How were Pharaoh's magicians able to perform miracles?

We may ask how far the devil can work miracles; I know of no limit, if God allow it (as in Egypt, etc.) in the use of natural laws or producing appearances, and they have the primary effect of miracles on those who cannot account for them. The criterion is amply given in Scripture, but beyond nature or deception they cannot go - create a louse, and Satan's instruments are at hand (Exodus 8:16-18); natural agencies he can use, if allowed - changes to any extent as far as I know; God alone can create, or by His own will, of itself, produce or cause what is to accomplish His purpose. He disposes of nature as its Master, and does what He pleases; Satan uses power by inferior power, within the created scene, but cannot go beyond its modification, nor do it when he wills. Up to a certain point there may be the same apparent effects; but they accomplish God's purpose, even if Satan's present object be obtained by it. Jannes and Jambres helped to harden Pharaoh's heart, but it only occasioned the display of God's own power and government or judgment; Satan's are all lying wonders, even if power beyond ours be exercised.

Among those in Egypt there were some at least who were able to exercise powers beyond what they obtained by human learning. When Moses was endeavouring by means of signs to convince Pharaoh of the power of God, the magicians of Egypt were able to turn their rods into serpents, and to simulate the first two plagues with their enchantments. Ex. 7:22; Ex. 8:7. These plagues were 'turning the water into blood' and 'bringing up frogs upon the land.' This was beyond mere human power, and certainly the magicians did not work by the power of God; it must therefore have been by the power of Satan. We know not the nature of the enchantments used, the word is lat, and signifies 'secret, magic arts.' Satan can suggest what incantations to employ, if man is willing, and can exercise his powers as far as permitted by God. After the first two plagues the power was stopped, and the magicians had to own, when lice were produced, "This is the finger of God."

The question is, was the action of the magicians a real miracle or produced by juggling? Snake charming was carried on in ancient Egypt . However, these magicians were the instruments of Satan, who manifested his power through them. What they did were "lying wonders." The names of two of these endued with demoniacal powers are given in 2 Timothy 3:8, Jannes and Jambres. Such manifestation of demon power is found today in spiritualism and will be fully revealed during the days of Antichrist at the end of this age (2 Thess. 2:9-12). Pharaoh's heart was hardened (literal translation) because he wilfully rejected the sign given.

The rod is the sign of the power conferred upon Moses: hence it is not strange that our attention should first of all be directed to it. The rod turned into a serpent showed the whole power of Egypt delivered into Moses' hand. As here addressed to Pharaoh, it was a challenge of the completest kind; and if imitated by the magicians, the feebleness of the imitation is apparent in Aaron's rod swallowing up their rods. Of course, it was impossible for them really to imitate so stupendous a miracle, in which Jehovah, the God of the Hebrews, was demonstrated as the Creator. All the power of Satan was incompetent to bring into being the smallest creature; and the language here is meant merely to affirm that to outward appearance the thing was done, — by what juggle need not be told.

Now the magicians of Egypt they also did in like manner with their enchantments. Their "enchantments" were calls on the name of the special god summoned to help them. These scribe-priests or magicians withstood Moses by the help of their gods, "for they cast down every man his rod and they became serpents." The names of the two who were chief among them who withstood Moses by imitating his power, are preserved (2 Tim. 3:8). Their names, Jannes and Jambres, are Egyptian, "in which language An, or Anna, identical with Jannes, means a scribe. It was also a proper name borne by a writer well known in papyri of the time of Rameses II. Jambres may mean scribe of the south: it is the name of a sacred book."

The serpent was an object of greatest adoration among the Egyptians. God began with the serpent as the representative of their whole system. By His power when Moses cast down His rod in presence of the king and the magi, it became a serpent. The magicians accustomed to the power of Satan were not affrighted, and essayed the same with their rods. God permits that their rods should likewise become serpents. But the rods of the magicians becoming serpents proves the direct agency of Satan, who had a brief moment to show his power and to strengthen man in opposition to God. He put his power in direct antagonism to God. He dared to dispute with Jehovah the place of being the object of worship, and imitates the miracle which was to prove the sovereignty of God. Before the eyes of Pharaoh the powers of darkness came into collision with the true God, and in a manner perfectly intelligible to Pharaoh. It was well; it gave irrefragable evidence, and left him without excuse. There was but one rod on the side of God, there were many on Satan's side. "But Aaron's rod swallowed up their rods." How conclusive this should have been to Pharaoh that the serpent which he worshipped was no god! There was demon power under its form. "The things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils." (1 Cor. 10:20.) Man has stupidly bowed down to a creature lower than himself, and Satan clothes himself with that appearance. He did it in the garden of Eden to tempt, in Egypt to receive the homage of man. He succeeded in both. If the Egyptians could only have learnt the lesson the forbearance of God was teaching! They worshipped the serpent — what was become of their god? Swallowed up. Only Aaron's rod left. Aaron put forth his hand to take his rod, the magicians had none to take. All this took place that the Egyptians might know that "I am Jehovah." There was no form of idolatry, so widely spread, as that of the serpent. Can there be a more complete condemnation of the whole system than here in its representative? This first miracle stands by itself in this, that it was not a plague. It was simply Jehovah executing judgment upon the gods of Egypt. The last miracle, the destruction of Pharaoh's host in the Red Sea, was not so much judgment upon the false gods as upon their worshippers. The other miracles partake of both characters, that is, both judgment upon the gods of Egypt and a plague upon the Egyptians. A plague because the truth taught by the first miracle was not received, nor the command obeyed of Him whose supremacy had been so clearly proved. Israel was still retained in bondage. Yet, by Pharaoh's obstinacy, God was accomplishing His purpose of judgment against ALL the gods of Egypt. And to make His judgment more manifest, and man's persistency in opposition to the true God, the magicians were allowed to imitate the earlier miracles, until, no longer permitted to imitate, Satan's power stopped, the magicians exclaiming, "This is the finger of God." It is Satan compelled to own God's supremacy; as afterwards demons could not but own the Godhead of the Lord Jesus, forced to say, "The holy One of God."

It may be interesting now to trace for a little the opposition of the Egyptian magicians to the wonder-working power of Moses and Aaron in the presence of Pharaoh. The chief of these are mentioned by name in the New Testament. We read, "As Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth." (2 Tim. 3:8.) This reference is highly important as showing that a principle of Satan's acting is embodied in the conduct of the magicians. What, then, it may be asked, was its especial character? It was, in one word, IMITATION. Thus when Aaron cast down his rod, and it became a serpent, "they also did in like manner with their enchantments. For they cast down every man his rod, and they became serpents." (Exodus 7:11-12.) So also when the waters of Egypt were smitten with the rod of God, and they became blood, the magicians "did so with their enchantments." (Ex. 7:22.) It was the same in the case of the frogs. (Ex. 8:7.) Their action was thus an imitation of the action of Moses and Aaron. In Timothy also the men who are said to resist the truth, as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, are described as "having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof." (2 Tim. 3:5.) This is one of Satan's most dangerous subtleties. If he can succeed in open opposition to the truth, he will not conceal himself; but if this door of antagonism is closed, he will transform himself into an angel of light. It was so in Paul's days; and it is especially the case at the present moment. Professing Christians would scarcely be led away by the open exhibition of Satanic power; but how many are seduced by it because outwardly it is an imitation of the divine. Take one of the grossest examples of this. If Roman Catholicism, with all its vile profanations of the truth, were not dressed up in the outward garb of Christianity, could it by any possibility deceive souls? But claiming to be able to dispense every blessing, which has been secured by the death of Christ, it seduces the souls of men by thousands, and brings them under the complete dominion of its falsehoods and corruptions. It is therefore, as a system, one of Satan's most successful instrumentalities. But there are greater dangers. There is not a single operation of the Spirit of God, nor a single form of His working, that Satan does not imitate. His counterfeits are around us on every hand, within and without. But thanks be to God, He has provided us with sufficient safeguards, and with the means of the detection of every phase of his ensnaring arts. "These things," says John, "have I written unto you concerning them that seduce you. But the anointing which ye have received of Him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in Him." (1 John 2:26-27.) The Spirit and the word of God are sufficient to preserve us from the most dangerous simulations of the truth that Satan may present to our souls.

More than this, if there is but the steadfast adherence to God and His truth, the workings of Satan will in due time be exposed. Three times did these instruments of his "withstand" Moses. But when the plague of lice was brought in, a question of producing life from the dust of the earth, the magicians were powerless, and compelled to confess that it was "the finger of God." (Ex. 8:18-19.) Life belongs to God; He only is its source; and hence here the efforts of Satan are baffled, and we read of no farther attempt on the part of his instruments to intercept the force of the divine signs. In the next chapter, indeed, we find that they "could not stand before Moses because of the boils." (Ex. 9:11) They themselves have fallen under the punitive hand of God. We may therefore rest confidently, whatever the present seeming success of the evil one; for "the God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly." (Rom. 16:20.)

The magicians of Egypt are invoked as the pattern of the misleaders; and this remarkably by names otherwise in scripture unknown to us: "And in the manner that Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also withstand the truth, men corrupted in mind, reprobate concerning the faith" (ver. 8). Now the manner in which these adversaries wrought was by imitating Moses as far as possible. This they could only do within limits till the power of God rising in its display made it hopeless for them to follow. In Christendom imitation is easier, as it is not a question of miracle, but the semblance of truth; and striking it is that the new and withering seductions of the enemy are characteristically imitations of truth, so close as to deceive, if it were possible, even the elect (as will be the case with the Jews by and by). The old bodies of Christendom contain the foundations of the faith in a great measure; those more showy deceptions hold out higher promise as to the hope of the saints, and the church, and Christian privilege, but they sink far below common orthodoxy or they fail in ordinary righteousness. And no wonder, if their guides are "men corrupted in mind, reprobate concerning the faith." Soaring far higher and alluring the sanguine and unstable far more in what is less known, they betray ruinously those blessed and vital truths to which all saints cleave, however ignorant or prejudiced they may be otherwise.

Now, it is peculiarly solemn to mark the nature of this resistance to the truth. The mode in which "Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses" was simply by imitating, so far as they were able, whatever he did. We do not find that they attributed his actings to a false or evil energy, but rather that they sought to neutralise their power upon the conscience, by doing the same things. What Moses did they could do, so that, after all there was no great difference. One was as good as the other. A miracle is a miracle. If Moses wrought miracles to get the people out of Egypt, they could work miracles to keep them in; so where was the difference?

In marking the forms of Satan's opposition to the truth of God, we find that his method has ever been, first, to oppose it by open violence; and then, if that did not succeed, to corrupt it by producing a counterfeit. Hence, he first sought to slay Moses, (Ex. 2:15), and having failed to accomplish his purpose, he sought to imitate his works.

Thus, too, has it been in reference to the truth committed to the Church of God. Satan's early efforts showed themselves in connection with the wrath of the chief priests and elders, the judgement-seat, the prison, and the sword. But, in the passage just quoted from 2 Timothy, we find no reference to any such agency. Often violence has made way for the far more wily and dangerous instrumentality of a powerless form, an empty profession, a human counterfeit. The enemy, instead of appearing with the sword of persecution in his hand, walks about with the cloak of profession on his shoulders. He professes and imitates that which he once opposed and persecuted; and, by so doing, gains most appalling advantages, for the time being. The fearful forms of moral evil which, from age to age, have stained the page of human history, instead of being found only where we might naturally look for them, amid the dens and caves of human darkness, are to be found carefully arranged beneath the drapery of a cold, powerless, uninfluential profession; and this is one of Satan's grand masterpieces.