This photo from the International Space Station shows the V-shaped Sinai Peninsula, with Mount Sinai (Horeb) among the peaks in the southernmost point. To the west lies the Gulf of Suez; further west, the deep cleft and wide delta of the River Nile; to the east, the Gulf of Aqaba. The Israeli city of Eilat stands at the Gulf of Aqaba’s northernmost point; southern Jordan and Saudi Arabia can be seen to the right. The distance from Cairo on the Nile Delta to Eilat is roughly 220 miles.
PHARAOH believed he had the Israelites pinned down, trapped between his host and the Red Sea, and many of the Israelites feared so too.
But Moses lifted up his staff, and the waters of the sea parted, heaping up left and right. Between these swirling walls the Israelites crossed the glistening sands on foot, led by God (though he left no footprint),* together with their flocks. Pharaoh’s chariots and cavalry followed them in headlong, but the exposed sea-floor was heavy going.
The Israelites reached the farther shore first, where there was sweet water, and palm trees.* There Moses turned. He stretched out his hand over the sea, and the turbid walls of water began to fall. Down upon Pharaoh’s host they fell. Horse and rider were cast into the sea, sank like lead, and were lost.
But there was no rest for the Israelites. Almost at once, Moses led them away into the wilderness beyond, towards the land that God had promised to them.*
Remarked in Psalm 77:16-20. In the Christian liturgy, the birth of Christ is spoken of in these same terms, as God left no footprint in entering our world: Mary remained a virgin still.
The Israelites crossed into the Sinai Peninsula, meaning that they probably crossed not the Red Sea proper but the Gulf of Suez, an arm of the Red Sea projecting northwest towards the Mediterranean, to which it is now joined by the British-built Suez Canal.
