The Egyptians who chased the Hebrews into the sea did not drown quietly. According to Josephus, the water came crashing back accompanied by storms, rain, thunder, lightning, and thunderbolts hurled from the sky—every weapon in God's arsenal deployed at once. Not a single Egyptian survived to carry news of the disaster home.
Moses struck the sea with his rod, and it parted. The waters pulled back into themselves and left the ground dry—not muddy, not damp, but dry enough to serve as a road. Moses walked in first. He did not send scouts. He did not test the path. He stepped onto the exposed seabed and told the Hebrews to follow him along what he called the "divine road," and to take joy in the danger now facing their enemies.
The Egyptians watched from the shore, exhausted from their pursuit. They had planned to attack the next morning. But when they saw the Hebrews marching through the sea without harm—mile after mile, no obstacle, no collapse—they charged in after them. They assumed the path was safe for everyone. It was not. The road through the sea had been made for the deliverance of those in danger, Josephus writes, not for those who intended to use it for destruction.
The Hebrews reached the far shore. The entire Egyptian army was inside the corridor of water. Then God closed it. The sea rushed back with a torrent amplified by violent winds. A black, dismal night descended. Every form of divine wrath that had ever been recorded struck the Egyptians simultaneously. The army that had terrorized the Hebrews for generations ceased to exist in a single night.
On the far shore, the Hebrews sang all night. Moses composed the Shirah (שירה), a song of praise to God, which Josephus notes was written in hexameter verse—a striking claim from a Jewish historian writing for a Greek-literate audience. The next morning, Egyptian weapons washed up on shore, carried by the current and the wind. Moses armed the Hebrews with the swords and spears of their dead enemies and led them toward Mount Sinai to offer sacrifices of thanksgiving. The instruments of their oppression had become the tools of their freedom.