When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.”

So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”  Matthew 2:13-15

            Herod only had power in Judea (county) and Jerusalem (city), but not over anything in Egypt.  Mary and Joseph were escaping Herod because really nothing in Israel would be safe.  They also went to Egypt because God routinely protected people there in the Old Testament (Abraham, Joseph, Jacob and the tribes) then brought people out of Egypt to the Promised Land.

            The prophecy in Hosea 11:1 that Matthew quoted found fulfillment through this escape.  God’s son was called out of Egypt.