believe the sea was parted by a rare meterological phenomenon called “wind setdown.”  Evidently they say there was a freak wind that pushed the water away from the seabed. No word on why it lasted just long enough to allow the Israelites to cross over, and then died just in time to kill Pharaoh’s army.

Just like evolution, it requires more faith to believe in what these scientists are saying than simply believing that the Bible is true and God can do things that scientists can’t explain. There’s no mystery in the Bible. The only mystery is why people choose to invent theories to explain away their creator.