The flax and barley were destroyed, since the barley had headed and the flax was in bloom. The wheat and spelt, however, were not destroyed, because they ripen later. – Exodus 9:31-32

Today’s Scripture Reading (August 19, 2018): Exodus 9

I recently watched an episode of the old Detective Television Series “Colombo.” Back in the day, I loved to watch Colombo in his rumpled coat and old car chase down the crooks. The plotline was typical for the detective show. Usually, the crooks underestimated the detective, often liking to play along with him, making fun of his inept ways. And in the process, they released details that later the detective would use to solve the crime. In detective fiction, the details are important. Whether it is a book or a television show or a movie, seldom is a detail mentioned to the audience that is not somehow important to the plot. If something is mentioned, then it will be used later. If prescriptions were picked up on Monday at 6 p.m., then the audience should immediately realize that somehow that is going to be important to the solving of the crime later in the story.

And sometimes the details trip us up. The idea of a Monday at 6 p.m. prescription pick-up was used in a book I recently read, and it actually left even more of a mystery. At one point in the story, the pick-up of prescriptions was used to indicate that one of the characters was without an alibi, but somehow the author seemed to lose that details. She indicated that one character could have committed the murder because she was not the one who picked up the prescriptions, even though the character had used the prescription pick-up as her alibi. But later her murderer confessed to the crime ending the story. But the eventual revealed murderer was the one who picked up the prescriptions earlier in the story. The result was that while the book ended with a confession and the law enforcement officers solving the crime, everyone seemed to miss that the murderer had an alibi and could not have committed the crime. In a crime story, we have to follow the details.

The Bible also provides us with details that help us to fill in some answers for some of our questions. Sometimes the details help us, and sometimes they just add more questions. In this case, the details are a help. We are told that the hail destroyed the flax and barely, but not the wheat and spelt (sometimes mistakenly translated as rye). The detail makes sense, and allows for the destruction of the wheat and spelt later in the story. It also gives us a bit of a date for the disaster. Since the flax and barely were “headed” or “in bloom” but the wheat and spelt were not, then it is likely that this disaster took place in late January or early February.

But the destruction of the flax and barley was significant. Flax would have been used for the making of linen for the clothing of the wealthy classes, and barley was a food source for both men and animals. Through the details, we can understand the disaster a little more clearly, and maybe feel some of the desperation that the Pharaoh would have felt realizing that this part of his harvest was lost.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Exodus 10