PARASHAT BESHALACH

Saturday 31^st January 2026         Shabbat Shirah         13^th Shevat 5786

PARASHAT BESHALACH – ‘When He Sent’ – בְּשַׁלַּח                           FFOZ

Torah: Exodus 13:17-17:16, Prophets: Judges 4:4-5:31, Gospel: Matthew 14:22-33

Summary:

The sixteenth reading from the Torah is named ‘Beshalach’, which means “when he sent.” The title comes from the first verse of the reading, which can be literally translated to say, “And it happened when Pharaoh sent out the people.” The reading tells the adventures of the Israelites as they leave Egypt, cross the Red Sea, receive miraculous provision in the wilderness, and face their first battle.

HaShem leads Israel out of Egypt with a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. Pharaoh pursues them. HaShem parts the Red Sea, allowing Israel to cross before drowning Egypt’s army. Israel sings and dances in triumph. In the wilderness, the people cry out, and HaShem provides bread from heaven and water from a rock. Amalekites strike the rear of the encampment, but Moses’ raised arms secure a miraculous victory. HaShem promises to blot out Amalek.

A People Ransomed by God

How is becoming a disciple of Yeshua like crossing the Red Sea (1 Corinthians 10:1–2)?

Paul wrote to the believers at Corinth, “For I do not want you to be unaware, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea; and all were immersed into Moses in the cloud and in the sea” (1 Corinthians 10:1–2).

In Paul’s day, one who wanted to become a disciple of Yeshua had to go through a ritual immersion. This rule applied to both Jews and Gentiles. Prior to the immersion, the new disciple confessed and renounced his sins in keeping with the tradition of John’s immersion. Then he descended into a gathering of living water “for the name of Yeshua.” The immersion brought ceremonial cleansing from Levitical impurity, and it symbolized spiritual cleansing, death, and resurrection.

Judaism teaches that one who immerses in a mikvah (immersion pool) symbolically dies as he descends into the water and is reborn as he leaves the water. The apostles applied the death and rebirth imagery of the immersion ritual:

Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Messiah Yeshua have been baptized into His death? Therefore, we have been buried with Him through baptism into death … if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection. (Romans 6:3–5)

For the apostles, immersion into the name of Messiah represented the transition from death to life, from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light. By way of analogy, Paul saw the same imagery at work in the crossing of the sea. The children of Israel left Egypt, Pharaoh, and slavery behind as they descended into the water, and they arose on the other side as free men—a people ransomed by God.

Paul warned the Corinthians not to think too highly of themselves. Paul warned them that the generation that perished in the wilderness had similar credentials to their own. They had all been “immersed into Moses in the cloud and the sea,” yet they did not enter the promised land (which is compared to the Messianic Era).

And, in 1 Cor 10:11, Paul explained that “these things happened to them as an example, and it was written down as a warning to us—on whom the ends of the ages have come”. And then, just in case you think that you, as a modern day Yeshua believer, would not make the same mistakes, and that your obedience to God’s instructions would be far better, in the very next verse, Paul cautions “¹² Therefore let the one who thinks that he stands watch out that he doesn’t fall”.

Paul was not the only Torah teacher to compare the crossing of the Red Sea to the water of the mikvah. In the Midrash Rabbah, the nation of Israel passes through the Red Sea to purify themselves in preparation for their journey to Mount Sinai:

The crossing of the sea can be compared to a woman who, having completed the days of uncleanness, purified herself and came to her husband. When he saw her he asked, “Who can testify that you are clean?” She replied, “Behold, my maid can testify that I have purified myself by immersion in the mikvah.” (Exodus Rabbah 23:12)