A new computer modelling study suggests a powerful wind could have divided the waters just as depicted in the Book of Exodus.
The likely location of the ''miracle'' was not the Red Sea as such, but a nearby spot in the Nile Delta region.
In the biblical account, Moses and the fleeing Israelites are trapped between the Pharaoh's advancing chariots and a body of water identified from translations as either the Red Sea or Sea of Reeds.
Thanks to divine intervention, a mighty east wind blows all night, splitting the waters to leave a passage of dry land with walls of water on both sides.
The Israelites make their escape, but when the Pharaoh's army tries to pursue them the waters come crashing back and drown the soldiers.
Scientists in the US studying ancient maps of the Nile Delta region pinpointed where the crossing may have occurred, just south of the Mediterranean Sea.
