Certain [authors], in Abulensis (quest. 34), deny [it]; but imprudently. For first, at verse 17, [it] is clearly said [that there was] “dry ground,” upon which the priests stood in the middle of the Jordan; and again, “all the people passed over through the dry channel.” Where [there] is [one and] the same phrase always in the Hebrew — namely becharabah [בֶּחָרָבָה, “on the dry ground”] — but in the Greek ἐπὶ ξηρᾶς [epi xēras], and διὰ ξηρᾶς [dia xēras] — that is, “upon the dry [land]” and “through the dry [land].” Likewise in the following chapter, verses 22 & 23, and [in] 2 Kings [Reg.] 2. And Josephus (bk. 5) says [that] the pebbles, which are wont otherwise to be on the shores, and to be swept away by the swifter river, now had settled on the bottom, and, as it were, on a pavement. Next, all God’s works are wont to be perfect. But now the miracle of the crossing granted would have been less perfect, if [the people] had had to cross through a channel still wet, through mud and mire. Thirdly, [it] was not fitting to enter the land so often promised, and so desired, and long sought, with muddied and miry feet, and to defile that very bank with filthy footprints. Fourthly, [there] would have been need to them again of water and of time, that they might wash off the filth of the mud; and thus the mind of all would have been somewhat called away and hindered from the consideration of so great a miracle. Fifthly, the reason why this drying is denied is one only; and yet that same [reason] is vain and futile. For thus do they argue:
“When the Red Sea had to be crossed, so that its channel might be dried, [there] was need to send in, the whole night, a certain vehement and dry wind, which should dry it, and take away all the moisture of the water, the mud, and the mire (Exod. ch. 14 v. 21). But in this place [there] was no wind; nor any night intervening — nay, nor any longer time [at all]. For as soon as the Jordan was cut asunder by the contact of the priestly feet, and the way through it laid open, at once all began to cross.” These [things] are indeed so [put]. But [one] ought to have remembered [that there] is not to God only one manner and mode of doing any thing. The wind dried the Red Sea by its blast; but [God] could have dried [it] in many other ways. For example: he could have heated the air which stood nearest to the channel, so that it should utterly drink up all the moisture; he could have made certain, as it were, fissures of the earth, into which the same moisture should all be gathered, and utterly hidden away; or through which certain hotter exhalations might break out, which should, as it were, suck it up or cook it away — especially since (as the Duke of Ołyka [Radziwiłł] says, letter 2 fol. 104) “the Jordan has a bottom not muddy, but sandy.” And Pererius (Exod. ch. 14 disp. 15) says this was done on account of the shortness [narrowness] of the channel, and the sandy shallow. For, as [in] Aeneid 7, Virgil [says]: “the Tiber, yellow with sand.” So perhaps the Jordan. He could have set beneath the bottom itself fires, as [beneath] a kind of pot, greater [ones], by which everything that was wet would be burnt off. He could [also employ the ministry] of Angels—
(col. 440)
—of Angels (so to speak) to scatter, by [their] hands, sand and any other drier material in great quantity, so that the little hollows and little pits should all be filled, [and] the wetter [parts] thicken and harden; [or] he could, through the Angels, so suddenly in the whole channel work down [subdue] all the mud and moisture, and, as it were, ram [it] tight, that — like a paved road — [there] should be a most convenient crossing. And why do I labour [the point]? We see by how various means, [and] by how manifold herbs, powders, dusting-mixtures [diapasmata], and purgatives, skilled physicians can dry the human body more succulently and greenly [i.e. keeping it fresh]; and shall we deny to the divine power six hundred [i.e. countless] ways by which it may dry the deep of either a sea or any river? But if you should ask, out of so many ways, which one he employed in now drying the Jordan? — I answer [that] to us [it] indeed ought to be certain [that] it was dried, but the manner is uncertain; yet [it] seems likely [that] this was [it]: that the Angel heated, by a certain hidden force, the air spread through the whole channel and lying closest upon it, and thus sucked up all the moisture — just as, [by] a certain hidden cold and frost, we said [that] the upper water was constricted on three sides: one, namely, of the length, at the crossing itself, and two of the breadth, at either bank, lest the swelling waters should pour themselves out into the surrounding fields. And to this pertain also those two Hebrew [words], about which [I spoke in] the preceding question: “the waters failed, and were cut off.” But in what manner the priests’ feet are said to have been drawn out, and at length to have touched the dry ground (ch. 4 v. 18) — that will be said [in] part 2, quest. 1.