Under the Waters of the Sea

Some Considerations on the Account of Ex 14

Abstract

The miraculous passage through the sea of Suf with the consequent persecution of the Egyptians and the deadly outcome for the oppressors in its waters constitute one of the most important milestones in the history of the history of Israel. Scripture will often allude to this a prodigious event with which YHVH glorifies himself at the expense of Pharaoh and his army. However, critical studies show that the chapter is far from being a unitary page. No minimally informed reader does not know the composite character of the account of the death of the first oppressors of Israel, drowned in the sea. Moreover: Ex 14 constitutes one of the strange examples of a double parallel version of the same event. Among the main arguments for such a conclusion are finds the fact that the final story presents irreconcilable tensions between them and would only admit the possibility of a text homogeneous at the cost of strong concordance or harmonization questionable.
This paper aims to analyse some elements of this ancient tale and to verify what may still be afloat from this first narrative, after being "covered by the waters" of the story priesthood, a tradition that has made a lot of money. We will try also to find out what its original purpose might have been. The following pages are divided into four parts, each of which is uneven: to a presentation of the fundamental elements of the story (1), we added a text analysis that can be related to the action described in Ex 14* (2). This comparison allows us to establish differences and similarities with the war stories and with this approach to purpose of the non-priestly story (3). Finally we try to trace biblical "survivor" testimonies of this ancient story (4). Some Brief final considerations close our analysis (5).