to the coast of the Red sea: their passing the CHAP. II. same, and what else is requisite to be taken notice SECT. II, of in relation to the Red sea, shall make the subject of the following distinct section.

SECTION II.

Of the Israelites passing through the Red Sea, and of other Particulars relating to the same Sea.

are drown

THE sacred Historian tells us, Exod. xiv. 9, &c. 1. that Pharaoh with his army overtook the Israelites The Israelencamping by the sea, beside Pi-hahiroth, before ites pass through the Baal-zephon; and that when the Israelites saw the Red Sea on Egyptians marching after them, and drawing nigh dry ground, to them, they were sore afraid; insomuch that they but the began to mistrust the providence of God, there Egyptians being no visible way left them to escape; as being ed. shut in on all sides, either by the wilderness, or by the mountains, or by the sea, or by the army of the Egyptians. But God now quickly began to shew them his almighty power, and that he is able to save in the most imminent and greatest danger. He directs Moses to bid the children of Israel to go forward, on that side where the sea was, and consequently that way which they, probably, least of all thought to have found deliverance in. Withal he directed Moses to lift up his rod, and stretch out his hand over the sea: whereupon the Lord caused the sea to go back by a strong wind all that night, and made the sea dry land, and the waters were divided. And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon dry ground; and the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand and on their left. And the Egyptians pursued after them into the midst of the sea: but Moses, upon God's command, stretching forth his hand again over the

PART II. sea, the sea returned to its strength, and the waters covered the chariots, and horsemen, and all the host of Pharaoh, that came into the sea: there remained not so much as one of them. Thus the Lord saved Israel out of the hand of the Egyptians. Exod. xiv. 15-30.

2.

The Red

On account of this miraculous passage of the Israelites, the Red sea has been famous in all sucSea called ceeding ages, among such as have been acquainted with the sacred Scriptures, or have any other ways the Weedy had notice of this wonderful and so memorable

in Hebrew

Sea.

transaction. It will therefore be proper to insist a
little on this so celebrated sea, and to lay before
the reader such particulars as relate thereunto, and
deserve peculiar notice. It is then observable,
that the name given to this sea in the Hebrew text,
and consequently its most ancient name known to
us, is Jam-Suph, i. e. the Weedy sea, so
called from the abundance of sea-weed growing
there; which is taken notice of by several Heathen
writers, as Diodorus, Agatharchides, Artemidorus
in Strabo, &c. whose testimonies are cited at large
by the learned Bochart: the sum of them is this;
that the Egyptian Ichthyophagi (i. e. such Egyp-
tians as, living near the Red sea, feed chiefly on the
fish they catch therein) did dwell in huts, made of
fishes ribs, covered with sea-weed: nay, that there
are in those parts great quantities of sea-weed
heaped up together like a mountain; which in pro-
cess of time is become so very hard, that the fore-
mentioned people dig themselves holes or caves in
the same, wherein they dwell. But what is more
peculiarly remarkable, the fore-cited authors tell
us expressly, that the Red sea looks of a green
colour, by reason of the abundance of sea-weed
and moss that grows therein. Indeed there is one
place in Diodorus *, whence we may observe, that
the
passage of the Israelites through the Red sea
was preserved in memory even among the neigh-
bouring Heathens, and by a constant tradition de-

* Lib. iii. p. 208. Edit. Wesseling.

livered down to their posterity for many ages. CHAP. II. Diodorus's words are to this effect: " Among the SECT. II. neighbouring Ichthyophagi there is an old tradition, delivered down from their ancestors, that formerly the sea parting, and the waters falling back, some on one side, and some on the other opposite to it, the whole gulf, i. e. as to its breadth, was dry, and the bottom of it appeared of a green colour; but some time after, the sea returned again into its usual place." As it is not to be reasonably doubted, but this tradition is to be understood of the miraculous passage of the Israelites through this sea; so we may from this and the other testimonies observe, not only the reason why this sea was called by the Hebrews Jam-Suph, or the Weedy sea, but also the falseness of that opinion, which will have the said sea to be called otherwise the Red sea, from the red colour of its waters, or of the sand at the bottom of it. And what is above said by the Heathen writers concerning the bottom of this sea appearing of a green colour, is confirmed by one who may be called a sacred writer, viz. the author of the book called the Wisdom of Solomon. For herein, chap. xix. 7. we read thus: Where water stood before, dry land appeared; and out of the Red sea, a way without impediment; and out of the violent stream, a green field.

called.

Proceed we therefore, in the next place, to en- 3. quire, what was the true reason of this appellation. The Red And this I have already briefly mentioned in the Sea, why so first Part, chap. i. and shall here insist somewhat longer upon it. It is then well known, that it is usual for seas to take their names from the countries they lie upon, as the British sea, the Irish sea, the Spanish sea, the German sea, &c. Now it is very probable, that mount Seir, or the mountainous tract denoted in Scripture by that name, and given by God to Esau, the eldest son of Isaac, for a possession, extended so far southward as to come near the Red sea. Nay, it is certain, that as Ezion-Geber stood on the Red sea, so it did appertaip to the kings of this mountainous tract, or the

PART II./kings of Edom. For Esau being nick-named Edom, i. e. Red, on account of his selling his birth-right to his younger brother Jacob, for some red pottage; hence the mountainous country, that he and his descendants were possessed of, is called in Scripture the Land of Edom, or simply Edom. And it is not to be doubted, but that this was the name, whereby it was generally denoted and known in those early times. Now some of the ancient Greeks altered the Hebrew word Edom no more than to give it the mode of their own language; and so, preserving the Hebrew radicals, turned it into Idumæa. But others of them, coming to understand that Edom in the Hebrew tongue denoted red, hence they rendered not the word itself, but its signification; and so, instead of Idumæa, called the country of Edom by the name of Erythræa; or (which comes to the same) denoted Edom himself, the father of the Edomites, by the name of Erythræus; the Greek word Erythrus denoting red, as does the Hebrew word Edom. Now Edom himself, or his posterity, becoming famous by reason of their great power and strength, or at least by reason of the great success God vouchsafed to give them in those early times; and so this country not only lying upon the sea we are speaking of, but also the Edomites being probably for some time masters of this sea; hence it came to be denoted by the name of the Idumean or Erythrean sea. And, because it seems to have been most frequently denoted among the Greeks by the name of the Erythrean sea, hence the Latins, as well knowing the signification of the common Greek word Erythrus, came to give it the name of Rubrum Mare, and we, from them, the name of the Red sea. Some of the Greek writers have themselves taken notice that it was called the Erythrean sea, from a certain famous and potent king, named Erythræus; and not from any redness of its water, or of its sand, it being no redder than any other sea, in either of these respects, as Thevendt assures us, who saw it; and tells us withal, that, as

4.

The Red

he went to mount Sinai, he did indeed observe CHAP. II. SECT. II. some mountains all over red, upon the sides of it; though, as he adds, he thought not, that this was the reason of the common name given to this sea, but much the same as I have above mentioned. He truly observes further, that the name of the Erythrean sea is in some authors extended beyond Sea, how the gulf of Arabia, comprehending all the sea be- far extendtween the eastern coasts of Afric and the Indies. ed in its And the reason hereof may be the same with what largest acI have already intimated, namely, the great power ceptation. of Edom and his posterity in the more early times, and consequently the great fame he had through all the adjoining parts of Arabia, the southern and eastern parts whereof were washed by the Erythrean sea, in its larger acceptation, as well as its western coast by the Red sea properly so called. And in the larger acceptation it is, that the gulf of Persia (which lies on the eastern coast of Arabia, as the gulf of Arabia does on its western coast) is sometimes denoted by the name of Sinus Erythræus, or Mare Erythræum, i. e. the Erythrean gulf or sea. And probably this is the Red sea denoted by Origen, when he saith, that, among all the Indian pearls, those of the Red sea are of the greatest value; as was observed, Part I. chap. i. § 12.

5.

the Arabs

Thevenot further observes, that the Red sea (so called in Scripture, at least in the Greek, Latin, This sea called by and other European versions of it, that is, the gulf of Arabia) is by the Arabians themselves called Bubr el Buhr el Calzem, i. e. the sea of Clysma; because, Calzem, says he, of the town named Clysma, which was i. e. the sea built heretofore at the most northern point of that of drowning, But I find it placed by geographers, not at the northern point, but a little more south, on the west coast of the sea, and much about the place where the Israelites are supposed to have passed from the western or Egyptian coast of this sea, to the eastern or Arabian coast. And indeed, if it be considered, that the word Clysma may denote a

sea.