B’yad hazakah – zeh hadever, with a mighty hand – this refers to pestilence: Rabbi Alshich explains yad hazakah is a reference to the plague of pestilence because it is the fifth plague. Concerning this plague, the Torah says: “Then the hand of the Lord will strike your livestock in the field…” Since each plague is described as the ‘finger of God,” then the fifth plague is the hand of God…” The second five plagues make up God’s ‘other hand.’ We find a proof for this in the following verse from the Torah: “You shall soon see what I will do to Pharaoh: he shall let them go because with a mighty hand (yad) he shall let them go and with a greater might (yad)he shall drive them from the land.” Why was it necessary to have repetitive language in this verse? It could have said: “With a mighty hand he sent them and drove them out of Egypt. This verse comes to teach us that the first five plagues represented the one hand of God and the other five plagues represented the second hand of God. And with the ‘two hands’ together the redemption was completed: one to send the people forth and the other to have them driven out of Egypt. With the first five plagues the people received permission to leave; and with the second ‘hand’ the Egyptians were motivated to actively seek Israel’s ouster from the land of Egypt. With this explanation we can now understand the following verse: “Yet I know that the king of Egypt will let you go only because of a mighty hand. So I will stretch out My Hand…” This verse implies that the Egyptians would not let Israel leave as a result of a single ‘hand.’ God would have to send forth a second hand (that is, five more plagues as the verse says.) The verse then goes on to say, “I will smite Egypt with all my wonders…” It is for this reason that the Torah mentions the word hand in the fifth plague, unlike the first ones. The Maggid here appears to agree with the approach of Rabbis Akiva and Eliezer – that each plague is a ‘finger of God,’ and not with Rabbi Yose Hagelili who felt that the word ‘finger’ refers to all ten plagues.