| The New Unger's Bible Dictionary. THIS IS ONLY POSTED HERE BECAUSE IT IS PART OF THE UNGER'S DEFINATION. THE HEBREWS DID NOT CROSS THE REED SEA! The scriptures in no way describe any such thing as a sea of rees which would be more like a marshy lake, not a true sea.. (Heb. yam sup, "sea of reeds"). The Reed, or Papyrus, Sea that the Israelites miraculously crossed "may reasonably be supposed to be the Papyrus Lake or Papyrus Marsh, known from the Egyptian documents from the thirteenth century, to be located near Tanis" (W. F. Albright, O. T. Commentary [1948], p. 142). The topography of this region has been altered to some degree since the digging of the Suez Canal. Lake Ballah has disappeared. In the fifteenth century B.C. (taking the early date of the Exodus) the vicinity of Lake Timsah between Lake Ballah and the Bitter Lakes may well have been more marshy than it is at the present day. Israel's crossing of the "Reed Sea"' was undoubtedly in the vicinity of Lake Timsah or just N of it (cf. G. E. Wright and F. Filson, The Westminster Historical Atlas to the Bible [1945], p. 38). The question of whether the Israelites crossed the Red Sea (the northern tip of the Gulf of Suez) or Sea of Reeds (the Bitter Lakes area to the N of the Gulf of Suez) is much debated and cannot be argued in detail here. |