9. “When Pharaoh says to you, ‘Do a miracle,’ and you say to Aaron, ‘Take your staff and throw it down before Pharaoh,’ it will become a snake.”
10. When Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh, they did so, just as the Lord had commanded them – Aaron threw down his staff before Pharaoh and his servants and it became a snake.
11. Then Pharaoh also summoned wise men and sorcerers, and the magicians of Egypt by their secret arts did the same thing.
12. Each man threw down his staff, and the staffs became snakes. But Aaron’s staff swallowed up their staffs.
13. Yet Pharaoh’s heart became hard, and he did not listen to them, just as the Lord had predicted.
14. The Lord said to Moses, “Pharaoh’s heart is hard; he refuses to release the people.
15. Go to Pharaoh in the morning when he goes out to the water. Position yourself to meet him by the edge of the Nile, and take in your hand the staff that was turned into a snake.
16. Tell him, ‘The Lord, the God of the Hebrews, has sent me to you to say, “Release my people, that they may serve me in the desert!” But until now you have not listened.
17. Thus says the Lord: “By this you will know that I am the Lord: I am going to strike the water of the Nile with the staff that is in my hand, and it will be turned into blood.