Red Sea Crossing: The Eight Day Wait: Exodus of the people of Israel from Egypt

The World's greatest miracle was the Red Sea crossing. For 600,000 men excluding women and children along with their different modes of vehicles to cross over is nothing short of a miracle. The Bible says that God guided Isreal by sending a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night to show them the way they should go. Though more than 3400 years have elapsed the site of the Red Sea crossing was based on geographic, marine archaeological remains and technically possible aspects. The route of the migration and what influenced the choice, encampments and aspects of the time were based on factual features, theorized or deduced from scientific research methods on several discoveries of what could have happened in the journey. The actual site of the Red Sea included a large number of animals, horses, human beings, chariots and wheels, which are lying on the sea-bed of the underwater bridge. Naum Volzinger, a senior researcher at St. Petersburg's Institute of Oceanography, and Alexei Androsov, a colleague based in Hamburg, Germany, analyzed conditions that could have made the parting of the Red Sea possible.As the biblical story goes: "And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea; and the Lord caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night, and made the sea dry land, and the waters were divided."Volzinger and Androsov calculated that a wind blowing at the speed of 67 miles per hour sustained overnight could have exposed a reef that existed close below the ocean surface. The Israelites could have then fled over the nearly 5-mile reef in just four hours before the wind died down and waters rose again, blocking the way for pursuing Egyptian soldiers in their wheeled chariots.Colin Humphreys, a physicist at Cambridge University in England and author of the book, The Miracles of Exodus, said, "I still say they're miracles, but I think the miracle is in the timing."Humphreys has used similar calculations to explain the parting of the Red Sea, although he places the event in a slightly different location along the shore. Other scholars have argued that the name the Red Sea has been mistranslated over the centuries from Hebrew and the name yam suph, or "Sea of Reeds" actually refers to a marshy, inland lake, which would have been easier to cross than a sea.Humphreys travelled to the head of the Gulf of Aqaba of the Red Sea to settle the matter and found that reeds still grow there today due to the freshwater flow of mountain springs. The so-called "Sea of Reeds," he concluded, could therefore refer to the Red Sea.Exodus refers to the most important event in Israel's history. It tells the story of captivity and miraculous deliverance of Abram's descendants. Abram was ten generations from Noah and was referred to as God's friend, a title used for no one else in the Scriptures. Believers of all ages are called the children of Abram. Abram's importance and impact in redemptive history are in the Scriptures.