Exodus 14

Updated
2001-05-26; 14:30:50utc

The location of the next encampment of the Israelites, near Pi Hahiroth between Migdon and the sea, is hard to pinpoint. Some scholars take the sea to be the Mediterranean. The Pulpit Commentary places the camp close to the Bitter Lakes. It is clear that the place was so chosen to make Pharaoh think that the Israelites had lost their way. The choosing of this route defied all human logic. God brought the Israelites purposely in a situation that was desperate from a human viewpoint, a situation from which they could only be saved by a miracle.

The purpose of the plan was two-fold: God set a trap for Pharaoh and He wanted to demonstrate to Israel that the mode of their journey through the desert would be supernatural. As far as Pharaoh was concerned, God's plan was one hundred percent successful. With the Israelites, the Lord was less successful. This is the tragedy of the book of Exodus and of the whole Old Testament: those who had seen God's miracles and experienced His delivery, were the least open for it.

Nothing is as trying to the human mind as to have to depend on a miracle. No matter how many proofs of God's power and faithfulness we receive, we feel extremely uncomfortable with the supernatural.

We say that it is unpleasant to have to depend on a miracle, but we should not forget that God informed Israel ahead of time of what would happen. The only surprise element was God's method. Our situation differs from the one in which Israel found itself only in that we have more of the Word of God than they did; we have as much trouble adjusting to a walk with God in a supernatural way as they did: maybe even more.

When Pharaoh was informed about the apparently erratic way Israel wandered around, he reacted exactly the way God wanted him to. Spiritually, he was beyond the point of return. His master, Satan, wanted to destroy him and he cooperated wholeheartedly. Pharaoh realized that he had consented at the spur of the moment during the Passover night, but he had recovered sufficiently from the sudden death of his son to admit that had he acted foolishly in letting Israel go, and Pharaoh's officials agreed with him. They too had lost a son in the recent past, but in retrospect that seemed to be a small price for the convenience of the slave labor they had enjoyed. Above all, they still had no clear concept of YHWH, the God of glory who had struck them ten times.

So the Egyptian army was mobilized, as Pharaoh ordered the preparation of six hundred of the best chariots and an untold number of others. The king planned the recapture of his slaves in a scheme that would be comparable to a superpower in our present age. In comparison, the Israelites did not have a chance. The Bible tells us that they were "marching out boldly" (vs.8). The KJV reads: "the children of Israel went out with an high hand." It was not human courage, but the hand of the Lord that made them move. The opposing forces were not the Egyptian army and the people of Israel, but the powers of darkness versus God Almighty. The divisions of Egypt were a visible force of highly trained and well armed elite troops, while humanly assessed, the Israelites did not have a ghost of a chance. But the hand of the Lord was there to deliver them.

We read in the story of Elisha and his servant during the siege of Samaria: "When the servant of the man of God got up and went out early the next morning, an army with horses and chariots had surrounded the city. 'Oh, my lord, what shall we do?' the servant asked. 'Don't be afraid,' the prophet answered. 'Those who are with us are more than those who are with them.' And Elisha prayed, 'O LORD, open his eyes so he may see.' Then the LORD opened the servant's eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha."[ 1 ] And Zechariah says: "This is the word of the LORD to Zerubbabel: 'Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,' says the LORD Almighty."[ 2 ] In spite of the outward appearance, the Egyptians were doomed to lose: they faced the forces of Omnipotence.

Several days may have elapsed since the Passover night. After the departure for Succoth, the Israelites turned south and went toward the Red Sea. It would have taken a few days for word about Israel's erratic behavior to reach Pharaoh and again the mobilization of the Egyptian army would have taken time. Jewish tradition places the crossing of the Red Sea at the 21[ st ] day of Abib, which is one week after the Passover. The feast of unleavened bread would have just ended.

Pharaoh's last campaign against Israel is attributed to the hardening of his heart by God. We have to remember, though, that this does not annul Pharaoh's personal responsibility for his acts. He had allowed himself to sink so deeply in his sin and obstinacy that a return to healthy thinking and normal behavior was out of the question. He must have intended to frighten the Israelites into surrender. He may have planned to kill some of the leaders as an example for the others, but what he wanted was a multitude of slaves, not two million dead bodies. Israel's fear that they would all be killed by the Egyptians was groundless. Their panic was even less rational because of God's prophecy to Moses about what would happen. They did the right thing in crying to the Lord, although they would have cried differently had they trusted Him and believed His Word. But we cannot always keep our emotions under control, and the wisest thing we can do under such circumstances is to cry to Him for help.

The Israelites' problem was that they blamed Moses for the situation. Vs. 11 and 12 say: "Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? Didn't we say to you in Egypt, 'Leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians'? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!" They said in fact: "We didn't want to be saved. We are worse off now than we were in our slavery in Egypt." The fact that they could see the cloud of God's glory in front of them didn't seem to make the slightest difference. God was not more authentic to the Israelites than He was to the Egyptians. Actually, we can be in the presence of the Lord and be completely oblivious of it. The worst thing sin does to us is to make us blind and deaf. If we cannot see God in our circumstances and hear His voice, we are no better off than a person who is born deaf and blind. But even Helen Keller learned to communicate, so there is hope for us too. We can learn the song of Moses and of the Lamb.

In Revelation, those who had been victorious over the beast stood at the shore of the sea of glass and fire. They had not crossed that sea yet, and in terms of time and space the Antichrist was still alive and well on earth. They sang their song of victory before the events, not on the basis of their experience, but by faith. That is the difference between the two incidents. We should belong to those who sing the song of Moses, because for us it is the song of the Lamb. We shall see more about this when we get to chapter fifteen.

After the terrible accusations and complaints the newly redeemed Israelites bring to Moses, he initiates them in the life of faith. The first thing he says is: "Do not be afraid." We find these very words twenty-three times in the Bible. Every time a human being has an encounter with God, he is afraid because of his sin. Adam says to God: "I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid."[ 3 ] It wasn't until Adam had been covered by the skin of the animal that died in his place that his fear could subside.

The responsibility of the Israelites in this last battle was three-fold: they had to conquer their fears, they had to stand firm, and they had to keep quiet. As we have seen, fear can be conquered only on the basis of reconciliation; it is related to our fellowship with God. John says: "There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love."[ 4 ] The Israelites had not yet learned to love God.

The second requirement was to stand firm. The Egyptians expected the Israelites to surrender and to give up the freedom they had gained. However, God had placed them in a position of freedom, and they were not allowed to give up one inch of this. In application, we learn that it is not up to us to gain ground but to hold on to what God has given us. Paul explains in the epistle to the Ephesians that the purpose of the armor God puts at our disposal equips us to be able to stand our ground and to stand firm.[ 5 ] The enemy will never be able to take what God has given us, but he could intimidate us to the point where we draw back.

The third requirement was to be still. This was the hardest of all. To be still means, in the first place, that we refrain from negative sentiments. The Israelites accused Moses of bring them to die in the desert, and complain that they preferred their slavery in Egypt. This kind of talk had to be cut out.

But being still before God has a positive meaning that goes far beyond all that is negative. There is a silence of intimacy that has to be learned and practiced. David says: "But I have stilled and quieted my soul; like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me."[ 6 ] And God says: "Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth."[ 7 ] The principle of being quiet and seeing the Lord's victory is also evinced in Jehoshaphat's victory over Moab and Ammon.[ 8 ] Silence can be the most eloquent expression of confidence and worship.

When God said to Moses in vs. 15, "Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on," He did not necessarily imply that Moses lacked faith. The crying out referred to the people. They would never have said those words if they had had any confidence in God. Actually, they had not cried to God at all. They had demonstrated against Him. Vs. 11 says: "They said to Moses ...," but they were accusing God of ulterior motives of the lowest kind – as if the whole exodus had been nothing but a plot to kill them!

The opposite of faith is suspicion. God is either perfectly good or totally bad; He cannot be a mixture, as humans are. We must affirm constantly what James says: "Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows."[ 9 ]

We might believe that the best thing the Israelites could have done in their panic was to pray, but God wanted them to act instead of pray. There are moments when God wants us to act on His promises and when prayer is a sign of unbelief. Most of the time our Lord shows an abundance of patience and understanding. In the case of Gideon, God went beyond the limits of patience to build up Gideon's faith.[ 10 ] And the writer to the Hebrews assures us that "We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are; yet was without sin."[ 11 ] But there are also moment when God is amazed about our lack of faith. The Gospel of Mark says: "And he [Jesus] was amazed at their lack of faith."[ 12 ] After all, the exodus with all the miracles that accompanied it was no small thing. The Israelites had seen enough evidence of God's power to be convinced. It seems that the Egyptians had taken God more seriously than God's own people.

God opened a way of escape where there was none. Mark the order of events: First, the Israelites had to move toward the sea and then Moses has to raise his staff to divide the water. They were to see the proof as they journeyed. It was only after they had made up their minds to go that God opened the way. "Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see,"[ 13 ] says the author of the Hebrew epistle. But as we exercise faith, that is act upon it, the invisible will become visible. God promises that the path through the sea will become dry.

In vs. 21 we read that the miracle was brought about by a natural phenomenon, in a similar way that the miracles of most of the plagues in Egypt took place. God doesn't use magic, but He uses the laws of nature. This should be reassuring to our western mind! The sea was driven back by a strong east wind which may have been a huge tornado that moved above the water and sucked it up so that a dry path occurred, flanked by two enormous walls of water. The fact that the people were not sucked up also, which would be the case with normal tornadoes, could be explained if the people moved in the eye of the storm, which could be several miles long. We do not read that they had to wrestle with the wind or that they were even aware of a storm. The most miraculous aspect of the miracle was the timing of it.

As soon as the mass of people was set in motion, the Lord explained to them what the reaction of the Egyptians would be. In their stupidity they would disregard the miracle and march toward their own death. Twice in this chapter the Lord described this with the words: "I will gain glory." It may be hard for us to understand how death can glorify God since death is the result of a broken fellowship with God. Death is God's last enemy. It belongs to the realm of Satan. The writer of Hebrews says: "Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death; that is, the devil."[ 14 ] Since His resurrection, the key of death and its kingdom is in Jesus' hands. We read that Jesus says: "And I hold the keys of death and Hades."[ 15 ] The fact that human death can be glorifying to God is implied in John's Gospel: "Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God,"[ 16 ] and the psalmist says: "Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints."[ 17 ] Since life is our most treasured possession, the sacrifice of it is to the glory of God. But we cannot say that Pharaoh and his army willingly gave their lives to the God of Israel. In this instance the glory consists in the fact that God uses Satan's own weapon against him to defeat him. God confirms this in the eradication of the whole army of Egypt "The Egyptians will know that I am the LORD when I gain glory through Pharaoh, his chariots and his horsemen" (vs. 18). The dead soldiers would instantly stand before the throne of judgment, and when the news of the disaster reached Egypt the whole nation would have to recognize that YHWH was not a local Israelite deity, but the Creator of heaven and earth, the Almighty God. Pharaoh's question in chapter 5:2: "Who is the LORD, that I should obey him and let Israel go?" would be answered once and for all.

In vs. 19 we read that the glory of God moved from the front of the Israelite army to the rear. The dark side was turned toward the Egyptian army and the light toward Israel. This prevented the Egyptians to move forward during the night and made it possible for the Israelites to prepare themselves for the crossing of the sea.

The verse makes a distinction between the angel of the Lord and the pillar. I do not think this is important enough to build theories upon regarding the mode in which God manifests His glory. The importance is in the effect it has upon man. Whether we walk in God's light or in darkness depends on which side we are. If we belong to the people who have been redeemed from slavery, the light of God will shine upon us and protect us; if we are under the dominion of darkness, God's presence will be darkness for us also. Jesus says to His disciples: "Are there not twelve hours of daylight? A man who walks by day will not stumble, for he sees by this world's light. It is when he walks by night that he stumbles, for he has no light."[ 18 ] Those words describe the condition in which Israel and Egypt found themselves at this point.

Israel must have started their crossing somewhere in the middle of the night, and, as the pillar of fire and darkness moved on, the Egyptians must have followed them into the sea. We read that the LORD looked down during the last watch of the night, which is about four o'clock in the morning, about two hours before daybreak, and threw the Egyptians into confusion. The bottom of the sea which had been hard enough to support people and cattle marching, proved to be too soft for the "tanks" of the Egyptians.

Adam Clarke quotes Ps. 77:17-20, which reads: "The clouds poured down water, the skies resounded with thunder; your arrows flashed back and forth. Your thunder was heard in the whirlwind, your lightning lit up the world; the earth trembled and quaked. Your path led through the sea, your way through the mighty waters, though your footprints were not seen. You led your people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron." If the psalmist gives a literal description of the crossing, it means that a tornado moved down to a lower level and started strafing the Egyptian army, which was thrown in utter confusion.

A Sunday School teacher of liberal persuasion tried to explain away the miracle of the crossing of the Red Sea by suggesting that the sea had no more than a few inches of water when Israel crossed it. One of the pupils raised his hand and asked the teacher to explain the miracle of the whole Egyptian army drowning in two inches of water.

Within minutes a whole army of several hundred thousand was exterminated. Previously, the Israelite baby boys had been drowned in the Nile to curb the population explosion, and now the murderers meet their nemesis in the kind of graves they had prepared for their slaves.

The Lord's victory over Israel's enemy was complete. They would never have to be afraid of the Egyptians again. They witnessed the events; they saw from a distance how the thunder and lightning came down upon the Egyptians when Moses stretched out his staff over the sea and how the tornado that had protected them moved away, making the water rush over the army. When the sun came up they saw the dead soldiers and their officers and probably Pharaoh himself washed ashore.

On this day, a part of God's prophecy to the serpent was being fulfilled: "And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel."[ 19 ] The enemy got a foretaste of what the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ would do to him. He must have shuddered.

The chapter concludes by saying: "And when the Israelites saw the great power the LORD displayed against the Egyptians, the people feared the LORD and put their trust in him and in Moses his servant." It sounds as if the people entered a new phase in their understanding of spiritual things. The evidence convinced them that God and Moses had always been right. Unfortunately, this conviction was not lasting. Their doubts were subdued for the moment; they were not eradicated.

Such is human nature. There are very few Bible characters who believed consistently. Joseph and Daniel are examples of this, but they too, probably, had doubts that were never recorded. The only perfect example of consistent faith is our Lord Jesus Christ.

The people feared the LORD and trusted Moses. The distinction is significant. This fear is the realization of who God is; the One Karl Barth called: "the totally different One."[ 20 ] God is beyond our human understanding. We cannot even conceive the extent and content of His eternal being. This fear is the experience of finite mortals in the presence of the Eternal and Immortal One.

But God revealed Himself to Israel also through Moses. Moses was the link of faith between Israel and YHWH. In this he was an image of Jesus Christ. The people trusted Moses, at least at that moment. Just as Israel approached God through Moses, and received God's Word through Moses, we put our faith in God's Son, Jesus. He said: "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."[ 21 ] Peter and John testify about Him: "Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved."[ 22 ]

At the moment of victory, the whole congregation burst into a song of praise: the song of Moses.

[ 1 ] II Kings 6:15-17

[ 2 ] Zech. 4:6

[ 3 ] Gen. 3:10

[ 4 ] I John 4:18

[ 5 ] See Eph. 6:10-18

[ 6 ] Ps. 131:2

[ 7 ] Ps. 46:10

[ 8 ] See II Chr. 20:15-17

[ 9 ] James 1:17

[ 10 ] See Judges 7:10-15

[ 11 ] Hebr. 4:15

[ 12 ] Mark 6:6

[ 13 ] Heb. 11:1

[ 14 ] Hebr. 2:14

[ 15 ] Rev. 1:18

[ 16 ] John 21:19

[ 17 ] Ps. 116:15

[ 18 ] John 11:9,10

[ 19 ] Gen. 3:15

[ 20 ] Der ganz Andere

[ 21 ] John 14:6

[ 22 ] Acts 4:12