Exodus 14:21-22

21, 22. And the Lord caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night Here, as in the history of the plagues, natural causes are declared to have been supernaturally used. A northeast wind, which would be called “an east wind” in Hebrew, would tend to drive the water out of the narrow bay towards the southwest, and if transpiring at the time of an ebb tide, might be strong enough to blow the channel dry. If there were shoals or flats at the place of crossing, as there now are near Suez, and deeper water to the north, as there now is, a pathway might thus be made across the Gulf, leaving deep water above and below. It will be noticed that this was soon after the full moon of the vernal equinox, when there would be a very low ebb and a very high flood, and that the tide rises from five to seven feet opposite Suez, and from eight to nine feet when aided by strong winds, returning with unusual suddenness and power after the ebb. (See Introductory remarks.) The Hebrew and heathen traditions of this wonderful deliverance all make it probable that all these natural causes were employed to answer the prayer of Moses. In Moses’ song of triumph the waters are said to have been “gathered together” by the “blast of the nostrils” of Jehovah. He also sang, “Thou didst blow with thy wind, the sea covered them,” (Exodus 15:8; Exodus 15:10;) thus assigning the return as well as the division of the waters to the agency of the wind . So in many places God is said to have “dried up the waters of the Red Sea,” as if by wind . Joshua 2:10; Psalms 66:6; Psalms 106:9. [Different minds will assign different degrees of the supernatural to the transaction . But, (1 . ) The movements of Israel by divine orders were prescribed, and to these the blowings of the wind were precisely timed, measured, and even changed from east to west . (2 . ) The two armies were long in such proximity that Israel could have easily been destroyed had not Pharaoh been deterred and blinded by the “pillar . ” (3 . ) The ordinary tidal action of the sea must have been better known to Pharaoh and his generals than to Israel . That the whole should have been so executed as to save all Israel and destroy all the Egyptians is… unaccountable on merely natural assumptions . See note on Joshua 10:12. ]

The waters were a wall unto them on their right hand, and on their left That is, they were a defense, not necessarily perpendicular cliffs, as they are often pictured. God could make the water stand in precipices if he should so choose, and such a conception is more impressive to the imagination; but it is certain that the language of the text may mean simply that the water was a protection on the right and on the left flanks of the hosts. Thus in Nahum, (Nahum 3:8,) No (Thebes) is said to have the sea (the broad Nile) for a rampart and wall; that is, a defense, a protection against enemies. It is true that in poetical passages the waters are said to have stood “as a heap;” Exodus 15:8; Psalms 78:13; but so they are also, in the same style, said to have been “congealed in the heart of the sea;” and the peaks of the trembling Horeb are said to have “skipped like rams,” and the “little hills like lambs . ” Psalms 114:4. Of course these expressions are not to be literally and prosaically interpreted . Yet it will be noticed that upon our view the waters were heaped up by the wind, though we do not believe that they stood in parallel precipices . But see note on Joshua 3:13.