Vehamayim lahem homah miyeminam umismolam. “The water was a wall for them to their right and to their left.” That is how the experience of crossing the Red Sea is described in this week’s parsha. This line is repeated twice, once at the start of the narrative and once at its end (14:22 and 29), as if to give the reader the same feeling of being enveloped and surrounded as the Israelites in the Sea.
What exactly is that feeling? A homah, a wall, is a symbol of protection and security. Walls were used to surround cities and keep out enemies. Here the water walls serve to protect the Israelites from their Egyptian enemy, and also from whatever killing forces are destroying the Egyptians.
But the wall of water is not just about divine protection, but also about divine guidance. The wall is said to be “to their right and to their left,” creating a clear derekh, a path. The Israelites are being taught to walk the straight and narrow, not to veer either to the left or the right.
Protection and guidance are intertwined throughout these stories. The parsha begins with a description of the divine cloud which guides the people on their derekh through the desert. Upon the arrival of the attacking Egyptians, this same divine cloud then serves a protective role, standing between the Israelites and the Egyptians. And, in the stories about water and manna which follow the Red Sea incident, God offers the people protection against the hunger and thirst of the desert, but only if they learn to carefully follow His instructions and His Torah.
The intertwining of the themes of protection and guidance has an important theological implication; it means that it is not God alone who is responsible for our protection and salvation, but that He has given us a way, the Torah, to protect and save ourselves.
The midrash Mekhilta deRabbi Ishmael says as much in its interpretation of the water walls at the Red Sea. It wasn’t the water, says the midrash, that protected the Israelites. In fact, the waters were filled with anger, heimah (a play on homah, wall) at the Israelites and refused to protect them. What was it that finally caused them to be saved? Miyemanam umismolam. Things to their right and to their left, which, according to one opinion means the mezuzah which is placed on the right side of the door and the tefillin which are placed on one’s left arm, and, according to another opinion, means the Torah, on the one hand, and Tefillah, prayer, on the other. In other words, the Torah and mitzvot we surround ourselves with are the true source of our strength and protection.
Today our water does not stand for us as a wall. Our water is flexible and mobile, running in all directions so that we are uncertain what to do and how to live. We are not granted the clarity of a split Sea experience with walls on either side of us to protect and guide us. We no longer have the physical derekh clearly marked, but we have a long tradition of a spiritual derekh, a path that was first forged at the Sea. We have a long tradition of a way to live, and we have the Song that was first sung at the Sea, a song that can carry us back -- its sound surrounding us like walls of water -- and make us feel the sense of peace, security and clarity of direction the Israelites once experienced at the Sea.
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Following up on your point about God offering protection but expecting the people to do their part, another possible example of this can be found in Exodus 12:42 in last week’s parsha Bo. The final night in Egypt was a leil shemorim (vigil night) for both God and the people. God was protecting them from the Egyptians. In return the people had to keep their own vigil, but not just that night – throughout all the generations.
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