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Pharaoh Boasted Five Times at the Sea and Sentenced Himself

Pharaoh declared he would pursue and overtake and divide the spoil. The Yalkut Shimoni shows how each boast became the sentence he pronounced against himself.

Curated by Arthur · Told by Maggid ·
Table of Contents
  1. Words Out of Order in the Song
  2. A Rule That Unlocks the Whole Torah
  3. Five Boasts and Five Answers
  4. The Psalms That Confirm the Count
Pharaoh Boasted Five Times at the Sea and Sentenced Himself Click for full size

Words Out of Order in the Song

The Song of the Sea is a victory hymn, and in the middle of the victory hymn stands a strange intrusion. The enemy said: I will pursue. I will overtake. I will divide the spoil. My desire will be filled. I will draw my sword. My hand will destroy them. Six verbs, first person, Pharaoh's voice captured mid-boast inside Israel's song of deliverance.

The Yalkut Shimoni, the great thirteenth-century anthology that gathered centuries of older midrash into a running commentary on the whole Hebrew Bible, opened with a problem: those words do not belong here. They belong at the beginning of the story, in Egypt, when Pharaoh first planned the chase. The song comes after the crossing, after the sea has already closed, after the chariots are gone under. So why is Pharaoh's boast quoted in the middle of the triumph?

A Rule That Unlocks the Whole Torah

The sages gave a principle as their answer, and it turned out to be one of the most useful keys in the entire tradition. There is no strict earlier and later in the Torah. The text is not a chronicle that tells events in the order they happened. It is an arrangement, and the arrangement serves truths that the timeline would obscure. Pharaoh's boast, spoken in Egypt before the pursuit began, appears in the middle of the sea crossing because the Torah placed it where it would do the most interpretive work, not where it fell chronologically.

The proof came in a cascade. A verse from Leviticus that introduces a passage but appears buried inside it. The year of King Uzziah's death in Isaiah, which opens a vision that does not describe Uzziah's death at all. A riddle in Ezekiel that appears after the events it explains. A cry in Jeremiah that announces what has already happened. Each one is a beginning hiding somewhere other than the front. The Torah feels free to move things. Every reader who looks for strict chronological sequence will miss what the arrangement is saying.

Five Boasts and Five Answers

Then the midrash went deeper into Pharaoh's speech and counted. Five boasts. Not six. The sages collapsed the six verbs into five distinct claims, and against each one they set the Spirit's answer, the divine response that Pharaoh could hear only if he understood the language he was speaking in.

I will pursue: and the sea pursued him instead, driving toward him as he drove toward Israel. I will overtake: the sea overtook Egypt while Israel walked out ahead of it on dry ground. I will divide the spoil: the sea divided itself, and what Pharaoh thought was a path he could follow was the instrument of his end. My desire will be filled: the desire that was filled was not his. I will draw my sword: the sword drew itself and found a different target. Five statements, five reversals, each one hidden inside the Hebrew words that Pharaoh chose, a sentence that was already a prophecy of his own defeat before he finished speaking it.

The rabbis called this a particularly bitter form of divine justice. God did not need to compose a separate punishment. Pharaoh wrote his own sentence in the words he thought were his war cry. He announced what would happen to himself and heard it as a threat against his enemies.

The Psalms That Confirm the Count

The midrash found support in Psalms. The verse that says the sea saw and fled, and the Jordan turned back, was read alongside Pharaoh's boast as part of the same moment. The sea that fled was not fleeing Israel. It was fleeing the presence that was in the coffin of Joseph being carried across on the shoulders of the people Israel. When the sea saw what was coming down into it, it did what every force of nature does when the divine presence approaches: it moved out of the way.

And the boast that the enemy said was not a boast at all in the deeper reading. It was a confession. The word said is past tense. The sages heard it as already defeated. The enemy said these things, meaning he said them and they have already been answered, already been reversed, already been turned back on him before the song even reaches the verse. The Song of the Sea quoted Pharaoh's words not to mock them but to show that they were already over by the time anyone sang them.

Yalkut ShimoniExodusPharaohRed SeaDivine JusticeEgyptProphecy
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From the tradition

Sources

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The texts behind this telling. Some cards carry a translation of the source; others are our own retelling of it, and each card says which. Every card links out to the original.

Yalkut Shimoni on Torah 249:1Yalkut Shimoni on Torah

Translation of the source text.Torat Emet (Yalkut Shimoni) · CC-BY-NC

"The enemy said" (Exodus 15:9). This was the beginning of the passage, and why was it written here? To teach you that there is no strict earlier and later in the Torah. Similarly, "And it came to pass on the eighth day that Moses called Aaron and his sons" (Leviticus 9:1) was the beginning of the passage; why was it written here? Because there is no strict earlier and later in the Torah. Similarly, "In the year that King Uzziah died" (Isaiah 6:1) is the beginning of the passage; why is it written here? Because there is no strict earlier and later. Similarly, "Son of man, stand upon your feet," and some say, "Son of man, put forth a riddle" (Ezekiel 17:2), this was the beginning of the passage. Similarly, "Go and cry in the ears of Jerusalem" (Jeremiah 2:2), this was the beginning. Similarly, "I, Koheleth, was king" (Ecclesiastes 1:12), this was the beginning.

"The enemy said": this is Pharaoh. And from where did Israel know what Pharaoh had thought concerning them in Egypt? Rather, the Holy Spirit rested upon Israel, and they knew what Pharaoh had thought concerning them in Egypt. When Pharaoh saw that Israel had gone out, he said, It would be enough for us to go and pursue Israel only for the sake of the silver and gold they took from us; that alone is worth it. When part of the people saw that they had lost a little money, they said, We were better off before; let us pursue Israel. When Pharaoh saw this, he said, We are all equal in the plunder, as it is said, "I will divide the spoil." And not only that, but I will open to you storehouses of silver and gold, and distribute to you precious stones and pearls.

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Yalkut Shimoni on Torah 249:2Yalkut Shimoni on Torah

Translation of the source text.Torat Emet (Yalkut Shimoni) · CC-BY-NC

Another interpretation: "The enemy said," and he did not know what he was saying, "The arrangements of the heart belong to a person, but from the LORD comes the answer of the tongue" (Proverbs 16:1). It is not written here, "We will pursue, we will overtake, we will divide," but rather, "I will pursue, I will overtake, I will divide the spoil" [erdof, assig, achallek] which can be read: I am pursued by them, I am seized by them, I distribute to them spoil and my own wealth. It does not say here "You shall fill them," but "My soul shall fill them" [timla'emo], they fill their souls from me. It does not say "My hand shall dispossess them," but "shall dispossess them for them" [torishemo], I bequeath my wealth and my honor to them. In the past you used to plunder them, and I would demand it back from your hand by the laws of the kingdom; but here, "I will draw my sword, my hand shall dispossess them." In the past you wished to force their wives and daughters, and I would demand it from your hand; but here, "I will draw my sword." And some say it is not written "I will give my sword," but "I will draw [arik] my sword," as in the matter that is said, "and they shall draw their swords against the beauty of your wisdom" (Ezekiel 28:7). Because it is said "your heart was haughty," correspondingly the Omnipresent brought him low, and all the nations of the world came upon him.

Three factions did Egypt form against Israel at the sea. One said, Let us take their money and not kill them. One said, Let us kill them and not take their money. And one said, Let us kill them and take their money. The one that said, Let us take their money and not kill them, corresponds to "I will divide the spoil." The one that said, Let us kill them and not take their money, corresponds to "My soul shall fill itself with them." The one that said, Let us kill them and take their money, corresponds to "My hand shall dispossess them." Five things did Pharaoh stand and blaspheme within the land of Egypt, as it is said, "The enemy said, I will pursue, I will overtake, I will divide the spoil," and so on. And corresponding to these five things, the Holy Spirit answered him and said, "You blew with Your wind"; "Your right hand, O LORD"; "dashes the enemy in pieces"; "And in the greatness of Your majesty"; "You send forth Your wrath."

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Yalkut Shimoni on Torah 238Yalkut Shimoni

Retold in our words. Read the original at the link below.Sefaria Community Translation · CC0

"And the waters will came back and cover the chariot and the horsemen" (Exodus 14:26) And even Par'oh, according to Rabi Yehuda, as it says "the chariots of Phar'oh and his army" (15:4). Rabi Natan says Par'oh was the exception, since we have this verse about him: "maybe for this I made you stand up"(Exodus 9:16). And there are those who say that at the end Par'oh went down and drowned, as it says "and the horse of Par'oh came" (Exodus 15:19). "And the children of Israel went into the sea in dry ground" - the angels of service were astounded, saying: 'the children of Israel, idolaters that they are, are coming on dry land?!' And from where do we know that even the sea was filled with rage from Above? Because the text says "and the waters were like rage to them" [since the vav is missing to the word chomah, wall, it can be read as chema, rage; so you can re-read the verse as "the water was like anger on their right and on their left"]. And what caused them to be saved from their right and their left? From the right, it was Torah, which they would receive later on, as it says "From His right, [He gave] a fiery law to them". And left? This is tefilin.

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