The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on Exodus 14:30 adds two uncanny words to the aftermath. Israel, safe on the far shore, looks back and sees the Mizraee—dead and not dead—cast upon the sand.
What is "dead and not dead"? The Targum is playing on the fact that some of the Egyptian bodies were only just expiring, still twitching, their life leaving slowly. But the phrase resonates deeper than physiology. It captures the condition of a defeated enemy whose death has to be seen, not merely announced. Israel had to witness the drowning to believe it was over.
The sea, which had closed over the army, now throws the bodies back. In rabbinic tradition (Mekhilta Beshallach 6) this is part of God's calculation. The waters spit the Egyptians out so Israel could identify the corpses of their former masters. The trauma of slavery required the evidence of freedom.
"That day the Lord redeemed and saved Israel from the hand of the Mizraee." The Targum uses two verbs: redeemed and saved. Rescue from an enemy is one thing; redemption from the inner hold that the enemy had on you is another. A people cannot be redeemed from Egypt until they see Egypt dead.
And the image of "dead and not dead" bodies on the shore is the border marker. Behind: bondage, fear, a hand that had held Israel down for four hundred years. Ahead: Sinai, desert, a God who just proved He keeps His word.
Takeaway: the Targum teaches that freedom is not granted when the oppressor leaves—it is granted when the oppressed can see that he is truly gone.