Home > Torah - Exodus Stories in the Quran
The Bible records ten plagues in Exodus 7-12 and provides a step-by-step account of each plague and miracle. It is a comprehensive written account that is traditionally attributed to Moses. There is a significance in each plague humiliated the pagan gods of the Egyptians.
The Quran only gives a condensed summary emphasising signs and moral lessons. The Quranic account summarises or changes events in Surah 7:103–136. While Surah, 27:12 mentions nine miracles without specifying but still gets the number wrong from the Exodus account.
Surah 7:133 - “So We plagued them with floods, locusts, lice, frogs, and blood—all as clear signs, but they persisted in arrogance and were a wicked people.
Surah 17:101 - We gave Moses nine clear signs—ask the Children of Israel. When he went to them, Pharaoh said to him, “I think that you, Moses, are bewitched.”
Surah 27:12 - Put your hand inside your pocket, and it will come out white, without blemish—among nine miracles to Pharaoh and his people, for they are immoral people.”
The Quran mentions four of the biblical plagues (blood, frogs, lice and locusts) but also a mysterious flood?), but omits the six plagues of flies, livestock disease, boils, hail, darkness and death of the firstborn. The Bible distinguishes between the introductory signs and the ten judicial plagues. Mixing them up shows a lack of understanding of the legal "case" God was building against Egypt.
The inclusion of a "flood" in the Quran appears to be a confused recollection of the Red Sea event or perhaps the Noachian flood, erroneously inserted into the list of plagues. This is a factual error that contradicts the eyewitness account in Exodus.
The omission of the tenth plague where the firstborn of every Egyptian family and livestock died, is especially damning. It is the greatest causing Pharaoh to finally release the Israelites.
The Jewish festival of Passover (Pesach) has been celebrated continuously for over 3,400 years. It is based entirely on the 10th plague and the blood of the lamb on the doorposts (Exodus 12).
The significance of the lamb on the doorposts is missed out which is seen as a foreshadowing of Christ as the sacrificial paschal lamb and commemorated in the Jewish Passover. The Quran fails to retell the story accurately.
The Quranic account of the plagues is a fragmented and sanitized version of the original. By omitting the 10th plague and the Passover, it fails to provide a historical cause for the Exodus and misses the entire redemptive-historical arc that leads to Jesus Christ.