Hebrew Voices #112 – The Red Sea Miracle

In this episode of Hebrew Voices, The Red Sea Miracle, Bible Scholar Nehemia Gordon looks at the archaeological, linguistic, and historical evidence for the path of the Exodus, as investigative filmmaker Tim Mahoney gives us an exclusive behind the scenes peak at his latest movie that will be in 800 theaters for one-night only on February 18, 2020. Don't miss it!

I look forward to reading your comments!

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Hebrew Voices #112 – The Red Sea Miracle

You are listening to Hebrew Voices with Nehemia Gordon. Thank you for supporting Nehemia Gordon's Makor Hebrew Foundation. Learn more at NehemiasWall.com.

Tim: They’re so objective, that sometimes people are concerned that their faith is gonna get beat up when they look at my films, because I do allow multiple viewpoints to be heard. But I think you’re gonna have people that are gonna look at this and like I said, I’ve got audiences that are broad, from all different walks of life, that are gonna look at my films because they give all sorts of different viewpoints. But I also want you to know that I have something for people of faith that are interested in seeing a pattern of evidence that actually is going to help them see that there’s a historical credibility to the Torah, and to the Bible.

Nehemia: Shalom, this is Nehemia Gordon, and welcome to Hebrew Voices. I'm excited to be here today with investigative filmmaker, Tim Mahoney, who's working on a series of movies. Three of them have already come out. Actually, one is coming out next week, February 18th, 2020, for a one-night viewing. Shalom, Tim Mahoney.

Tim: Hey, thank you for having me on. I really appreciate it.

Nehemia: Tell us about your “Patterns of Evidence” series. Before we started, I actually called you up before I'd even seen the movie and I said, “What are you trying to prove in the movie?” And you said something I really appreciated. It was just the two of us alone on the phone, you could have said anything. But it really showed me, at least, what is the man behind the scenes. You said, “I'm not trying to prove anything. I'm presenting evidence to people. I'm presenting both sides.” In this case, I think you're presenting four different sides and letting people decide for themselves. I really appreciate that you're doing that. Tell us a little bit about the series that you're doing, and the movie that's coming out February 18th.

Tim: Yes, well I think the title itself, “Patterns of Evidence,” is a unique title. And what that really is, what I'm trying to tell an audience, is that it's a scientific approach. And I'm using a scientific approach to explore the historical events of the Bible. And for me, I grew up in a Christian home. My mother read the Bible to us. I actually grew up in a single-parent home and I went to church faithfully with her. And I was the oldest in the family, so I never really questioned the stories of the Bible.

But it's not until you get older, when you leave your house and you go on to meet other people, that people started questioning it. And I eventually became a filmmaker and really moved into the area of documentary filmmaking. I was very fascinated by the Bible and history. And so, when someone invited me to go in search for evidence of The Exodus, it was an adventure. I was 42 at the time, and I ended up going to Egypt. In fact, it was just after 9/11. I went searching with a film crew for the route of The Exodus. This was over 18 years ago that I began making the film that we're going to be releasing. So, it's taken me this long to come to a place where I could be prepared to actually release the film.

Nehemia: That's great. I've been working on projects for many, many years, probably as long as you have, and so, I really can appreciate the passion and the investment of just your energy and your soul into it. And I watched a video just now that's coming out. Guys, I got a special preview and I really liked the movie. Go see it, February 18th. It's in 800 theaters but only for one night. Where do people get tickets for this movie? This is called “The Patterns of Evidence,” and the subtitle is?

Tim: “The Red Sea Miracle.”

Nehemia: “The Red Sea Miracle.”

Tim: Yeah. In fact, this is part one. In 18 years, we filmed a lot. We have a really big investigation, and in fact, I was told it's never been done before, where you have a film where you see the first part of the film, and then you're gonna come back, be able to absorb it, and then come back on May 5th is gonna be the second part. Yes, we've been working on it for a long time.

Nehemia: So, where can people get tickets for this? It's only one night.

Tim: Yeah, if they go to patternsofevidence.com, they're going to be able to see a trailer and they can purchase tickets. There's other information about the film. In fact, I think I've got some clips that I brought for you, too, today.

Nehemia: I want to show the first clip here. The first clip is really an introductory clip which at least, for me, it set the stage. I saw that clip and then I watched the whole hour and 40, approximately, minute-movie. So, guys, here is a clip from “Patterns of Evidence, the Red Sea Miracle.”

Tim: The Red Sea Miracle, yeah.

“This story of The Exodus sea crossing is where it all began for me, over 18 years ago. I can't explain exactly why I've been so taken with this account, that I would risk my own business and personal life to explore these questions. I just knew it was something I had to pursue.

And after all those years, I did find a pattern of evidence showing that The Exodus and conquest happened, and that Moses really could have written about these events as an eyewitness account. However, there are still major questions about where the Israelites traveled, what sea they crossed and where Mount Sinai really is. In fact, after Israel gained control of the Sinai Peninsula in 1967, they searched extensively for evidence of their history, but no trace of The Exodus journey was found at the traditional locations. But have we been looking in the right places? If we can determine which sea was crossed, it could give clues about where to look for Mount Sinai. So now, for me, the first issue in The Exodus journey is the Red Sea Miracle. What sea was really parted? And could there still be evidence?”

Nehemia: Wow, that's some great stuff you got there, Tim. I'm really excited for people. You know, I watched it just now, I just spent about two hours nearly watching it, and I'm excited for people to have that opportunity.

I love that you're laying out all this evidence. I see a lot of videos where… it's either people coming from a perspective of faith and they're just steamrolling any of the objections...They're not even hearing the objections. They're pretending they don't exist, or they're not giving them air, let's put it that way. And then on the flip side, you have people who are coming from the academic world. And it's just a given that none of these things happened, because miracles aren't real, God isn't real. That's not what I believe, but the approach that they'll take is, they want to study The Exodus story the same way they would study biology. And so, in biology we're not expecting any supernatural events. We're expecting every time we perform an experiment, we'll have more or less the same results. And if we don't, maybe we did the experiment wrong. Well, here we can't experiment, it's history so it's a bit different.

Talk to me a little bit about that, because that was one of the themes for me throughout this movie, was the tension between naturalism and a miracle approach to history, a history that involves miracles.

Tim: Yes, exactly.

Nehemia: And actually, before you jump into that, I do this, I cut people off. I'm reminded, there's this famous interview where Dawkins was asked if he could believe that God was behind the creation of the universe or life. And he said, “Absolutely not.” And then they asked him, “What about aliens?” And aliens he considered a feasible possibility. He didn't say he accepted it or didn't, because he didn't have evidence, but he considered it a possibility, whereas God was not a possibility. And sometimes, when I hear these discussions about The Exodus and about biblical history in general, I feel like I'm talking to Dawkins. So, talk about that tension that you have in the movie.

Tim: When I work on a film, I try to gather as much context as I possibly can, in order for me to understand what the subject matter is. Our films are built on logic. What you have is a history. You start with the Bible and the biblical text tells you a pattern. If you look for it, you can identify certain things. And what it is, as you saw in the film, there's a departure point. The Exodus has a departure point. Where do they leave from? Is there any evidence that they left from there?

It has a direction. Moses was leading them back to Mount Sinai, so there's a direction. Which way was that? North, West, East, South, which direction? Then there is a desert, and the question would be, what desert did they cross? And then there's a detour to a dead end, which we call trapping at a deep sea, that's number five. And then there's a destination, Mount Sinai. So, in this first part, we're looking at the first three elements, the first three parts of the sequence, a departure point, a direction, and a desert.

And then we get to some of the turning points. And what I've shown in this film is, there are two camps. There are two different camps of belief. I've sort of simplified it, and there's some crossover. One camp I call the “Egyptian camp.” That is the camp that is basically looking at the last several hundred years, and it has to do with more of a naturalistic way of looking at the stories of the Bible, the narrative of the Bible. They're basically saying that the Bible borrowed or took words from Egyptian, and some of those words are clues to where the sea crossing was, near Egypt, on a border like, of Egypt. And then, the other group is called the “Hebrew group,” which I'm sure you're quite familiar with it. It also rounds with around one major word, “Yam Suf.” Yam, it’s the Hebrew word “yam,” the sea, and “suf.” The question is, what does that mean?

Nehemia: Let's hold off on the meaning of “Yam Suf,” because I do want to dive into that. But you mentioned that the Egyptian approach takes words from Egyptian, but I kept seeing words from Hebrew or Semitic languages, like Migdol, Pi haKhirot, which they interpret as an Acadian word, which is a Semitic language, Ba'al Tzefon, two Hebrew words, or two Semitic words, for sure, not Egyptian words. So, I do think that's really interesting. And you're right. This, in a sense, is an Egyptian approach, but they're trying to locate all these Egyptian places, or all these Semitic names in Egypt itself, which seems kind of interesting to me. Wouldn't those be closer to the land of Israel, where Semites lived, rather than in Egypt?

Tim: Yes, and so, this is an issue of interpretation, and I'm sure you're quite familiar with it. Don't they say, if there are two Rabbis to look at something, they have three opinions?

Nehemia: Absolutely, yeah. And where that comes from is... That sounds like a joke, right? But it's not really a joke. If you look in the Talmud, the traditional Jewish way of thinking and looking at a matter is they'll take, let's say, a verse in the Bible, and two Rabbis will interpret it. And then, three or four more Rabbis will come along, and they'll dissect, “What did the one Rabbi mean? Is it really different than what the second Rabbi meant?” And they'll say, “No, no, they were talking about two different scenarios, it's not that they had two different opinions. Oh no, they had two different opinions,” and they'll give like 20 different... they'll have what's called a “hava amina,” which means, “I might think,” or “I might say.” And it'll bring more than three or four different interpretations, and they're just hashing it out. And in the end, sometimes they say, “Well, we don't know which of these are right. These are all the different possibilities.” And that is one of the things I like about your films, that you seem to be doing that, presenting the evidence.

Tim: I think I'm actually making films with a Hebrew approach, because our films raise questions. They ask questions. And, by the way, our film company is called “Thinking Man Films.”

Nehemia: I like it. That is interesting. I don't know enough about the Egyptian approach to say, but the Greek approach is definitely very binary. And I think the Hebrew approach is, okay, these are the different possibilities. We don't know which one is correct, maybe more than one is correct, under different circumstances and with different situations.

All right, now I want to jump into the whole issue of... I identified four different routes that you talked about, and maybe there were more, in the route of The Exodus. And you made a statement that I think was interesting. You said the majority of scholars say that this one particular northern route is the most accepted by most scholars. I could tell you, my experience at Hebrew University in the Bible department, at least, and in the archaeology department, most scholars don't think The Exodus actually happened. They think it's a legend that was made up hundreds of years later, or a thousand years later. There might be some who say it happened, but it wasn't exactly what we think. And you bring a form of that, that it was 600 families, or clans, instead of 600,000 men along with their wives and children, like it says in the Torah. I think that's interesting, that we have these different possibilities. What are your thoughts on that?

Tim: I think the reason why they've come to those conclusions is partially the fact that there's a time period. What they say is,1250 BC, around that time period, is when an exodus would have happened. So, what they're saying is, The Exodus did not happen. It had to have happened at 1250 BC.

Nehemia: And you actually go into that in a little bit more depth in a previous conversation we had, and we'll put a link to that at nehemiaswall.com. Yeah, that's a good point. In other words, it would be like saying, “We looked through all the American sources in the year 1900, and we could find no evidence of the American Revolution and the Declaration of Independence.” Well, because it didn't happen in 1900, it happened in 1776.

Tim: Yes.

Nehemia: So, that's a very good point. When I studied archaeology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, one of the things they taught us, this was in the early ‘90s and they had just a little bit over a decade before, finished the Israeli survey of the Sinai. What they did is, they knew we were making a peace treaty with Egypt, and we would have to give the Sinai back to Egypt, so they scoured the Sinai looking for archaeology, number one, because we have the best archaeologists in the world. And number two, is the Egyptians didn't seem really interested in it. They hadn't done this before.

One of the little secrets about this is that Israel wasn't just looking for the archaeology, they were looking for any strategic advantage.

So, you brought up an interesting thing about how one of the routes had sand on it, and then this other route was more traversable, because it wasn't like Sahara sand. So, there's this incident in Israeli history, that in 1956 we captured the Sinai, and then after a year later, we gave it back to the Egyptians. But during that year we did a thorough land survey and we found tracks that the Egyptians didn't know about, probably don't know about to this day, that our vehicles could go over, so that if we ever had to come back to Sinai, we would know the quickest route. We wouldn't get stuck in the sand. And these are even within, more or less, the same region. You go 10 feet in that direction or 30 feet in that direction and you have routes that you could drive a car over, drive a tank over, march soldiers over.

So, we had mapped out in great detail every square centimeter of the Sinai, so that if there ever was another war, we would know exactly where to go and what to do. And we had another war, the Six Day War, and then the Yom Kippur War. And that information proved really lifesaving to the State of Israel.

So, during that entire process, we also looked for any archaeological remains. And I remember one of my professors at Hebrew University in the early ‘90s in archaeology, saying, he said, “If there were two or three million Israelites in the desert, it leaves a lot of archaeology.” Where's all the archaeological remains? They're wandering around for 40 years in this triangle known as the Sinai desert. Where's all the archaeology, right? I mean, you can go to Qumran... Well, maybe not today, but a few decades ago, you could go to Qumran in the Judean Desert and there was an archaeologist who found the toilets at Qumran by smelling them after 2,000 years. Qumran was a small community of, I don't know, 50 or 100, 200 people. This was two to three million people. Let's say it was 600 clans. You're going to, at the very least, find their toilets, find all kinds of remains. And so, this Professor at Hebrew University said, “It didn't happen because we looked in the Sinai and we didn't find it.” And I feel like your movie is a response to what my Professor said, or at least it's a way of offering an alternative explanation, even though you never met my Professor, as far as I know. But I'm sure you've heard similar things from people?

Tim: Oh, yeah, exactly. And so, what I’ve found is that many of these archaeologists have a preset conditioned idea of the way they were taught. So, what's happening is that one Professor is teaching... they're basically locking in a time period and a location. So, one of the phrases we've had is, have they been looking in the right places, and in the right time periods? And so, if you come with a preset existing set of ideals about the biblical narrative, because of somebody 50, 60 or 100 years ago that ironed that into the school of thought that was at the university, everyone's going to have a paradigm. And my films have talked about paradigms. Paradigms blind people from the possibility that what they were taught might not be the way it really was. And so, I'm gonna suggest, and we're going to continue to open up, we'll let people suggest and defend the idea that there is a possibility that the Israelites were in the Sinai. But there are other people - and this film is going to explore that - that the Israelites didn't. They crossed the Sinai, because the ancient land of Midian is in northwest Saudi Arabia in southern Jordan. So, it's very possible, very likely...

Nehemia: Can we show that clip? We have a clip that talks about this. This talks about the location and shows a great map. Here is a clip about the location of the land of Midian.

Tim: “When Pharaoh heard of it, he sought to kill Moses, but Moses fled from Pharaoh and stayed in the land of Midian, where for 40 years he tended sheep. And then, one day, God revealed himself to Moses and spoke to him out of a burning bush. God told Moses to return to Egypt and tell Pharaoh to release the Israelite slaves and bring them back to this mountain that he was standing on, to worship God. This gives us a clue to the direction step. The initial destination of The Exodus journey was not the promised land, but rather, a mountain where Moses encountered God during his 40-year stay in the land of Midian, prior to The Exodus. The traditional view is that Moses encountered the burning bush at a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula. But was this the land of Midian?”

Narrator: “One of the questions that people have always asked is that if you look at the biblical story of The Exodus, you see that Moses went to the land of Midian. The land of Midian, where is Midian? Midian is actually in Saudi Arabia. It's not in Sinai, it's not in what is today, Transjordan, and it's not in Israel or Palestine. It's in Saudi Arabia.”

Nehemia: Okay, so if you're looking for Midian, in southern, what's called, “Sinai,” the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt, and that's not the actual land of Midian, then you're not going to find it there, right? I mean, it'd be like going to Beersheba and saying, “I didn't find any proof of David's capital in Jerusalem.” Well, you didn't look in Jerusalem, why would you find any proof?

Tim: Yeah. Let's go back to this issue of logic. I mean, once you start to look at this and you realize oftentimes that there are really smart people that have been sort of researching this, but they haven't asked a logical question. I'm a visual person. As you could see, the films are visual. If I just sort of play out the logic of what some of these ideas are that have been presented to us about the way the Bible is, and why they can't find evidence for it, I don't necessarily see the logic in their reasoning.

If I'm going to be a person of faith, I'm going to say, “If you're going to try to tell me that it didn't happen, I'd rather have a more compelling argument.” And that's the reason why I made these films. I have a calling, I guess, just like a number of people, and yourself, you have a calling, you feel like you're supposed to do something. I didn't know I was supposed to be working on these films, but if I was gonna work on them, I figured out, “What does the Bible say? Then, what's the pattern that we would look for? And what's the context and the historical context that I would look for?” And that's how I made these films. And what you uncover then is, wow, when people attack biblical historicity, there are some holes in their arguments.

Nehemia: Well, they kind of set up this impossible dilemma, or it's really a false dilemma. They set up the situation and they say, “Look, we're scholars, we're scientists. We can't deal with miracles.” And I think that's okay, right?

Tim: Right.

Nehemia: Meaning, I think there's value in approaching the text with that approach, but it's not the only approach. So, they'll say, “Okay, we can't deal with miracles, and therefore, you could never prove that The Exodus happened, but we can prove it didn't.” Well, wait a minute. That's not a balance there, right? They're saying that there's only one thing we can prove. The other thing, by definition, we can't prove because it's a miracle. We can say it was aliens, but we couldn't say it was a divine being. That's the approach of science.

And look, there is some validity, I think, to that approach, right? In other words, if I'm carrying out scientific experiments with chemicals, and I mix two chemicals, there's two possible ways of explaining that. One is that there were spirits that were communicating with each other and one was a more powerful spirit. And the other is, “Well, no, chemicals are made that way and they have valence bonds.” You know, I'm not a chemistry guy, but there's a naturalistic approach. I mean, look, I'm in favor of that in chemistry.

Not that long ago, there was the demon theory of disease. They didn't know about microorganisms, and there were three main theories of disease, demons, dirty air, and microorganisms. They said, “Animals that are so small, we can't see them.” Well, you haven't proven it. Nobody's ever seen that animal, until Louis Pasteur was able to see them. So, I kind of feel like there's a place for that in science at the same time, when they enter into the study of the Bible and they say, “This is the only way to do it.” And look, you had a gentleman at the end, who I think was probably the most honest I've heard in a long time from academics. He said, “If you say certain things, you're not going to get published.” So, you know how the game is. And the people who don't know how the game is played, they don't end up as tenured professors, so it's what's called a “self-selecting group.” Any thoughts about that?

Tim: Yeah, yeah. What you're referring to is this big question about, if evidence is leading in a particular direction, but the academy or the university is saying that that's forbidden, you have to determine, am I willing to risk my career? In this particular case, a lot of these people who had a biblical understanding, and they believe the Bible was telling them this was the location, or this was the place. And we're talking about Midian, we're talking about where Mount Sinai might be.

Because when you cross a body of water, you're on your way then to the mountain where God had called Moses. And it's almost as if in this journey as we look at it, that the body of water was part of God's gaining glory. In fact, it says it like three times in Exodus, “I'm going to gain glory over Pharaoh and his army.” And that's what we're talking about 3,500 years later. The Ten Commandments were about that event. I'm making a film and I've spent years doing it, God is going to gain glory, because what happened a long time ago, He's saying it was true. And nations from that point on, were fearful because of this God.

Nehemia: Well, that's a great point. There's this wonderful account in the book of Joshua, where Joshua, he doesn't have the confidence in God, that God is going to deliver the Canaanites into the hands of the Israelites, so he sends spies over. And the spies meet this woman, Rahab. And they ask her, “What do you guys know? What do you Canaanites know about us?” And she said, “We've heard that your God split the sea and defeated Pharaoh.” Now, this was 40 years later.

And one of the first things that comes to mind when you think about an Israelite is, “How are we gonna beat these guys? They defeated the Egyptians. The sea was split.” You know, it's interesting, you're dealing with this issue here, which is a relatively modern question. Did The Exodus happen at all? And I think of Josephus who you mentioned in your video. He wrote a book called “Against Apion.” Apion was this Jew-hater in the Roman Empire. He was what we would call today an “anti-Semite.” And he said, “Okay, yeah. The Jews came out of Egypt because they were lepers, and the Egyptians threw them out of Egypt because they were full of diseases.” But the idea that an entire nation would make up a story that they had come out of Egypt and they'd been slaves in Egypt, nobody in the ancient world would make up a story like that. They call it the “argument of embarrassment.” If you make up a story, you make up a story that you have some glorious past, you defeated some major empire.

Today, we glorify being a victim. We’re living in this era today, in 2020, where victimhood is glorified. Everybody's trying to find how I'm a victim, it's like the oppression Olympics. But in the ancient world, to say that you had been slaves was not something you would brag about. That would be something very embarrassing. And the fact that the entire nation with one voice said, “Yeah, we were slaves in Egypt and God took us out.” Now, a scientist could say, “I can't prove whether Apion is right, that they were lepers and driven out of Egypt, or whether the Torah is right and God took them out of Egypt. But the fact that they went out of Egypt is testified by the entire nation.” If somebody had made that up, I think there would be some Jew somewhere who would call them out and say, “Wait a minute, my ancestor didn't know this story.”

And we actually have a statement similar to that in Deuteronomy, where it says, “Where in all of history…” I'm paraphrasing, “…do you have a situation where God has taken a nation to be His?” It's in Deuteronomy, after The Exodus, “And He took them, and He revealed Himself.” We don't have any account like that. It really is a unique event in history, the revelation at Sinai, which I think you're going to get to in a future film. So, remind the people one more time where they can see this movie.

Tim: “Patterns of Evidence: The Red Sea Miracle.” You can see a trailer at patternsofevidence.com and buy tickets there. We are in 800 theaters for only one night, only one night, which is February 18th. It’s in 800 theaters, it’s for one night only. But these films, as you know, are events. So, there's a pre-show, but it starts right on time, and the time set for this is like 7 pm. There'll be a 12-minute intermission, then we'll have part two. Because, you know, in my films there's a lot of information, but they're dramatic. They turn, they've got recreations, we've got a lot going on in them. And then at the end of the film, there's going to be about an 18-minute panel discussion to sort of wrap it up and to really understand what's at stake here.

Nehemia: Very cool. Hey, can we just talk really quick about the phrase "Red Sea?” Because you have some great discussions about this. Something as simple as the phrase "Red Sea" is subject to so many different interpretations, some of them probably more valid than others. Talk to us a little bit about this term that we take for granted. It's not that clear what it means, or at least there's a lot of different opinions in scholarship about what it means.

Tim: Right. It goes back to Hebrew, right? I mean, when Moses was writing, he wrote Yam Suf, yam meaning “sea.” The question is, what is suf? And one of the things that we do know, that I've learned about, is that the Hebrew group is gonna say, every time this Hebrew word “Yam Suf” is used, when it's used to identify the geographical location, it's always associated with the Gulf of Aqaba. When Moses is writing and God tells him what the boundary of Israel is, it's Yam Suf, and that's the Gulf of Aqaba. That's the southern border of Israel. And then, when Hezekiah and King Solomon are referencing it, they had a fleet of ships on Yam Suf.

Nehemia: Can I read that verse? It's 1 Kings 9:26. “And King Solomon made a fleet at Etzion Gever, which is near Eilot.” And today, it’s called…

Tim: Eilat.

Nehemia: In the Bible it actually says “Eilot” but today it's referred to as “Eilat.” “On the edge of Yam Suf in the land of Eedom,” “in the land of Edom.” So, that's interesting. There's no question whatsoever, this couldn't be something that today is roughly the area of the Suez Canal. In other words, we have the two branches of the Red Sea... I might be backwards for the audience, but the one on the left is the Gulf of Suez, and the other you referred to in the movie as the “Gulf of Aqaba.” In Israel, we call it “Mifratz Eilat,” the Gulf of Eilat. It's like the two branches, they go like this, of the Red Sea, and in between them is the supposed Sinai Peninsula, or so-called “Sinai Peninsula.”

A lot of your video, a lot of your movie is dealing with this question of which of these two branches, and is it even the sea itself, or is it some other body of water? And boy, guys, there's a lot of information there. You really lay out a lot of different opinions, you bring top experts. That's very impressive that you got these people to come on camera. You mentioned in the movie that you have people who said that if this is what you're talking about, we don't want to come on camera. How often did you get that response?

Tim: It has happened, depending upon what sacred cow I'm going to be talking about, you know, whether it's the chronology, or whether it's issues of where the sea crossing was. There's a lot of resistance to the Gulf of Aqaba, because people have been looking for chariot wheels. We're going to take on that in the second film, the whole chariot wheel question. We've had divers that have been filming, and I've been collecting footage for a long time. And so, we're going to be looking at it, in this big investigation. This is an epic documentary, you can see that, can't you?

Nehemia: Yeah. Well, it's epic in the sense that it's episodic, right? You're now three movies in. How many more do you have to go?

Tim: Well, I shouldn't tell you this, but we've outlined about 50 hours, honestly.

Nehemia: I won't tell anybody, it's just between me and you, and the audience.

Tim: I've got about enough footage in the can for another five or six films, already. There's so much to tell. We have thousands of hours of investigative footage, and we're just weaving it together, because it has to be made into something. I think that the investigation is going to be inspiring, but it's also going to allow people to say, “Well, what does this mean for me, today?” Because in this film, I also make it personal.

In other words, if God was able to provide for these people and take them this distance, that's the question. Is God showing us that in impossible situations and with more people than you think would be possible, this is the battle between a natural way of looking at it, and a supernatural way of looking at it. And I think at the end of the day, that's the big question that we're raising.

Nehemia: I think that last statement that you just made is probably the number one thing that makes a lot of people in the academic world say, “Whoa, whoa, whoa.” It's almost like, “It quacks like a duck, and it talks like a duck, and it walks like a duck, and it looks like a duck.” But we can't say it's a duck, because if we say it's a duck, if we say that there's some supernatural event, then somebody will come along, and they'll derive some spiritual application to it. And it seems like there's this fear there in the academic world, like, “Oh no, we don't want these religious fanatics who actually believe these books to come along and derive...” I mean, exactly what you just said, right? I mean, if God could bring the Israelites through the desert, and feed them, and nourish them, surely, He can take care of me.

Tim: Right, and my family. Growing up in a single parent home, there were times when God provided for our family, and I came to just have a faith that would happen. And, you know, we basically talk about truth. And you said something, I never thought about this before, like a religious fanatic. But we have academic fanatics.

Nehemia: Absolutely. Well, I brought the example of Dawkins, who is willing to entertain that it's aliens, but not a Divine being,

Tim: Right, so an academic is basically not willing to go, sometimes, where the evidence is pointing, or they can't arrive there because they're living by a code. And the question at the end of the day is, has God acted in history, and can we find a pattern? And Patterns of Evidence is taking a scientific approach and basically looking for the events and saying, “Well, what if it surfaces?” And we do see a pattern of evidence that matches the biblical text. And we're seeing that in many cases, but what happens is that for people to acknowledge that God might actually have been involved in this and miracles are happening, that is a challenge for a number of people. But I'm comfortable with that, because our films, basically, I'm not gonna tell you what to think, but I've had people who didn't believe who said, “You know what? I don't have as much confidence in my unbelief anymore.”

Nehemia: Wow. You know, it's not just that they're living by a code, some of these fanatics, and I guess I'm talking about the academic fanatics. It's not just that they're living by a code, they're part of a culture. I had this conversation a few weeks ago. I was at my sister's house near Ma'ale Adumim in Israel, and she's a scientist and works in a lab, runs a lab. And we were talking about a very controversial issue that I'm not gonna even say what it is, because it doesn't matter. But it was a very controversial issue within the scientific world.

She would say, “No, every scientist knows that this isn't true.” And I'm like, “Okay, well, you bring a number like 92 percent. There's 8 percent that say something.” And her position was, “Well, how can all the scientists be wrong? Somebody would have called this out.” And I said, “Well, wait a minute, you're telling me that if there's some low-level scientist at some small little school in Nebraska, and they apply to the National Institute of Health, and their hypothesis is contrary to the accepted opinion, that grant request will be accepted and they're going to get funding?” And she said, “Well, I guess in theory it's purely objective. But in reality, you're right.”

And here, we're just talking about raw science, right? Meaning, so-called “natural sciences,” not the humanities, where you can actually prove things with experimentation. So, if somebody proposes an experiment to prove something that's considered heretical... And there's actually a thing today called the “Heterodox Academy of Scholars” who say, “Wait a minute. We should be allowed to ask these questions.” I won't even say what the issues are, but, I mean, you could think off the top of your head of a few issues that most people can, that wait a minute. If you brought that up in a scientific context, you'd be laughed out of the Academy. But what if you're right?

There's this great quote, and I've brought it a number of times for my listeners. It's from the English Ambassador to Venice. In 1611, he writes to King James I. And he gives him a report about how there's this mathematician who looked through this tube and claims these crazy things, that there are canyons and mountains on the moon, which is completely contrary to 2,000 years of science, and he's talking about Galileo. And he ends the letter, and he says, “The man will prove to be exceedingly famous or exceedingly ridiculous.” Meaning, in 1611 when he's giving this report, he doesn't know whether Galileo is going to be the laughingstock of the scientific world, or one of the greatest scientists of history. And he says, “I'm sending one of these devices so you could look for yourself.” Meaning, he's like, “I know this sounds crazy,” and he starts off the letter saying, “This is the most fantastical report I've ever submitted. Look for yourself through this tube, through this telescope, and you'll see if it's real.” And I love what you're doing is, you're presenting the people with the evidence, they can look for themselves. They can decide if they agree or disagree, or which of the options they agree or disagree with.

Tim: Yeah, I was thinking about the name Copernicus, too.

Nehemia: Copernicus didn't prove it. Copernicus hypothesized that the sun was in the center of the solar system and the earth went around it. Galileo, at least, definitively proved that there were bodies that went around other bodies that weren't the earth, because he could see the four moons going around, they're called the “Galilean Moons” today, the four moons that he identified going around Jupiter, and he proved it definitively, it wasn't a theory anymore. Not everything goes around the Earth. The four moons, or he thought they were planets, go around Jupiter. So, Copernicus, think about that. He was out in the wilderness making this hypothesis. And for decades, nobody knew for sure if he was right. The beauty of Galileo's observation is, it was empirical. You didn't have to take his word for it, you could look through the telescope yourself. It wasn't like some supercollider, it was something that at least the king could afford, maybe not the average person.

Tim: I had a situation one time, sometimes in your subconscious there are ideas, you don't know where they come from. But I was trying to measure some property that we had, a camping property. And people couldn't figure out, because there were hills, and valleys, and there were trees, and brush. And it was hard to basically get a straight property line, and people were putting their driveways in and crossing over other people's property. For some reason, when we were trying to figure this out, I said, “Yeah, can you imagine how difficult this would be, if you did it in the dark?” And I don't know why I said it. And then I thought about it and I go, “Why don't we do this in the dark?”

Nehemia: Wow. Were you able to do it?

Tim: What we did is, I remember that when we were camping, I could see a lantern for a long way away. And so, what we did is, we stuck a great big light on the end of the property line, and another one on the other end, and we had a flashlight. We could basically align... If someone walked a little bit off, we could see, and we could look back, and you could just walk straight to that light. That little beam of light would work through the trees, and branches, and everything. And we marked the property lines in total darkness, with light.

Nehemia: That's pretty cool.

Tim: Now, I don't know how I came up with that idea, but it worked. But I think about the way some of these films are being made. There's a sense of intuition. There are times when I personally feel like I'm being guided to the information. Once again, “The Red Sea Miracle,” I had a sense that it really was so big that we needed to make it into two parts. The first one is February 18th, and this is a film that you can bring anybody, wouldn’t you say?

Nehemia: Yeah.

Tim: Because if someone doesn't believe, they're not going to be offended. They're going to basically have a lot to think about. This is a historical, archaeological investigation, but it's inspiring, too.

Nehemia: I think, if you bring someone who's, let's say, an atheist, or is primed not to believe this, he'll say, “Okay, at least my side was represented.” We had the Austrian guy who says, “No, this is ridiculous. This would be a difficult thing to conclude,” basically.

Tim: Yeah.

Nehemia: I like that. We live in an age today, where people are in their little bubbles and they don't hear what the opposite side has to say. Somebody did a study recently, and I won't even say which side it was, but there were two groups in America. One of them could predict what the other side's views would be, and the other side, which is supposed to be the open-minded side, could not predict at all what the other side was going to be. They were like, “Well, they're just bad people. They don't have a view. There is no view, they’re bad people. They're just full of hate.” Well, really? They don't have a view? And they do.

Hey, I wanna just jump really quickly into this whole thing of the Red Sea. I'm gonna jump into the Red Sea. It's interesting, you brought up something I hadn't really thought a lot about, how the Greek translators translated it. I did a little bit of digging and I found, so the phrase there is “Erythrà Thálassa,” which is literally, “Red Sea.” And Herodotus, the Greek historian, uses that term. And he writes, “Now in Arabia, not far from Egypt, there is a gulf extending inland from the sea called ‘Red,’ the Arabian Gulf of which I shall speak extends from the south towards Syria.” So, he describes this Arabian Gulf, meaning it's a gulf that runs along the coast of Arabia, and it comes in from the Red Sea.

And there, he's talking about the Red Sea, he's including the Indian Ocean as well as the Persian Gulf. He, basically, is describing the Gulf of Aqaba, or the Gulf of Eilat, it sounds to me, at least, like. Now, he might not have known there were two different seas there, right? That's possible, and you bring that up.

Tim: “So what you're suggesting is that there's a crossing in these border lakes right here. How did you come up with that?”

Interviewee: “Well, it all began by my interest in this very famous depiction on the walls of Karnak Temple, which show the Pharaoh Seti I, who was the father of Ramesses II. And what we have here is a 3,300-year-old roadmap containing the forts from Egypt's frontier, depictions of forts and their names, stretching across northern Sinai all the way to the land of Canaan. This shows us water. We have pictures of lakes, we have pictures of reeds growing out here, but all of this is desert today.”

Tim: “The reeds depicted on the Karnak inscription connect well with the popular ‘Sea of Reeds’ definition for Yam Suf.”

Tim: I think what we’re saying is that the Gulf, there’s a gulf of the Red Sea called “Aqaba,” and then there's a gulf of the Red Sea called “Suez.” They extend like gravity, as it were. And so, there’s the question of Red Sea, because later on we hear the word "Sea of Reeds". And now, what I understand is that the Greeks, it was called a “reedy sea.” The Greeks actually had about 20 different words for vegetation that they could have used. They could have called it “Sea of Reeds,” but they didn't. They call it the “Red Sea.” So, there's a clue that they realized that this wasn't just a shallow lake, three to six or seven-feet deep on Egypt's border, that this is actually a sea. And that's the reason why the Septuagint, when it was translated, went from “Yam Suf” to “Red Sea.” That's something to think about.

Nehemia: I have a hypothesis here that I'm just throwing out, and it requires further investigation. I read you that verse from 1 Kings 9:26 and it referred to the Yam Suf in the land of Edom. Edom means “red,” so it's very possible that when they said, “Red Sea,” let's say the translators of the Septuagint, who were these Jewish Rabbis in Alexandria, that they were saying, “Oh, the Edomian Sea, that is, the sea of the land of red, ‘edom.’” It's possible, I don't know. And it was a term that already existed, that's for sure. Meaning, it existed in the context of Herodotus referring to the sea. He actually talks there, Herodotus, how he thinks there was another sea that got filled in by the Nile, and it just goes to show what a limited knowledge of geography they had back then. We take it for granted that we can pull up Google Maps, and that surely if he's in Egypt, he would know. I wouldn't assume that at all. He might not know what's down the road.

Guys, this is a really good movie, I want to invite you to come see it. Give the people one last time, the dates and where they can get the tickets.

Tim: Yeah, “Patterns of Evidence, The Red Sea Miracle.” If you go to patternsofevidence.com, they can see the trailer, they can buy tickets there. I encourage people to buy tickets. Our ticket sales are growing really, really well. We can sell out in certain areas. In fact, I know we’ve got some theaters that are selling, they're trying to put on more showings, but it's only a one-night event, basically. And it's going to be a full evening. It starts at 7 pm sharp. I mean, the movie starts right at that time. There'll be an intermission in the middle, and then there'll be a panel discussion at the end of it. If you've ever heard of the “Patterns of Evidence” films, what you're gonna know is these are five-star award-winning films, and they’re big theatrical productions. You're going to meet a lot of people, there’s probably a cast of over 20 cast members, as far as experts that are gonna be talking. And they're following my personal journey. This is my story. It's taken me almost 20 years to get to this point, to bring all this information and evidence and present it in a multi-viewpoint case. And then, we're gonna carry that on on May 5th, and we're going to have the conclusion of The Red Sea Miracle. We're going to go into the diving, the chariot wheels… what are people finding?

Nehemia: The chariot wheels will be part two on May 5th? Okay.

Tim: That's correct. And we're just gonna get into the whole thing, because everybody has been a part of this investigation. I'm trying to, basically, historically give a context to what's happened. And then, we're going to be dealing with miracles and the question of miracles, and does God violate the laws of nature? Can He intersect into His own creation? And does God act through time and history? Where He does interact; we're gonna have a debate about that. And so, there's a lot more in this big, epic documentary, and it's really fun. And we've got some of Cecile B. DeMille on this, as well. As you know, I got to know the family, and they are a big supporter of this film.

Nehemia: Very cool. All right guys, you heard it. February 18th, 2020, and we're gonna post a link at nehemiaswall.com. Thank you for joining us. Any last words you want to share with the audience?

Tim: Well, I've heard some people say, and I know that your audience is probably... they believe in the biblical text, and they want the Bible to be true.

Nehemia: Hey, you shouldn't assume anything about my audience. We've got people from all walks of life. I mean, really, people who aren't Jewish, people who aren't Christian, from all over the world. I think there'll be a lot here for everybody.

Tim: Well, I was gonna say, our films work for the agnostic. I've had some people say, “I don't even know which way this is going.” But I'm going to tell you that people of faith are going to be encouraged, because most of the time, films are negative about the Bible. In fact, my films come across sometimes, and people say, “You need to tell people that there are some positive, interesting things you're going to see about the evidence of the Bible.” And so, this isn't all just gonna be like tearing it down, tearing it down. But at the end of the day, it's gonna be inspirational, as well. That's what I'm trying to say.

Nehemia: All right. Thank you very much, Shalom.

Tim: Thank you.

Nehemia: Bye-bye.

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  • Carmen Kriegler says:

    Hi Nehemia
    Thanks for that interesting hint and interview, I wouldn’t have known otherwise. Glad that there is also a DVD available now for people outside the US.
    Biblical archeology nowadays is not far from former bible criticism (starting 18th century CE) since many of involved scientists are agnostic or atheists and that is mainstream in nearly all scientific fields (even in natural ones as I know too well) . And that is how they will interpret any archeological or other findings. Drawing other conclusions is ridiculous in their eyes. It is often fanatism or as I call it their “religion”. And students often follow their tutor, most would not dare to go off mainstream, it’s much more comfortable.
    I often wonder how they selfconsciously combine incomplete historical data with instruments of (to a certain extent) exact science and claim infailibility (e. g. bible chronology vs. incomplete data in astronomical writings as input into computer simulation programs which always are approximations wherin their quality depends mainly on input parameters). And people become easily convinced.

    I like it if somebody lays down on the table discovered findings, shows possible conclusions or problems related to them and finally leaves it to the person.Thats an respectful approach. But the conclusion drawn is essential despite. Either Jehova is a liar or the true God, his Word shows that he can’t lie and then Proverbs 3:5,6 has an impact in our life and our relationship to God is affected.

    So I am really curious about the film.
    Thx!

  • Walter Schwenk says:

    and speaking of “chaiim”, if you would like health advice from a jewish perspective, Chaiim “notadoctor” Goldman might have something of interest to you. stay well.

  • Samantha washman says:

    At the theater first at intermission. One of the scholars mis pronounced yehova. I don’t think that anyone heard of Jonathan Gray. Thks for getting this out so I could see. you are a light to the world

  • Saundra says:

    Great episode Nehemia and Tim! We have our tickets and are excited to see The Red Sea Miracle tonight!

  • Jw says:

    Called AMC Theater in Evansville, IN to try to learn more. They don’t answer phone, just refer you to their website. Went to theater website, and it doesn’t even have listing of show named patterns of evidence. Seems like a poorly marketed concept. Can’t find price of tickets nor make reservations. Sad, cause I really was interested. J.W.

  • Jw says:

    Went to patterns of evidence dot com website. Followed link to buy tickets, even found out where documentary was playing nearby, but link to buy tiknets didn’t function. So I tried a different zip code and area, and its link didn’t work either. Could not make out name of link cause was in such light blue it blended with white background. I couldn’t even find out the ticket price. Rather disappointed. I will try to call theater but unsure if they will be selling in advance there. Site was too hard to this senior to navigate. Need to keep it simple for us. 🙂

  • Wilma Mulder says:

    The theaters are only in the US isn’t it? Is it also possible to see it in Europe?

  • Walter Schwenk says:

    I can hardly wait to see how this compares to Lennart Moller’s video “exodus revealed”. A second witness, as was presented here, is always welcome.

  • Daniel says:

    Why does everyone act as though Ron Watt never lived? We’ve had the evidence for some time now to include video of the dive that showed the remenets of Pharoah’s army. Any new film should start by either refuting Ron’s work or confirming it and adding to it otherwise, it is ridiculous to pretend that his work doesn’t exist. The same applies to Noah’s Ark and the Ark of the Covenant.

    • Michelle Schultz says:

      Thank you Dani’el ! How appropriate your name! Yes. My sentiments exactly. Because of the YHVH inspired and led work of Ron Wyatt, I have known since long ago the real truth and I am still amazed that others use his work as their own springboard. I am not saying this man does but in the short clip I recognised the German who did make it his own as if never before revealed by the God-fearing Ron Wyatt ! Ron never got acknowledged by man for his great work in all he did but nevermind… his reward is from Where and Whom it matters !

      • daniel says:

        Heaven must’ve held Ron Wyatt in high regard, so man’s opinion of him is of little importance. I concur, a lot of people made money off Ron’s work, passing it off as their own. Mr. Wyatt and both sons spent a lot of tense weeks in Saudi prison when a ‘professional’ archaeologist tipped the Saudi’s they were in Midian. After their miraculous release Ron miraculously got the info and a crude map to Jim and Penny Caldwell, who documented the entire site over ten or more years – and the rest, as they say, is History (but a history most may never know). Heaven holds it’s own rewards.

  • Darlene DeSilva says:

    My husband, son and I say Tim’s last movie, LOVED IT! We are looking forward to this one too. We are so greatly to all of you that are working so hard to bring truth to people so they can have the opportunity to decide for themselves.

  • Walter says:

    If you haven’t seen any of the Patterns of Evidence movies, make sure to see this one. He gives both sides of the argument in an entertaining and professional way.

  • Lars Tunkrans says:

    Thanks for this engaging preview of the reed sea miracle. Can I ask a slightly off topic question on Exodus 4:27 ?
    Stipulating that Moses had been on Mount Horeb in the land of Midjan, and had gone from there to get his wife and son, and then heading west from the Land Midjan to Egypt, Aron then is instructed to Meet Moses, BeHar HaElohim it says in JPS Shemot 4:27. How can Moses and Aron meet on the Mountain of G_d if the Mountain is several days journey to the East of Moses position ? Has Shemot 4:27 been lost in translation somehow ? Is there Two Mountains of G_d ? One in the Land of Midjan and another to the West were Moses met Aron ?