Exodus Chapter 14 verse 22 Holy Bible
And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon the dry ground: and the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand, and on their left.
read chapter 14 in ASV
And the children of Israel went through the sea on dry land: and the waters were a wall on their right side and on their left.
read chapter 14 in BBE
And the children of Israel went through the midst of the sea on the dry [ground]; and the waters were a wall to them on their right hand and on their left.
read chapter 14 in DARBY
And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon the dry ground: and the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand, and on their left.
read chapter 14 in KJV
And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon the dry ground: and the waters were a wall to them on their right hand, and on their left.
read chapter 14 in WBT
The children of Israel went into the midst of the sea on the dry ground, and the waters were a wall to them on their right hand, and on their left.
read chapter 14 in WEB
and the sons of Israel go into the midst of the sea, on dry land, and the waters `are' to them a wall, on their right and on their left.
read chapter 14 in YLT
Pulpit Commentary
Pulpit CommentaryVerse 22. - The waters were a wall - i.e., a protection, a defence. Pharaoh could not attack them on either flank, on account of the two bodies of water between which their march lay. He could only come at them by following after them. The metaphor has been by some understood literally, especially on account of the expression in Exodus 15:8 - "The floods stood upright as an heap;" and again that in Psalm 78:13 - "He made the waters to stand as an heap." But those phrases, occurring in poems, must be taken as poetical; and can scarcely have any weight in determining the meaning of "wall" here. We must ask ourselves - is there not an economy and a restraint in the exertion by God even of miraculous power? - is more used than is needed for the occasion? - and would not all that was needed at this time have been effected by such a division of the sea as we have supposed, without the fluid being converted into a solid, or having otherwise the laws of its being entirely altered. Kalisch's statement, that the word "wall" here is "not intended to convey the idea of protection, but only of hardness and solidity," seems to us the very reverse of the truth. Protection is at any rate the main idea, and any other is secondary and subordinate. CHAPTER 14:23-31
Ellicott's Commentary
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(22) The waters were a wall unto them.--Any protection is in Scripture called "a wall," or "a rampart" (1Samuel 25:16; Proverbs 18:11; Isaiah 26:1; Jeremiah 1:18; Nahum 3:8). In the present case, the waters protected Israel on either flank--the Red Sea upon the right, the Bitter Lakes upon the left. Poetical writers, as was natural, used language still more highly metaphorical (Psalm 78:13; Exodus 15:8), and spoke of the waters as "standing on an heap." Hence, some moderns have gone so far as to maintain that on this occasion the water "gave up its nature, formed with its waves a strong wall, and instead of streaming like a fluid, congealed into a hard substance" (Kalisch). But this is to turn poetry into prose, and enslave oneself to a narrow literalism. . . .
