John Calvin Commentary Exodus 14

And the Lord spoke unto Moses. God, by closing all the ways by which the Israelites might have escaped, now opens a way for His wonderful power. By bringing them for one moment to despair, He provided for the safety of His Church for a long time. This final act, then, marvelously illustrated the grace of God, so that the people, however ungrateful and disaffected they might be, should still acknowledge God as their deliverer. Moreover, its consequence was that with the forces of Egypt not only broken but the whole nation destroyed, or at least its flower extinguished, it brought no more trouble to the people until they were established in the land of Canaan.

If they had freely and peacefully gone out, with the king and the people of Egypt quiet, the former miracles would not have been sufficient to testify to their redemption. But when, being everywhere shut in, they see nothing but death before them, while the sea suddenly and unexpectedly provides them a passage and overwhelms their enemies pressing them from behind, they are obliged to confess that they were saved not only from death but from the deepest abysses by the hand of God.

But it appears that when they were commanded by Moses to throw themselves, and, so to speak, to engulf themselves in the narrow passage that has been mentioned, they were astonished by the miracles. They were like those who dream, since they obeyed without hesitation, although the very sight of the place must have filled them with horror. For if they had perceived danger, their readiness to obey would not have been so great, as we will soon see. Therefore, it was Moses' intention not so much to praise them as to praise the providence of God. For it is clear that unless they had been amazed by the many miracles they had seen, they could scarcely have been persuaded to willingly throw themselves into defiles from which there was no retreat.

From the word מגדל, migdol, we may conjecture that a fortress was built on the rock to prevent access to it.

I do not fully understand the meaning of החירת¹⁵¹hachiroth, nor do I see why the Greeks translated it as “the mouth of the valley;” yet from the word meaning “a mouth,” it can probably be conjectured that it was narrowed by piles.

Because the word חור, chor, means a cave or hole, I do not know whether the place might have gotten its name as “the mouth of the holes” or “caverns.” For the letter ו, vau, is often changed into י, yod, and a change of gender in the plural is common among the Hebrews.

Or perhaps some may think it more likely that, although it was written החירות, hachiroth, the letter ח was mistakenly substituted for ה due to their similarity. If we understand it this way, the feminine gender is used for the masculine, and it would mean “the mouth of the mountains.”

But even if we are ignorant of the etymology of the second word, the word “mouth” makes it certain that the defile was enclosed by rocks and had a narrow entrance. However, if I may offer my own judgment in a doubtful matter, I am more inclined to think that it is derived from the word חרת charath, which means to engrave or to furrow, because the rocks looked as if they were cut by a mallet. But on the opposite side, the place was surrounded by the sea, as though the Israelites had been thrown into a sepulcher.

For Pharaoh will say. God here explains His design to Moses. Although He had so often gained glorious victories in His engagements with Pharaoh, the last act still remained: to overwhelm him and his army in the sea. He says that Pharaoh, then, will be caught in His snare, so as to rush to his own destruction.

For if the people had gone into the land of Canaan by a direct route, they could not have been so easily pursued. Therefore God, for the sake of magnifying His glory, set a bait to catch the tyrant, just as fish are hooked.

The word used here, נבכים,¹⁵² nebukim, some translate as “perplexed,” others as “entangled.” However, it may be well explained that they were to be “confounded in the land” because they would find no way out, being hemmed in on all sides in the narrow passage, with the sea behind them.

And when He speaks of Pharaoh’s intentions, He does not, as humans do, merely guess at a probability. Instead, He declares the secret mind of the tyrant, as something He knew well, since it is His attribute to discern our hearts.

Afterwards, He goes still further, for He signifies not only that He foresaw what would happen, but He again repeats what we have so often observed before: that He would harden Pharaoh’s heart so that he would pursue the people. From this it follows that all this was directed by His will and guidance.

But He did not communicate this to Moses only in private; He intended for all of them to be warned beforehand, so that they would not despair of safety when terrified by the sudden assault of their enemies. However, this warning was not as helpful to them as it should have been, because, being soon after surprised, they were no less alarmed than if they had been brought into danger through God’s error and Moses’s ignorance.

And the children of Israel went out.¹⁵³ Moses indirectly rebukes their excessive security, which had freed them completely from care and fear. From this security, even the desire to call on God had cooled in them, as security always produces drowsiness and an idle spirit. Consequently, this great danger, which they had not expected, caused even greater fear.

But, on the other hand, Moses magnifies God’s grace, because He came to help the wretched Israelites at such an opportune and critical moment while they were exulting in their foolish joy. Otherwise, if suddenly overtaken, they would have immediately fallen into confusion at the first shout of the enemy.

Thus, we are admonished by this example that while we are safe under God’s protection, we should be aware of the dangers that might occur—not so that we become anxious and alarmed, but so that we may humbly rest under His wings and not be carried away by reckless joy.

In the next verse, Moses briefly relates how formidable a sight appeared to the Israelites when they saw themselves trapped on one side by the sea, engulfed, so to speak, on both sides by the jaws of the narrow pass, with the army of Pharaoh closing in on them. He specifically mentions the strength of this army so that the glory of the help divinely provided to them might be more fully evident through the opposition.