After the institution of the Passover, the Hebrews obeyed the demand that they leave Egypt without delay (the Egyptians at last being terrified by the succession of plagues). So the Israelites and their leader, Moses, turned their steps toward their ancestral land of Canaan (see Gen. 12:5; 47:1).
It was indeed a great concourse of people which set out from Rameses, where many of them had served so strenuously, for Exodus 12:37 records that about six hundred thousand grown men were in the company. On the basis of this estimate, it has been calculated that the total number of the emigrants may have been little short of two million.
Their first stop after leaving Rameses was Succoth, which seems to have lain south of the direct road leading toward Canaan. This route had its pitfalls, for it would have led the Israelites through hostile Philistine territory; so the divinely provided "pillar of a cloud" (Ex. 13:21), which guided and protected them, led them by a detour toward the south into the vicinity of Baalzephon, which some have identified with the modern Suez.
