והדגה אשר ביאור מתה )ז’ כא’(
And the fish that were in the Nile died (7:21).
The Medrash (Shmos Rabba 9:9) says that the Jewish people became rich from the Plague of Blood. This came about because the Jews were the only ones who had access to fresh drinking water, which they subsequently sold to the Egyptians.
The Zera Shimshon asks how Chazal saw this in the aforementioned passuk.
The Zera Shimshon explains that the Egyptians allowed the Jewish people to catch and eat fish free of charge. This is clearly seen from the passuk where the Jewish people complained about the mann in the desert, saying (Bamidbar 11:5), “We remember the fish we ate in Egypt free of charge.“ Now that the fish died, the Jewish people just lost their source of free nourishment, and they would now have to spend money they did not have to buy food.
The Zera Shimshon learns that the Medrash understood that if the Jewish people just lost their source of free food, Hashem had to have brought a remedy along with this loss. This must have been from the fact that they were now able to sell the most precious and most necessary commodity, water, at a tidy profit. This being the case, they were no longer in need of free food since they now had the means with which to acquire food.
The Zera Shimshon points out that looking through the pessukim of the ten plagues, there were three about which Moshe Rabbeinu did not issue a warning before their coming: כנם, lice, שחן, boils, חשך, darkness.
The Zera Shimshon explains the reason for this in the following manner.
The Yalkut Reuvaini (Va’eira) quotes the Sefer HaPliah that these three plagues happened together. When Egypt was plagued with lice, it also came along with boils and darkness. (It would seem that lice was the primary plague, and the other accompanying plagues did not come with the same force that they came with when they served as the primary plagues.) As well, when Egypt was plagued with boils, it was accompanied by (a lesser degree of) lice and darkness, etc. This is seen in the following diagram:
נ מ כ ח נ ש ש כ חAll these plagues can be read regularly (right to left) and can also be read from the bottom up. This indicates that they are interconnected.
For this reason, Moshe Rabbeinu did not warn Pharaoh before the arrival of these plagues, since had he warned Pharaoh about lice, Pharaoh would have said that Moshe was wrong, since it wasn’t only lice that came, but rather, lice, boils, and darkness. As well, he could not warn Pharaoh about the other two plagues that would be accompanying the lice, since it was not yet the main moment for them. This is why no warning preceded these plagues.
