Gnat

Scripture references: Exodus 8:16–19; Psalm 78:45; 105:31; Matthew 23:24

The Hebrew term, כִּנִּים (kinnim) is the third plague in Exodus 8:16–19. The precise identification of kinnim is debated: the LXX uses sknipes (gnats or mosquitoes); the KJV translates "lice"; NASB and ESV have "gnats"; NIV uses "gnats." The Talmud identifies kinnim as a kind of insect that emerges from the earth. The most probable identification based on etymology, context (arising from the dust of the ground), and LXX precedent is gnats or midges, small biting insects that emerge from soil and standing water. The gnat is the smallest of the plague insects, which makes it the most striking choice for the plague the magicians cannot match.

The third plague, Exodus 8:16–19, YHWH commands Moses: "Say to Aaron, 'Stretch out your staff and strike the dust of the earth, so that it may become gnats in all the land of Egypt.'" Aaron strikes the dust; all the dust of the land becomes gnats, on man and animal, throughout all the land. The magicians attempt to do the same with their secret arts. They cannot. For the first time in the plague sequence, Egypt's own supernatural technology fails. The magicians turn to Pharaoh and say: "This is the finger of God." The phrase is significant, they do not say YHWH's name, but they identify a divine agency that exceeds their own. The gnat is the plague that breaks the magicians.

The distinction of the third plague, The first two plagues (blood, frogs) the magicians replicated, they could produce blood from water, they could bring up frogs. They could escalate the problem; they could not solve it. The third plague they cannot produce at all. The line between human and divine power is drawn at the gnat, the smallest plague, from the dust of the ground, unreplicable by the most sophisticated alternative religious technology of the ancient world.

Strain out a gnat, Matthew 23:24, In the seven woes against the scribes and Pharisees, Jesus delivers the most extravagant image of all: "You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel!" The gnat is the smallest of the unclean creatures, too small to be seen clearly in liquid. The practice of straining wine through cloth to remove insects was a known purity concern (m. Terumot 10:9 addresses insects in wine). Jesus does not mock the concern; he names the total inversion: obsessive attention to what is microscopically small and unclean while consuming what is large and unclean. The camel is one of the most prominent of the Levitically unclean animals. The Pharisee straining the gnat swallows the camel, the tiniest prohibited thing filtered, the largest prohibited thing consumed. The gnat and the camel together are the image of scale-inverted religion.

The gnat is the creature born from dust that breaks Pharaoh's magicians, the first plague they cannot replicate, the one that wrings from them the confession "this is the finger of God." In the New Testament it is the creature Jesus uses for the image of total religious inversion: straining out the microscopic forbidden thing while consuming the largest forbidden animal. The Sanctum holds it as Canon-tier: the gnat that reveals the finger of God, and the gnat that Jesus pairs with the camel.