There was another way which led south-west, upon Beersheba and Hebron, in the middle, between the Dead Sea and the Mediterranean. This was the direction in which Abraham, Lot, and Jacob, are supposed to have reached Egypt. But there was neither food nor water there to sustain the Israelites. When Abraham and Lot returned out of Egypt, they were obliged to separate by consent, because Abraham said to his brother, “The land will not bear us both[169].”
The third way was straight east into Arabia, pretty much the road by which the Pilgrims go at this day to Mecca, and the caravans from Suez to Cairo. In this track they would have gone round by the mountains of Moab, east of the Dead Sea, and passed Jordan in the plain opposite to Jericho, as they did forty years afterwards. But it is plain from scripture, that God’s counsels were to make Pharaoh and his Egyptians an example of his vengeance; and, as none of these roads led to the sea, they did not answer the Divine intention.
About twelve leagues from the sea, there was a narrow road which turned to the right, between the mountains, through a valley called _Badeab_, where their course was nearly south-east; this valley ended in a pass, between two considerable mountains, called _Gewoube_ on the south; and Jibbel Attakah on the north, and opened into the low stripe of country which runs all along the Red Sea; and the Israelites were ordered to encamp at Pihahiroth, opposite to Baal-zephon, between Migdol and that sea.
It will be necessary to explain these names. _Badeah_, Dr Shaw interprets, _the Valley of the Miracle_, but this is forcing an etymology, for there was yet no miracle wrought, nor was there ever any in the valley. But _Badeah_, means _barren_, _bare_, and _uninhabited_; such as we may imagine a valley between stony mountains, a desert valley. _Jibbel Attakah_, he translates also, _the Mountain of Deliverance_. But so far were the Israelites from being delivered on their arrival at this mountain, that they were then in the greatest distress and danger. _Attakah_, means, however, to _arrive_ or _come up with_, either because there they arrived within sight of the Red Sea; or, as I am rather inclined to think, this place took its name from the arrival of Pharaoh, or his coming in sight of the Israelites, when encamped between Migdol and the Red Sea.