Egypt is an ancient country that has interacted with Abraham’s family for a very long time. That relationship changed throughout the Bible and when the prophecies in Isaiah are fulfilled it will change again. I think it is fair to say much of the time Egypt has not been nice to Abraham’s family through Jacob. The poetry and prophetic books in the Bible use several different names/symbols for the land along the Nile River, and that is what this post is about.

Psalms 105 and 106 are “Sabbath lessons” and part of those lessons include Egypt. Psalm 106 has a telling of the exodus from Egypt: verse 10 uses terms for ‘hand of one hating’ and ‘hand of the enemy’ to describe Egypt, verses 19-20 tell the story of the Golden Calf/Bull (a god of Egypt), and verse 21 uses the names Egypt and Ham (also in 105). Psalm 106 was written after Jeremiah because it includes ‘other foes’ who oppressed Israel (verse 41).

Ham

Ham is Noah’s son who had to tell on his father. For that unkind, embarrassing act he got cursed, especially his son Canaan. This story is found in Genesis 9 and 10. Another of Ham’s sons is Mizraim or Egypt. If you do a word search in the KJV you can find Mitsrayim and Egypt. If you use the Strong’s Concordance it is H2526. Ham appears to come from the word for hot. Ham is used in Psalms 78:51, 105:23 and 27, and 106:22 in connection with or for the land of Egypt.

Mitsrayim or Mizraim is H4714 in the Strong’s and is translated Egypt. It is the lands along the Nile River, both upper and lower Egypt.

Rahab is H7294 in the Strong’s and is another name used for Egypt. It means boaster or storm. When this name is used it is negative. See Psalm 87:4, 89:10, and Isaiah 51:9. PLEASE do not think that is the name of Jesus’ grandmother who helped the spies in Jericho; she is H7343 and her name means to be wide or spacious.  

Pharaoh is the title for the king of Egypt. See H6547. I am including it in this post because of Isaiah 30, where the people thought he would help them against Assyria. Pharaoh is often used as a symbol that Israel thought would help them, they seldom did. That Pharaoh did not help at all during the time of Isaiah.

What do Rahab, Pharaoh, and Mizraim have in common? They all contain RA or the Egyptian sun god. Yes, other words contain that set of Hebrew letters, but I thought it was funny. Strong’s Hebrew: 7451. רָע (ra’) — Evil, bad, wicked, harmful, unpleasant

Isaiah 30:6 refers to Egypt as ‘a people of no profit’ or Hebrew Concordance: yō·w·‘î·lū — 9 Occurrences  This was not a great time for Egypt and they were having problems. Assyria was the new power in the Levant to be reckoned with and they took the idea of being a bully to a whole new level.