The Pillar of Fire; or, Israel in Bondage

by J. H. Ingraham

"Fear ye not! Stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will show you to-day! for the Egyptians whom ye have seen to-day, ye shall see them again no more forever! The Lord shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace. Wait to see what He will do."

Then Moses, with a troubled face, entered his tent, and his voice was heard by those near by, calling upon God.

And the Lord answered him from the cloud above the tent—

"Why criest thou unto me? Speak unto the children of Israel that they go forward! But lift thou up thy rod and stretch out thy hand over the sea, and divide it; and the children of Israel shall go on dry ground through the midst of the sea. And behold Pharaoh, (whom I withhold from nothing which he chooseth in his hard heart to do, leaving him to his own devices to reap the fruit of his own ways), he shall follow you with the Egyptians into the sea! and I will get me honor upon Pharaoh, and upon all his host, upon his chariots and upon his horsemen. And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord!"

Then Moses came forth from the tent, whence the voice of the Lord had been heard by all, both near and afar off. Now, lo! the angel of God in the Pillar of Cloud, as soon as the armies of Israel began to move forward to the sea, removed from the front, and went to the rear of the Hebrew host, and stood behind them in the Pillar of Cloud! Thus, it stood between the camp of the Israelites and the camp of the Egyptians, so that when night came, the Israelites, lying encamped on the shore, had the full splendor of its light; while the Egyptians, to whom it presented a wall of impenetrable darkness, also encamped, fearing to go forward in the unnatural night which enveloped them. So the two hosts remained all night, neither moving—the Pillar of Fire and the Pillar of Cloud between them, creating day on one side of it, and tenfold night on the other.

Now, at the going down of the sun, on that day when the Egyptians encamped because of the cloud, Moses had stretched forth his hand over the sea by God's command, and lo! there arose a mighty wind upon the sea, rising from the south and east; and all that night we heard the sea and waves roaring, and the hearts of Israel sunk within them for fear. The Pillar of Fire cast upon the sea a radiance like moonlight, so that we could perceive that it was in a great commotion, and that God was doing some great wonder in the deep. It is said that the noise of the waves reached the ears of Pharaoh, and that he at first believed it was the sound of the tramping of the whole host of the Israelites, advancing with their God to give him battle in the darkness. He called his men to arms, and tried to show front of war; but the shadow of the cloud between him and the Hebrews, rendered it impossible for any man to move from one place to another, or to see his fellow.

At length morning came to us, but not to the Egyptians, whose night still continued. But what a spectacle of sublimity and power we beheld! Before us, an avenue, broad enough for two hundred men to march abreast, had been cut by the rod of God through the deep sea, the water of which stood as a wall on the one side and on the other, glittering like ice on the sides of the rocks of Libanus, when capped with his snows. At this sight, the Hebrew hosts raised a shout of joy to God, for they could see that the sacred avenue reached as far as the eye could extend across the sea; but so great was the distance, that its sides converged to a point far out from the shore, and seemed but a hair line. Then Moses, lifting up his voice, commanded the children of Israel to form into companies and columns of one hundred and eighty men abreast, and enter the sea by the way God had opened for them. First went Aaron and the twelve elders, being one of each tribe, who guarded the body of Prince Joseph. Then followed the sarcophagus, drawn by twelve oxen, one also furnished by each tribe. Then came a hundred Levites, carrying all the sacred things which the Hebrews had preserved in their generations. Now came Moses, leading the van of the people in column. I also walked near him. As we descended the shore and entered the crystalline road, I marvelled, yet had no fear, to see the walls of water, as if congealed to ice, rise thirty cubits above our heads, firm as if hewn from marble, with sharp edges at the top catching and reflecting the sunlight. The bed of the sea was hard and dry sand, smooth as the paved avenue from Memphis to the pyramids. All day the Israelites marched in, and when night came not half their vast column had left the land. All the while the Pillar of Cloud stood behind, in the defile between the Israelites and the Egyptians. At length, in the first watch of the night, it removed, and came and went before the Israelites, throwing its beams forward along our path in the sea. Its disappearance from the rear removed also the supernatural darkness that enveloped the Egyptians; and when, by the light of the skies, Pharaoh beheld the Israelites in motion, he pursued with all his host, leading with his chariots his eager army. It was just light enough for him to see that his enemy was escaping, but not enough so to see by what way; but, doubtless, he suspected that they were wading around the mountains; for great east winds have, from time to time, swept the sea here outward, so that the water has been shallow enough for persons to make a circuitous ford around the northern cliff, and come in again upon the same shore into the desert above. Pharaoh knew that the wind had been blowing heavily, which he at first mistook for the Israelites in motion, and there is no doubt that he pursued with the idea that the sea had been shoaled by the wind, and that they would come out a mile or two on the north side, and gain the desert by Etham, and so double the head of the sea into the peninsula of Horeb. There can be no other reason assigned for his pursuit into such a road of God's power, unless it was judicial madness,—a hardening of his heart by God, in punishment for his contumacy and opposition to His will. Doubtless this is one way in which God punishes men, by making their peculiar sin the instrument of their destruction.

Pharaoh and his chariots, and horsemen, and host pursued, and came close upon the rear-guard of the Israelites, against whom they pressed with shouts of battle. The sea was faintly lighted, and the king and the Egyptians did not see the walls of water which inclosed them, as they rushed madly and blindly after their prey, urged on by the loud voice of Pharaoh. At length, when they were in the midst of the sea, the Lord, in the Pillar of Cloud, suddenly turned and displayed its side of dazzling light towards the astonished Egyptians! By its sunlike splendor, Pharaoh and his captains perceived their peril, and the nature of the dreadful road in which they were entangled. The walls of water on each side of them, say the Israelites who were in the rear and saw, moved and swelled, and hung above them in stupendous scrolls of living water, upheld only by the word of God! The vivid light of the shekinah blinded their eyes, and bewildered their horses, and troubled the whole host. All the horrors of his situation were presented to the mind of the king. With frantic shouts to his charioteers to turn back, he gave wild orders for his army to retreat, saying—

"Let us flee from the face of Israel! for the Lord their God fighteth for them against us!"

Then followed a scene of the most horrible confusion. The steady gaze upon them of the Angel of the Lord, in the cloud of fire, discomfited them! They turned to fly! Their chariot-wheels sunk in the deep clay which the wagons of the Hebrews had cut up, and came off! The king leaped from his car, and, mounting a horse held by his armor-bearer, attempted to escape, when the Lord said unto Moses, who now stood upon the Arabian side of the sea—