4. Pharaoh will not listen to you. Then I will lay my hand on Egypt and bring my hosts, my people the children of Israel, out of the land of Egypt by great acts of judgment.
5. The Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord, when I stretch out my hand against Egypt and bring out the people of Israel from among them.”
6. Moses and Aaron did so; they did just as the Lord commanded them.
7. Now Moses was eighty years old, and Aaron eighty-three years old, when they spoke to Pharaoh.
8. Then the Lord said to Moses and Aaron,
9. “When Pharaoh says to you, ‘Prove yourselves by working a miracle,’ then you shall say to Aaron, ‘Take your staff and cast it down before Pharaoh, that it may become a serpent.’”
10. So Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and did just as the Lord commanded. Aaron cast down his staff before Pharaoh and his servants, and it became a serpent.
11. Then Pharaoh summoned the wise men and the sorcerers, and they, the magicians of Egypt, also did the same by their secret arts.
12. For each man cast down his staff, and they became serpents. But Aaron’s staff swallowed up their staffs.
13. Still Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he would not listen to them, as the Lord had said.
14. Then the Lord said to Moses, “Pharaoh’s heart is hardened; he refuses to let the people go.
15. Go to Pharaoh in the morning, as he is going out to the water. Stand on the bank of the Nile to meet him, and take in your hand the staff that turned into a serpent.
16. And you shall say to him, ‘The Lord, the God of the Hebrews, sent me to you, saying, “Let my people go, that they may serve me in the wilderness.” But so far, you have not obeyed.