page_title: Beshalach
section_title: Exodus chapter 14
hierarchical_section_title: Beshalach / In modern interpretation / Exodus chapter 14
caption_attribution_description: Interpretation of the first committee's design for the reverse of the Great Seal of the United States in 1776, which was never used. This was Benjamin Franklin's design, originally suggested for the obverse, but the committee chose Pierre Eugene du Simitiere's design for that side. This interpretation was made in 1856 by Benson J. Lossing. Franklin's design was:Moses standing on the Shore, and extending his Hand over the Sea, thereby causing the same to overwhelm Pharaoh who is sitting in an open Chariot, a Crown on his Head and a Sword in his Hand. Rays from a Pillar of Fire in the Clouds reaching to Moses, to express that he acts by Command of the Deity. Motto, "Rebellion to Tyrants is Obedience to God." Thomas Jefferson, a member of the committee, liked the motto enough to later use it on his personal seal.
context_page_description: Beshalach, Beshallach, or Beshalah is the sixteenth weekly Torah portion in the annual Jewish cycle of Torah reading and the fourth in the Book of Exodus. It constitutes Exodus 13:17–17:16. In this parashah, Pharaoh changes his mind and chases after the Israelite people with his army, trapping them at the Sea of Reeds. God commands Moses to split the sea, allowing them to pass, then closes the sea back upon the Egyptian army. There are the miracles of manna and clean water. The nation of Amalek attacks and the Israelite people are victorious.
  The parashah is made up of 6,423 Hebrew letters, 1,681 Hebrew words, 116 verses, and 216 lines in a Torah Scroll.
  Jews read it the sixteenth Sabbath after Simchat Torah, in January or February. As the parashah describes God's deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt, Jews also read part of the parashah, Exodus 13:17–15:26, as the initial Torah reading for the seventh day of Passover. And Jews also read the part of the parashah about Amalek, Exodus 17:8–16, on Purim, which commemorates the story of Esther and the Jewish people's victory over Haman's plan to kill the Jews, told in the book of Esther.
context_section_description: Noting that Ezekiel 29:3 addresses the Pharaoh as a "mighty monster (הַתַּנִּים הַגָּדוֹל, ha-tanim ha-gadol)," thus associating him with the primeval sea monster that Psalm 74:13–14 reports God defeated in establishing order and creating the world, Rabbi Shai Held of Yeshivat Hadar argued that the Bible thematically associates Pharaoh with the forces of chaos, and thus that God's vanquishing Pharaoh at the sea in Exodus 14–15 reenacts God's primordial victory over the sea monster and chaos in creating the world.
  Professor Everett Fox of Clark University noted that "glory" (כְּבוֹד, kevod) and "stubbornness" (כָּבֵד לֵב, kaved lev) are leading words throughout the book of Exodus that give it a sense of unity. Similarly, Propp identified the root kvd — connoting heaviness, glory, wealth, and firmness — as a recurring theme in Exodus:  Moses suffered from a heavy mouth in Exodus 4:10 and heavy arms in Exodus 17:12; Pharaoh had firmness of heart in Exodus 7:14; 8:11, 28; 9:7, 34; and 10:1; Pharaoh made Israel's labor heavy in Exodus 5:9; God in response sent heavy plagues in Exodus 8:20; 9:3, 18, 24; and 10:14, so that God might be glorified over Pharaoh in Exodus 14:4, 17, and 18; and the book culminates with the descent of God's fiery Glory, described as a "heavy cloud," first upon Sinai and later upon the Tabernacle in Exodus 19:16; 24:16–17; 29:43; 33:18, 22; and 40:34–38.
  In his digest of Christopher Columbus's log from Columbus's first voyage, the 16th-century Spanish historian Bartolomé de las Casas reported that on Sunday, September 23, 1492, the sea was calm and smooth, causing the crew to grumble, saying that since there were no heavy seas in those parts, no wind would ever carry them back to Spain. But later, to their astonishment, the seas rose high without any wind. Referring to the splitting of the sea in Exodus 14, Columbus then said, "I was in great need of these high seas because nothing like this had occurred since the time of the Jews when the Egyptians came out against Moses who was leading them out of captivity."
  In a March 1776 sermon, Massachusetts minister
  Elijah Fitch likened the British King George III to "that proud and haughty Monarch Pharaoh, king of Egypt." Fitch argued that God appeared to aid the Israelites when they shook off the yoke of Egyptian bondage, and Pharaoh and his host pursued them and seemed to leave them no way of escape, and so God would aid the colonists. Fitch said that God permits the wicked to accomplish some of their evil purposes against the just, but in the end frustrates them.  And "thus was it with proud Pharaoh, he was lifted up on high, with sure expectations of destroying the Israelites and dividing the spoil, flushed with the hopes of certain success, he rushes forward, till his glory, his pomp and his multitude are altogether buried in the sea."
  Similarly, the Massachusetts minister Phillips Payson preached of the American Revolution that "the finger of God has indeed been so conspicuous in every stage of our glorious struggle, that it seems as if the wonders and miracles performed for Israel of old, were repeated anew for the American Israel, in our day." Payson also likened George III to pharaoh, saying: "The hardness that possessed the heart of Pharaoh of old, seems to have calloused the heart of the British King; and the madness that drove that ancient tyrant and his hosts into the sea, appears to have possessed the British court and councils."
  In 1776, Benjamin Franklin proposed a Great Seal of the United States based on Exodus 14, with "Moses lifting up his Wand, and dividing the Red Sea, and Pharaoh, in his Chariot overwhelmed with the Waters."
  The 19th century pre-Civil War African-American spiritual "Mary Don't You Weep" employed the image of Moses at the shore of the sea and the liberation of the Israelites in the context of slavery in the United States.
  The 18th-century German Jewish philosopher Moses Mendelssohn read the report of Exodus 14:31 that "the Israelites saw and trusted in the Eternal and in Moses, his servant" along with the report of Genesi
caption: Franklin's design for the Great Seal of the United States (1856 illustration by Benson J. Lossing)
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