Scripture Notes: Light and Darkness (Wisdom 18)

The Book of Wisdom reflects deeply on light and darkness as it revisits events in salvation history, particularly the plagues upon the Egyptians and God’s guidance of His people out of slavery. Pharaoh had already revealed his stubborn heart through eight plagues; He would not let the Israelites leave Egypt to sacrifice to God in the desert. He balked every time. Then came the ninth plague, which was probably worse than the others, for a deep darkness descended upon Egypt. No one could see anyone else. They could hear voices, but the darkness was so thick they could feel it in their very bones. They could not move. They were trapped in blackness and terrified.

But the Israelites had light where they were, for God gave it to them. The same God Who brought deep darkness upon Egypt bathed His people in light as a sign of the covenant He had made with their patriarchs. 

The ninth plague still did not make Pharaoh release the Israelites, so the horrors of the tenth plague descended. The Egyptian first-born died, human and animal alike, and God’s people fled Egypt on the first Passover, after their first-born had been passed over by the angel of death because of the symbolic sign of the blood of a lamb.  

God guided His people out of Egypt with “a flaming pillar of fire,” the shekinah, the glory cloud, a light in the darkness of the unknown trek into the wilderness. He also gave them the light of the Law, of His will for His people’s holiness. He provided them with the opportunity to enter into intimacy with Him, foreshadowing the infinitely increased intimacy that would arrive when the ultimate Light of the World, Jesus Christ, the true Lamb, came into the darkness to enlighten us for all eternity.