NILE. - River of Egypt. It is mentioned in many passages of the Bible and is often referred to simply as “the river” by antonomasia (Gen. 41:1–3; Ex. 1:22; 2:3; 7:17–22; 8:5–13; 9:9; Ps. 77[78]:44; Jer. 46:7–8; Isa. 19:6–9; 18:2). As is natural, it is always present in the life of the country: Pharaoh dreams of it in Genesis (41:1–3), when he sees seven fat cows and then seven lean ones rising from the river in the prediction; by the river Pharaoh orders that all the male infants of the Hebrews be cast in (Ex. 1:22); and among the reeds of the bank Moses is placed and later found and saved by Pharaoh’s daughter, who had come down to bathe in the waters (ibid. 2:3–6).
The Nile is the instrument of Yahweh’s vengeance against Egypt, when Moses is ordered to command Aaron to stretch out his hand over the river to bring forth frogs from it (ibid. 8:5–13), and Moses himself proclaims that with Aaron he is able to turn the water into blood, so that the fish will die and the waters become foul (ibid. 7:17–22; cf. 4:9; Ps. 44). At another time allusion is made to the possibility that the river may remain dry (Isa. 19:6); indeed, among the grave threats that resound in the words of Ezekiel (29:1–16) is that of Yahweh to make Egypt arid, a desert, uninhabitable because of the pride of Pharaoh, who refuses to acknowledge in God the creator of the river and thus of the prosperity of the land.
Again in the Bible one finds an allusion to the flood of the Nile (Jer. 46:7–8), to the fact that Alexandria is entirely surrounded by the waters of the river as well as by the sea (Nah. 3:8), to the hippopotamus and the crocodile of the Nile (Job 40:10–28) and perhaps to the dragon (Ezek. 32:2; Amos 9:4); likewise to fishermen with net and hook (Isa. 19:8) and to papyrus boats coming from Ethiopia toward the north (ibid. 18:2).