Footnote 5 – Red Sea or Reed Sea?

One is reminded that in the Israelite conception, the earth was an island of dry land surrounded on all sides by, and floating in, the primeval waters of chaos (Psalms 24:1–2; 104:5–7; 136:6). E. Levine (The Aramaic Version of Jonah [Jerusalem: Jerusalem Academic Press, 1975], pp. 75–77) relates that in later midrashic tradition Jonah while in the belly of the fish was shown the path of the Israelites through the Red Sea (b. Sota 45b; Midrash Jonah, h.l.; Yal. 551 Rashi, Comm. ad h.l.); this was possible, according to Ibn Ezra and Kimchi ad h.l., because “the Red Sea extends to, and mingles with the waters of Jaffa.”