Crossing the Red Sea

tourist · Apr 29, 2015

Muddy water? Pffft! I lived in Virginia and know red clay -- in and out of water. The soil needs a particular flora and fauna to get that color. Virginia's best known crop is tobacco. Even before tobacco, they had a certain selection of trees. (I found out they don't get red much in their fall foliage, because maples aren't native. Maple trees aren't a southern tree, naturally.) Georgia (another state with red clay) is best known for root crops and peaches. None of those crops were known by Egyptians, and Egyptians were bound to need what they grew, so they weren't wasting precious Nile water on unnecessary crops (like tobacco and peaches. I love both those crops, however, they're just not needed.)

I enjoyed your take on the tobacco crops. You wrote a very informative and entertaining post, per usual.

oldhermit · Apr 29, 2015

Bowhunter2394 said:

would DEPEND on how Wide the Path is.. and if He kept the whole PATH DRY.. or just had a piece of the pathway.. dry.. Scripture doesnt tell us that.. so you have senarios played out.. thought about pondered....I can see Him USING MUD AND doing that. for Narrow is the Way. that leads to life.. maybe the outer edges were still wet seabed?? dont know.. just conjecture.. if they were still wet. I can see pharaoh in his haste.. as he entered the sea bed to tell his armies to spread out.. so if they were to catch them, the Israelites, they couldnt get around Pharaohs army because it was spread out.. those outer flanks.. if the ground was wet.. those wheels bogged down as they pushed thru the seabed.. and all of sudden your only left with 1/3 of his Army, viable.. that which was travelling on dry ground... by that time.. Moses called to lower the walls on them.. just a senerio, thought out. if it was Mud He used.. but it doesnt say. says He took them off.. and He could do that supernaturally without any help from the seabed. indeed!

Regardless of the width of the path the text tells us twice that they crossed on dry ground. Had Moses meant muddy ground do you not suppose he would have said the crossed on muddy ground since there is a word in the Hebrew that expressly means muddy?

oldhermit · Apr 29, 2015

MarcR said:

Since you have some knowledge of Hebrew perhaps you could offer something on how this is expressed in 15:8 "...the deeps congealed in the heart of the sea."

Bowhunter2394 · Apr 29, 2015

oldhermit said:

Oh I know they Crossed on dry ground.. the discussion of 'how God took off their wheels'.. is what people are pondering.. God Himself did it... I know that. I was just throwing out a senario as to how those wheels may have come off, for those who thought maybe it was mud that caused them to come off.. there is no condemnation in that. thinking or pondering it. God did it and that's all that Matters to me.. How He did it.. He knows and He can reveal that to a person.. the Spirit searcheth the DEEP things of God.. and He can and will reveal those Mysteries to you.. God did it. I know that.. I'll REST in that..

Dan_473 · Apr 30, 2015

atwhatcost said:

well, in the revolutionary war, britain had to send its troops and often supplies across the atlantic... also, france helped the colonists... the colonists didn't defeat britain, just got britain to go away for a while... british came back and burned the capital in war of 1812...

in britain vs germany in wwII, I don't think britain is that much 'lower' than germany... also germany is fighting on two fronts, I think...

yes, it is speculatin as to the answer, but I think it's an interesting question... which number system should the translators use?

the smaller number make more sense to me in view of the stories in the wilderness...

but the larger numbers could work if God is often fighting against the israelites... like it says in psalms, "for forty years I hated those guys"...

Dan_473 · Apr 30, 2015

Jeff_56 said:

yes! I'm totally in favor with what's written... how to translate it... that's what I'm interested...

Dan_473 · Apr 30, 2015

atwhatcost said:

It is possible. But, unlike a bike, chariots have horse(s) pulling it. I'm not sure, (I've never seen a chariot in person), but aren't horses heavier than chariots? (Maybe not, since chariots were probably made of metal, and there was a dude with heavy armor on.)

I'm also not sure how wide the spot was at the crossing, except to assume over a million people walked across in roughly 12 hours. Imaging walking, with all you could carry for 12 hours in mud. Could you do it? Could Tom Brady do it? (Hey, I just picked one of the more atheistic people I can imagine. No big scientific logic behind that. lol)

Bigger question, could a horse pulling a chariot while running do it? I'd think the horses would have run out of steam before the chariots got stuck, assuming the whole army got through to the point of no return when the water rushed back in on them. If it were a mud/soggy ground issue, I would have gone with exhausted horses before stuck wheels.

Then again, like I said, I've never seen a chariot in real life, so you could be right. (I am assuming the chariots in Ben Hur were modern made, so they don't count. lol)

One thing for sure now. I really want to see an Egyptian chariot of that time period in person. It's now dawning on me that the wheels were wooden, so wouldn't rust in dampness.

I was picturing chariot wheels with iron rims... don't know...

over a million people crossing? how arrive at that number? not the 3 million usually mentioned?

yes, horses are heavy and strong... but horses pick up their feet/hooves like humans when they walk... wheeled vehicles are much different in mud... in my experience...

Jeff_56 · Apr 30, 2015

Dan_473 said:

no worries there. just learn hebrew (of back then) and translate away, or ask a Jew who already has.

Dan_473 · Apr 30, 2015

oldhermit said:

not odd at all... a bicycle will easily get stuck in mud/ground that a human can easily cross...

I think it's a translation question... does the hebrew mean free of all water, or free of standing water? if free of all water, moisture content is zero? I think it would tend to turn to dust very fast if the wind was still blowing at that time... maybe causing a great deal of eye and breathing issues for the israelites...

Dan_473 · Apr 30, 2015

Simiel said:

I'm glad you're here, Simiel... I like talking to non-christian folks, too!

Dan_473 · Apr 30, 2015

Jeff_56 said:

therein lies the difficulty... we don't know some things about the hebrew of back then...

oldhermit · Apr 30, 2015

Dan_473 said:

I would think obviously it means solid enough for them to traverse without getting their feet muddy. You cannot relativize this. The text says dry ground. This is ground that is solid enough to accommodate not only the people but their great herds of livestock, carts, and wagons. This was far more weight on the path than the chariots of Egypt and the muddy ground would be more taxing on the people of Israel that on the chariots. The simple fact is that to say the confounding of the chariot wheels was caused by mud, you have to add that to the text because the word mud in simply not there, neither literally nor by inference. You have to add this to the text in spite of the fact that the text says it was dry ground!

just-me · Apr 30, 2015

Dan_473 said:

oldhermit said:

This is close but not as exact as the original transcript. Reading right to left.

ויבאו בני-ישראל בתוך הים, ביבשה; והמים להם חומה, מימינם ומשמאלם
Then came the children of Israel into the sea, by land; And brown water them, right and left. Exodus 14:21 KJV

ובני ישראל הלכו ביבשה, בתוך הים; והמים להם חמה, מימינם ומשמאלם
And the children of Israel walked on land, in the sea; And they have hot water, right and left. Exodus 14:29 KJV

יבש = dry
ביבשה = land

As we can see the land has "dry" within the word land. So the translation is correct in that it is "dry land."

Exodus 15:19 is the same as these other 2 scriptures in relation to "dry land."

Jeff_56 · Apr 30, 2015

Dan_473 said:

again, no difficulty, no worries at all. ask a Jew who knows. i know we don't know. i know Jews (not all of them, but some) know.;

a lot of the questions on this forum and thread, a third grade brought up right in Israel can tell you truthfully.

westerners are so backwards and wrong about so much.

Bowhunter2394 · Apr 30, 2015

just-me said:

Dan_473 said:

Going by this, then God supernaturally TOOK THEIR WHEELS off. .indeed! No mud.... nice to see the earliest translations...as possible.. should make it very clear.. just as He used the Wind to part the Water! supernatural!

good discussion.. no condemnation in it.. pondering and thinking on the Things of the LORD... indeed!

just-me · Apr 30, 2015

Bowhunter2394 said:

There is much we can learn concerning the Hebrew culture and the spiritual dynamics of the scripture that were written in the 4 dimensional (some say only 3) Hebrew language. God Almighty is GREAT!!!

psychomom · Apr 30, 2015

all i can say is it's a good thing God's people didn't need as much
time to cross on dry ground as this thread's been going.

just-me · Apr 30, 2015

psychomom said:

LO ROTFL!!!

I haven't had that good of a laugh for weeks, maybe months.

psychomom · Apr 30, 2015

just-me said:

i like to laugh, especially at myself.

but i'm honestly perplexed...why in the world would Christians read about
something so miraculously wonderful as this history of the Sovereign God
intervening for His own, and pick it apart in the natural...

rather than bowing low in worship?

MadParrotWoman · Apr 30, 2015

psychomom said:

I thought the very same. How can one explain the supernatural in a natural perspective?

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