Pharaoh Rose in the Night and No House Was Without Its Dead

"And Pharaoh rose up in the night" (Exodus 12:30) — he did not arise in the manner of kings, who arise in the third hour and sleep through two hours; he rose in the night. "He and all his servants and all the Egyptians" — just as he himself, no man roused him, so too his servants, no man roused them, and so too the Egyptians, no one roused his fellow. "And there was a great cry in Egypt" — teaching that they saw their gods splitting apart and falling before them. And although the matter is left obscure here, it is made explicit elsewhere: "Then the earth shook and quaked, the foundations of heaven trembled and were shaken, because He was angry; smoke rose from His nostrils, and fire from His mouth devoured" (2 Samuel 22:8-9). "For there was not a house where there was not one dead" (Exodus 12:30). Rabbi Yaakov says: But was there no house that had no firstborn? Rather, such was the custom of the ancients: one who had no firstborn son would call the eldest of his sons "firstborn," as it is said, "Of the sons of Merari: Shimri the chief, for though he was not the firstborn, [his father made him chief]" (1 Chronicles 26:10). In a house with many men, where none of them had children, the eldest in the house died. And from where do we know that the eldest in the house is called "firstborn"? For so it says of David, "I also will make him My firstborn" (Psalms 89:28). Rabbi Shimon says: There were no fewer than six hundred thousand firstborn who died that night, as it is said, "I gave Egypt as your ransom" (Isaiah 43:3) — and the ransom is one for one. Another interpretation of "For there was not a house where there was not one dead": Rabbi Nathan says, But was there no house there that had no firstborn? Rather, when a firstborn son was born to one of them, he would make for him a portrait-likeness, and on that day [of the plague] it was crushed and ground up and torn before them, and it was as hard for them as if they had buried him that very day. Another interpretation: because the Egyptians used to bury their dead in their houses, and dogs would enter through the drains and dig up and bring out the firstborn from their graves and toy with them, and it was as hard for them as if they had buried them that very day.