{"id":6784,"date":"2026-03-15T12:56:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-15T10:56:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.jewishlife.co.za\/new\/?p=6784"},"modified":"2026-03-15T12:56:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-15T10:56:09","slug":"the-sea-that-split-within","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jewishlife.co.za\/new\/2026\/03\/15\/the-sea-that-split-within\/","title":{"rendered":"The Sea That Split Within"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Two Pillars of Geulah and Emunah <\/h2>\n\n\n\n

When Bnei Yisroel walked into the raging sea, they were not merely crossing a body of water. They were crossing a threshold of emunah \u2013 one that would define the Jewish People for all generations.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\n By: Rabbi Dovid Samuels\n<\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Pesach in Two Acts<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n Most of us think of Pesach as a single event \u2013 the night the Jewish People left Mitzrayim. Yet the Yom Tov itself tells a different story. Pesach spans eight days<\/strong>, and those eight days commemorate two distinct pillars of our redemption from Egypt. The first day of Yom Tov commemorates the miracle of Yetzias Mitzrayim \u2013 the night of the Plague of the Firstborns and the dawn exodus from Egypt. The seventh day, Shevi\u2019i shel Pesach, commemorates an equally momentous event: Krias Yam Suf, the splitting of the sea. The Torah itself signals the significance of this second moment. After Krias Yam Suf, the pasuk states[1]<\/a><\/sup>: \u201cAnd Yisroel saw the great hand… and the people feared Hashem, and they believed in Hashem and in Moshe His servant.\u201d The full salvation and the Jews\u2019 emunah both<\/strong> reached their fullest expression not on the first day, but on the seventh. Why?\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Disagreement With Deep Roots<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n The Magen Avraham[2]<\/a><\/sup> rules that a person can fulfil the mitzvah of remembering Yetzias Mitzrayim by reciting Shiras HaYam \u2013 the song Bnei Yisroel sang at the sea. After all, the Gemara[3]<\/a><\/sup> says one fulfils this obligation if he recites anything in which Yetzias Mitzrayim is mentioned, and all the more so by reciting the Song of the Sea itself. The Chasam Sofer, however, disagreed. He pointed to the verse[4]<\/a><\/sup> which commands us to remember the exodus as mentioning only leaving Egypt, but not crossing the sea or Krias Yam Suf. In the Chasam Sofer\u2019s view, Krias Yam Suf is an independent miracle \u2013 remarkable and transformative, but standing on its own, distinct from the exodus itself. Rabbi Akiva Eiger challenged this position from a Midrash[5]<\/a><\/sup> which states that one who recites Krias Shema must mention Krias Yam Suf and<\/strong> Makas Bechoros in the subsequent paragraph of Emes V\u2019Yatziv<\/em> \u2013 and if he omits Makas Bechoros, he has not fulfilled his obligation. From here it is clear that he holds that Krias Yam Suf and the Plague of the Firstborn are not merely separate matters but integral parts<\/strong> of the story of Yetzias Mitzrayim. Mentioning it, therefore, counts as mentioning the geulah from Mitzrayim.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n But this raises a striking question: if Rabbi Akiva Eiger is correct, and Krias Yam Suf is simply the culmination of Yetzias Mitzrayim, what exactly did the Chasam Sofer mean when he called it an independent, stand-alone miracle? And what was so qualitatively different about the emunah that emerged at the Yam Suf compared to the faith Bnei Yisroel already had when they left Egypt?\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two Kinds of Geulah<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n The Sfas Emes[6]<\/a><\/sup> offers a profound understanding to explain what\u2019s going on. He introduces us to the principle that there are two fundamentally different types of geulah \u2013 redemption. The first is a geulah that Hashem brings about through midas harachamim \u2013 pure Divine compassion \u2013 irrespective of the recipients\u2019 merits. The second is a geulah that people earn through their own actions and emunah.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n The geulah from Mitzrayim was of the first type. In Egypt, Bnei Yisroel were sunken in the forty-ninth level of spiritual impurity. The prosecuting angel of Mitzrayim argued before the Heavenly Court: \u201cThese are idol worshippers and those are idol worshippers!\u201d As if to say the Jews were no different \u2013 no better \u2013 than the Egyptians! Their redemption came not in their own merit, but solely through the chesed of Hashem and His promise to our forefathers. This is what our Haggadah means when it says \u201cshe\u2019amdah la\u2019avoseinu v\u2019lanu\u201d<\/em> \u2013 it is the promise to our forefathers that \u201cstood for them and stands for us.\u201d This was an is\u2019arusa d\u2019le\u2019eila<\/em> \u2013 an awakening that came entirely from Above. Krias Yam Suf was something else entirely. Here, Bnei Yisroel marched into the raging sea. They generated the geulah.<\/strong> This was an is\u2019arusa d\u2019le\u2019sata<\/em> \u2013 an awakening from below. Hashem responded to their emunah with a miracle commensurate with that emunah.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two Kinds of Emunah<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n There was certainly emunah at Yetzias Mitzrayim. When Moshe first brought Hashem\u2019s message to the Bnei Yisroel, \u201cvaya\u2019amen ha\u2019am<\/em>\u201d \u2013 the people believed[7]<\/a><\/sup>. But the Sfas Emes makes a crucial distinction: that emunah was given<\/em> to them through chesed. Hashem placed them on that spiritual level. It was therefore a fragile emunah \u2013 real, but not deeply rooted. And indeed, soon after leaving Mitzrayim, when they were camped before the sea with Pharaoh\u2019s army behind them, there were already factions calling to turn back.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n The Sfas Emes distinguishes between two categories of emunah. The first is natural emunah<\/strong> \u2013 believing in what you see. A person who witnesses a miracle believes in Hashem because he has seen Him act. Even the great Prophet Yechezkel, who beheld ma\u2019aseh ha\u2019Merkavah<\/em> and the visions of heaven, was operating within this category. He believed in what was revealed to his eyes.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n The second is a fundamentally different kind: emunah that transcends nature<\/strong>. This is the emunah of a person who believes even in what he cannot see \u2013 even in what contradicts what he sees before him. This requires breaking one\u2019s very nature, since it is natural for a human being to believe only in the visible and tangible.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n At the Yam Suf, Bnei Yisroel stood before an impasse. Everything they could see and hear and feel told them: turn back. Yet they walked in to the sea. The Midrash[8]<\/a><\/sup> captures this with its famous teaching: \u201cA<\/em> maidservant at the sea saw what the great prophets Yeshayahu and Yechezkel never saw.\u201d How can that be? Because Yechezkel saw sublime Divine visions \u2013 but those were visions given<\/em> to him. The maidservant, by contrast, marched into the sea with nothing before her eyes but crashing waves \u2013 and believed. That is a much higher level.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One Who Breaks His Nature \u2013 Nature Breaks Before Him<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n The Midrash[9]<\/a><\/sup> poses a striking question about a verse[10]<\/a><\/sup>: \u201cVayavo\u2019u Bnei Yisroel besoch hayam bayabashah\u201d<\/em> \u2013 \u201cAnd Bnei Yisroel came into the sea on dry ground.\u201d But which was it \u2013 sea or dry ground? The Midrash answers: the sea did not split until Bnei Yisroel had entered the water up to their very nostrils. Only then did it become dry ground. But why did they need to go in that far before the miracle occurred? The Sfas Emes explains: This was<\/em> the main salvation: reaching a level of total self-sacrifice, where no natural calculation has any hold. When a person achieves that, nature itself has no hold over him.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\n \u201cCertainly, Krias Yam Suf did not occur in the sea itself alone \u2013 but in every single Jew as well.\u201d\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

\n The Sfas Emes extends this insight with the Midrash[11]<\/a><\/sup>: \u201cHaYam ra\u2019ah vayanos\u201d<\/em> \u2013 \u201cThe sea saw and fled.\u201d What did it see? The Midrash says it saw the coffin of Yosef HaTzaddik. When Potifar\u2019s wife tried to seduce Yosef, the pasuk says \u201cvayanos vayeitzei hachutzah\u201d<\/em> \u2013 he fled. The sea, the Sfas Emes explains, saw someone who had broken his own nature \u2013 who had conquered the raging sea of desire within himself \u2013 and the sea made an obvious conclusion: if a human being can flee from his own nature, surely I, the sea, must flee from mine. In the words of the Sfas Emes: \u201cCertainly, Krias Yam Suf did not occur in the sea itself alone \u2013 but in every single Jew as well.\u201d\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n The principle the Sfas Emes is teaching us is breathtaking in its scope: man is a microcosm of the world.<\/strong> When there is a Krias Yam Suf within a person \u2013 when he conquers his inner sea of desire and natural instinct \u2013 the outer world responds in kind. Krias Yam Suf was not merely a one-time event at a body of water. It is a spiritual law. It can be re-created even now, today.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An Emunah For All Generations<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n Now we can return to the disagreement between Rabbi Akiva Eiger and the Chasam Sofer. Rav Akiva Eiger holds that it is one continuous process: the miracle of the first day taught Bnei Yisroel how Hashem saves \u2013 and on the seventh day they had internalised it so deeply that they generated<\/em> the salvation through their own emunah. This is \u201cD<\/em>raw me after You \u2013 and we will run.\u201d[12]<\/a><\/sup> First Hashem draws, then we run on our own.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n The Chasam Sofer sees a qualitative leap \u2013 not just a continuation. At Krias Yam Suf, a different kind<\/strong> of emunah was forged. Not emunah received as a gift, but emunah won through trial, through self-conquest, through mesiras nefesh. And because it was earned in this way, it became permanent \u2013 woven into the fabric of the Jewish soul. As the Sfas Emes puts it: what a person experiences externally is transient. What penetrates his inner being \u2013 that is enduring. The emunah of Yetzias Mitzrayim came from outside. The emunah of Krias Yam Suf was forged from within, in the crucible of a moment when everything shouted \u201cit\u2019s impossible\u201d \u2013 and Bnei Yisroel walked in anyway.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n This is why, in Hallel each Yom Tov, we turn to the sea and ask: \u201cMah lecha hayam ki sanus\u201d<\/em> \u2013 \u201cWhat its it to you, O sea, that you flee?\u201d We are not simply recalling a past event. We are invoking<\/strong> that same emunah. We are reminding ourselves \u2013 and the world \u2013 that the capacity to split the sea lives within every Jew.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Sea Within<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n While seemingly spiritual and lofty, this message is remarkably practical. Mesiras nefesh \u2013 self-sacrifice \u2013 does not have to mean leaping into a stormy sea. It means the daily, relentless, sometimes grinding work of overcoming one\u2019s own nature: the desires, the laziness, the anger, the habits that chain us. Every time a person subdues his inner turbulence \u2013 his own raging sea \u2013 he is performing a Krias Yam Suf. And the rewards are waiting to be seen.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\n \u201cEvery time a person subdues his inner turbulence \u2013 his own raging sea \u2013 he is performing a Krias Yam Suf.\u201d\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

\n The segulah for a miraculous salvation, then, is not a formula or a specific tefillah, though those have their place. It is a way of being: complete emunah, even when \u2013 especially when \u2013 the sea looks impassable \u2013 and the personal breaking of one\u2019s nature, which triggers the breaking of nature itself. Krias Yam Suf did not happen only once, at a sea in ancient Egypt. It happens every time a Jew looks at the impossible \u2013 at the raging waters of circumstance, illness, financial pressure, or spiritual struggle \u2013 and walks in. The sea always splits for those who have already split the sea within themselves.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \n

  1. Shemos 14:31 \u2191<\/a>
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  2. Orach Chaim 67 \u2191<\/a>
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  3. Brachos 13b \u2191<\/a>
    <\/p><\/li>\n\n\n\n

  4. Devarim 16:3 \u2191<\/a>
    <\/p><\/li>\n\n\n\n

  5. Shemos Rabbah 22:3 \u2191<\/a>
    <\/p><\/li>\n\n\n\n

  6. Rabbi Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter (1847\u20131905), known by the title of his magnum opus, the Sfas Emes, was the second Rebbe of the Gerer Chassidic dynasty in Poland. He is recognised as one of the most profound and influential Torah scholars of the 19th century
    <\/li>\n\n\n\n

  7. Shemos 4:31
    <\/p><\/li>\n\n\n\n

  8. Mechilta, Shemos 15:2 \u2191<\/a>
    <\/p><\/li>\n\n\n\n

  9. Shemos Rabbah 21:10 \u2191<\/a>
    <\/p><\/li>\n\n\n\n

  10. Shemos 14:22 \u2191<\/a>
    <\/p><\/li>\n\n\n\n

  11. Tehillim 114:3 \u2191<\/a>
    <\/p><\/li>\n\n\n\n

  12. Shir HaShirim 1:4 \u2191<\/a>
    <\/p>
    <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Two Pillars of Geulah and Emunah When Bnei Yisroel walked into the raging sea, they were not merely crossing a body of water. They were crossing a threshold of emunah \u2013 one that would define the Jewish People for all generations. By: Rabbi Dovid Samuels Pesach in Two Acts Most of us think of Pesach as a single event \u2013 the night the Jewish People left Mitzrayim. Yet the Yom Tov itself tells a different story. Pesach spans eight days, and those eight days commemorate two distinct pillars of our…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":6785,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[144,154],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6784","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-144","category-pesach-2026"],"gutentor_comment":0,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishlife.co.za\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6784","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishlife.co.za\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishlife.co.za\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishlife.co.za\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishlife.co.za\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6784"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishlife.co.za\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6784\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6786,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishlife.co.za\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6784\/revisions\/6786"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishlife.co.za\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishlife.co.za\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6784"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishlife.co.za\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6784"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishlife.co.za\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6784"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}