Hitherto the march of the Israelites had been in a general southeasterly direction. Another day’s journey in the same direction would have carried them well beyond the eastern border of Egypt. But God ordered a change that must have seemed to them strange and unaccountable. They were to set their course in a southwesterly direction, which would soon place the Red Sea between them and their destination. Although the geographical location of the next camping place is here described in considerable detail, not one of the places named has yet been identified. The name Pi-hahiroth is apparently Egyptian, but its meaning and site remain uncertain.

 Migdol means “tower,” or “fortress.” This no doubt refers to a number of localities along the eastern border of Egypt (see Num. 33:7; Jer. 44:1; 46:14; Eze. 29:10; 30:6). These “migdols” were probably not different cities, but strongholds that formed part of the border fortification system (see on Ex. 13:20).

This place is unknown, though the name Baal-zephon was applied also to a Canaanite deity. It means, literally, the “Baal,” or “lord of the north,” a god mentioned on Egyptian monuments as well as in north Canaanite inscriptions. One Phoenician text declares him to be the chief god of the Egyptian Delta city of Daphnae (Biblical Tahpanhes, modern Tel Defenneh). The place mentioned here may have received its name from this Canaanite god, whose shrine or sanctuary, to which peoples of the eastern desert came to worship, was in the town.

So exact a geographical description, unique in the Pentateuch, suggests, first, that Pihahiroth itself was not well known, and, second, that the author of Exodus was familiar with the geography of the country. No late writer could have ventured to give such local detail.