Exodus 10:14

14 The locusts covered the country of Egypt, settling over every square inch of Egypt; the place was thick with locusts. There never was an invasion of locusts like it in the past, and never will be again.

Exodus 10:14 Meaning and Commentary

Exodus 10:14

And the locusts went up over all the land of Egypt
Being raised up by the wind in the places where they were generated, they flew and spread themselves all over the land, being in a wonderful manner produced and multiplied by the power of God:

and rested in all the coasts of Egypt;
in every part of it where the Egyptians dwelt, and where there were meadows, pastures, fields, gardens, orchards; here they lighted and fed, excepting the land of Goshen, where Israel dwelt, which must be thought to be exempted from this plague, as from the rest.

Very grievous were they;
because of the mischief that they did, and because of their multitude, for they were innumerable, as the Vulgate Latin version renders it, and as it is, ( Psalms 105:34 ) ,

there were no such locusts as they, neither after them shall be such;
there were none before, and there would be none afterwards like them, which Moses knew by a spirit of prophecy. If this is to be understood of their size, they must be very large; in the year 1556, there were locusts at Milain that were a span long, and had six feet, and these like the feet of rats, and there was one four times bigger than the rest, which was taken and kept by a citizen, and would hiss like a serpent when it saw that no food was set before it ^F14; yea, Pliny ^F15 speaks of locusts in India three feet long; and what Moses here says is not contradicted in ( Joel 2:2 ) because his words may be understood of the Chaldean army, of which the locusts were an emblem; and besides, each may be restrained to the country in which they were, as that none ever before or since were seen in Egypt as these, though they might be in other countries; and so those in Joel's time were such as never before or since were seen in the land of Judea, though they might be in other places.

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FOOTNOTES:

F14 Frantzii Hist. Animal. Sacr. par. 5. c. 4. p. 800.
F15 Ut supra. (Nat. Hist. l. 11. c. 29.)

Exodus 10:14 In-Context

12 God said to Moses: "Stretch your hand over Egypt and signal the locusts to cover the land of Egypt, devouring every blade of grass in the country, everything that the hail didn't get."

13 Moses stretched out his staff over the land of Egypt. God let loose an east wind. It blew that day and night. By morning the east wind had brought in the locusts.

14 The locusts covered the country of Egypt, settling over every square inch of Egypt; the place was thick with locusts. There never was an invasion of locusts like it in the past, and never will be again.

15 The ground was completely covered, black with locusts. They ate everything, every blade of grass, every piece of fruit, anything that the hail didn't get. Nothing left but bare trees and bare fields - not a sign of green in the whole land of Egypt.

16 Pharaoh had Moses and Aaron back in no time. He said, "I've sinned against your God and against you.