arbeh choshech & makkas b'choros all involved darkness.
Choshech is perhaps the least fathomable of all the makkos, & i'm not coming to to make it any more understandable. But just to share an insight.
Medrash rabbah asks where did this choshech come from. One answers m'l'maalah from Hashem's surroundings. The other shitah says from gehinom.
nesivos shalom asks bishlomoh from gehinom we can imagine darkness, - but around Hashem its all LIGHT - ohr! how can darkness come from there?
he says we see from here that what for some is complete light for others can be darkness.
The vilna gaon says that (some kind of) darkness is really such blinding light that it is dark!
Gemara shabbos regarding the menorah tosafos brings medrash that all 40 yrs in midbar the Jews could see in the dark & even behind walls & in boxes etc.
its somewhat childish to assume a light shined wherever they looked.... There existed a constant ohr that for those who wished to avoid it & sleep etc. It was dark & those that needed saw perfectly.
We may say that the locust created a typical darkness of absecence of light. - they blocked the sunlight & blocked the view of the earth.
Choshech was a 'borei choshech' a creation of darkness that was light for some & dark for others.
Makkas bechoros - cherev - zu gilui shechina. Ani v'lo malach. Such a revelation of ohr that it killed the evil leadership of the land.
The slonimer says the word n'tey yadcha refers to reaching to the heights to bring down the choshech.
The siman in shulchan aruch that deals with what we call ois bris kodesh is 240 - RaM - lofty. What by goyim is low & choshech for us is holy. I passed a shul 'zera kodesh' but couldn't tel certain people what it means. We say that zera is 'meor einav shel adam' - & one who abuses it loses his clarity of sight.
The difference between ohr & choshech is if the material is just materilistic it is choshech. (All of existance just by its physical state shades Hashem's presence. its harder to be aware of Hashem's presence in front of something we see, than in the sky.) but when any matter is used for a good purpose it an ohr is present - you can see the meaning and spirituality & Hashem's existance.
That is the difference between the most purposeful substance & its hashchasah.
May we use all of olam hazeh enfused with meaning & purpose & may we live our life filled with layihudim husah oirah v'simcha
