Thank you for your responses and welcoming. I myself favor more literal interpretation of biblical text but this can sometimes lead to profound confusion when a metaphorical meaning is what the author intended to convey. This is the case with the word that Moses used when describing the water as walls on either side of the surface area that had been transformed into a firm substance, the dry ground, that could be walked upon. The Hebrew word Chomah is a very specific type of wall that is a defensive barrier surrounding and protecting an area from attack. It did not necessarily mean that the water was vertical, only that the water to the left and right of the dry ground was a defensive barrier preventing the Egyptians from attacking the Hebrews from the left or right.
The word chomah is also used in 1 Samuel 25:16 to describe soldiers standing guard around the perimeter of an encampment on open ground as being a wall to the camp inside the perimeter that they had formed. This use of chomah in 1 Samuel demonstrates that it was common to use the word chomah to describe things that served a defensive function that were not actual vertical walls. In this sense a moat of water surrounding a castle could be called a chomah.
When we consider the situation that the Hebrews were in back on the beach they must have felt much safer out on the dry ground with the water preventing the Egyptians from attacking them. This protection that the water provided against the Egyptians was a huge relief for the Hebrews even before they got to the opposite shore.
I didn't plan on getting into this aspect of the water right away but the literal interpretation of the water as vertical walls is perhaps the greatest interpretive error that has caused the most confusion about the miracle of the Crossing of the Red Sea. The water was like walls in that it was a physical barrier but it was never any sort of vertical structure. That mistaken concept of vertical walls of water is only necessary if the dry ground was the sea bed, however, several verses in Chapter 15 make it very clear when literally interpreted that the Egyptians were at the surface prior to being cast into the sea and drowning. If the Egyptians were on the surface at that time then the dry ground was also at the surface since they were on the dry ground prior to drowning when the dry ground dissolved and returned to liquid.
