234 Ph. Guillaume rayh tpçAl[ wtarql tbxnw hmymh axy hnh rqbb h[rpAla ˚l ˚dyb jqt çjnl ˚phnArça hfmhw Go to Pharaoh in the morning, behold he is coming out to the water, stand by to meet him at the river bank, and the staff that was turned into a snake take in your hand (Exod 7,15). YHWH orders Moses to intercept Pharaoh in the morning as he is going to the water. Why in the morning and why to the waters? Is Pharaoh going for his morning bath? Or are these hints at theomachy rather than at hygiene? In Egypt, the “Repulsing of the Dragon” motif is found in various temple and private rituals and is included in Coffin texts where the enemy dragon is identified as Sobek the crocodile god or as Apophis the snake god threatening to devour the solar boat (17). Seth’s standard posture is thus at the prow of the solar bark, lancing a huge reptile (18). As a god for Pharaoh (Exod 7,1), Moses mimics Baal/Seth striking the Apophis serpent, rod in hand ready to mete out YHWH’s punishment on Egypt (19). The dragon is obviously most dangerous during the night or as evening draws close (v. 5), as the sun is waning. Conversely, morning is Ra’s moment of mounting glory, when the dragon has to lie low (Ps 104,22), waiting for more propitious times to attack the divine vessel. A pharaoh hurrying to the waters in the morning is thus a transmutation of the king into the enemy dragon. Egyptian theology had already worked out a “Pharaoh-friendly” link between Pharaoh and the Dragon, with the Sobek-Re liaison whereby Sobek assumed solar features (20). In Exod 7, the process is simply reversed and Pharaoh, the “son of Ra” in Egyptian royal ideology (21), turns into Ra’s main enemy. From a Hebraic vantage point, pharaohs and other heads of empire do behave like dragons, gobbling up people and kingdoms (22). Rather than demythologizing P’s dragon, Exod 7,14-18 is an exact reflex (17) ANET, 11-12; and Context of Scripture (ed. W.W. HALLO) (Leiden 1997) I, 21. B.F. BATTO, Slaying The Dragon. Mythmaking in the Biblical Tradition (Westminster 1992); J.K. HOFFMEIER, “The Arm of God versus the Arm of Pharaoh in the Exodus Narratives”, Bib 67 (1986) 378-387. Sobek is associated with the Nile and the river banks: D.M. DOXEY, “Sobek”, Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt (ed. D.B. REDFORD) (Oxford 2001) III, 300. (18) ANEP, 669; O. KEEL, The Symbolism of the Biblical World (London 1978) 54-55, 224. (19) O. KEEL – Chr. UEHLINGER, Gods, Goddesses, and Images of God (Minneapolis 1998) 76-79; O. KEEL – S. SCHROER, Schoepfung (Freiburg – Göttingen 2002) 128-130; H. BRUNNER, “Seth und Apophis – Gegengötter im ägyptischen Pantheon?”, Das hörende Herz. Kleine Schriften zur Religions- und Geistesgeschichte Ägyptens (Hrsg. W. RÖLLIG – H. BRUNNER) (OBO 80; Freiburg – Göttingen 1983/1988) 121-129. (20) Sobek, the crocodile deity of Crocodilopolis in the Faiyum, became the god of the Pharaohs of the Twelfth Dynasty (XXth – XVIIIth centuries) and then experienced a real ascendancy in the Eighteenth Dynasty (XVIth – XIVth centuries): S. MORENZ, Egyptian Religion (London 1973) 140-141; V. IONS, Egyptian Mythology (Feltham 1968) 93. (21) J. ASSMANN, Egyptian Solar Religion in the New Kingdom. Re, Amun and the Crisis of Polytheism (London 1995). Letter to Zalaia from Kumidi: “the king is well like the sun in heaven”, Context of Scripture, III, 243. Most of the Amarna letters address Pharaoh as “to the king, my Lord, my Sun”: W.L. MORAN, The Amarna Letters (Baltimore – London 1992). (22) Nebuchadrezzar in Jer 51,34 and the Babylonians in Lam 2,19. Less directly: the Assyrians (Isa 28,4; 49,19; Hos 8,7); David and Joab (2 Sam 20,19).