What Does Exodus 14:22 Mean in the King James?

And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon the dry ground: and the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand, and on their left.

Exodus 14:22 · KJV

The analysis reads the King James wording.

King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.

This verse in the Selah Decoded Version

THE KEY

The water that could bar passage becomes the wall around it, while a dry way runs through its center.

THE MEANING

Your image is not a vanished sea but an open route through the sea: dry ground holds beneath your feet, and water stands on both sides. What surrounds you can remain present while a traversable way is open within it.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

A way forward cannot exist until every surrounding obstacle disappears.

THE ROOT

בַּיַּבָּשָׁה

bayyabbāšāh

GROWS FROM

יבש

Be dry, become dry, wither.

The Hebrew word for dry ground grows from the same root that names drying and withering. The path is marked by the ground’s uncovered, walkable state, held open in the middle of the waters.

ALSO GROWS

yāvēš: Be dry; become dry; wither.

יָבֵשׁ

This branch names the dry condition behind the ground underfoot, making its walkable state part of the verse’s central image.

hôvîš: Make dry; dry up.

הוֹבִישׁ

This causative branch names the making-dry action that opens a passage through what water covers.

THE PATTERN

When waters seem to cover every route, dry ground appears as a passage within or beyond them.

And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.

Genesis 1:9 · KJVThe waters gather and dry land appears; here the same dry-land word becomes ground underfoot inside the sea.

Thus saith the LORD, which maketh a way in the sea, and a path in the mighty waters;

Isaiah 43:16 · KJVThe way itself is named as being in the sea, echoing a path whose setting remains water.

By faith they passed through the Red sea as by dry land: which the Egyptians assaying to do were drowned.

Hebrews 11:29 · KJVThe crossing is described as passage through the sea on dry land, repeating the verse’s inversion of water and path.

THE THREAD

And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.

Genesis 1:9 · KJV

Genesis and Exodus use the same Hebrew word, ⁨יַבָּשָׁה⁩ (yabbāšāh), for dry land. Genesis shows it appearing as the waters gather; here that same ground is present within the sea, held between walls of water.

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