Tidal Waves or Tsunamis in Ancient Literature

[Robert Vermaat]

The question was about the route of a mass of people running from a mad bad king - you just dont take a route across a marsh or a tidal zone. :wink: And if they stayed clear of either, any tsunami would not have cleared a dry path for them. So either you go for the tsunami but you end up with an imposssible route, or you go for the 'acceptable rout'but then the tsunami does not affect anyone.

Ummm.... so you lead them to the big impassable and very deep Red Sea instead? Now that's reeeaaaallllllyyyyy dumb. Also, they didn't know a tsunami's about to hit; Moses didn't have a subscription to New Scientist. They saw the waters draw back. Now what would that suggest to a deeply religious man in those times? God saying "Go for it, boy, go for it!" perhaps?

Scoff all you want, but what´s your alternative= There are miles and miles of dry land between red Sea and Mediterranean. So whu are they still crossing water anyway? Ever thought of that? Or what body of water they are supposed to cross? The Red Sea is of course your alternative, not mine.
Also, a tsunami is not my explanation of the events, which I see as a foundation myth anyway. So don´t make me explain events as if they happened for real in every detail.

So how far is that tsunami supposed to have struck inland anyway? Ten miles? Further? If not, that really limits your itenerary for the exodus.

Even with the 'water away from the marsh', it's still a vast stretch of sogging mud. No Moses with abit of a brain would lead his people through thát!

You know it was impassable how?

Well... Marshy land, flooded by enough water to see it draw back, reeds growing en masse... I would say that the bottom would not be nice strong stuff, but instead, like every terrain I just described, a pathless mass of mud, roots and plants.
That, or they crossed over it on causeways?

And I come back to my point about the uselessness of leading them to a much larger body of completely un-wade-able sea.

Yes, your point, not my suggestion. :wink:

It may have been hard going, but if a marsh can be waded through when the water's there (as marshes usually can be), then it'll be a damn sight easier when the marsh is drained. How do we know if an Egyptian reed marsh is even remotely like a western European boggy marsh?

If you drain a marsh it takes a bit to dry out. Like days or weeks.
Why should Egyptian reed marshes be different from reed marshes elsewehere?

Now, all that being said, Professor Bob Brier, an egyptologist, believes there was a mistranslation and it most likely meant Moses, on foot, was able to part the reeds in the Delta region while pharaoh unsuccessfully tried to navigate through them with chariots. Chariots sink in the mud and Moses escapes.

Yeah, well, chariots are drawn by horses who generally get quicker through mud that people on foot. But maybe those causeways...?