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Mount Sinai (Hebrew:הַר סִינַי,Har Sīnay) is themountain at which theTen Commandments were given to theHebrew prophetMoses byGod, according to theBook of Exodus in theHebrew Bible/Old Testament.[1][2][3] In theBook of Deuteronomy, these events are described as having transpired atMount Horeb.[1] "Sinai" and "Horeb" are generally considered bybiblical scholars to refer to the same place.[1][4] Mount Sinai is considered one of the most sacred locations by the three majorAbrahamic religions:Judaism,Christianity, andIslam.[1][2][3]
The exact geographical position of Mount Sinai described in theHebrew Bible remains disputed.[1] The high point of the dispute was in the mid-19th century.[a] Biblical texts describe thetheophany at Mount Sinai,[1][3] in terms which a minority of scholars, followingCharles Beke (1873), have suggested may literally describe the mountain as avolcano.[b]
The biblical account of the giving of the instructions and teachings of the Ten Commandments was given in theBook of Exodus, primarily between chapters 19 and 24, during which Sinai is mentioned by name twice, inExodus 19:2; 24:16. In the story Sinai was enveloped in a cloud,[7] it quaked and was filled with smoke,[8] while lightning-flashes shot forth, and the roar of thunder mingled with the blasts of a trumpet;[7] the account later adds that fire was seen burning at the summit of the mountain.[9] In the biblical account, the fire and clouds are a direct consequence of the arrival ofGod upon the mountain.[10] According to the biblical story, Moses departed to the mountain and stayed there for 40 days and nights in order to receive the Ten Commandments, and he did so twice because he broke the first set of theTablets of Stone after returning from the mountain for the first time.
The biblical description of God's descent[10] seems to be in conflict with the statement shortly after that God spoke to the Israelites fromHeaven.[11] Whilebiblical scholars argue that these passages are from different sources, theMekhilta argues that God had lowered the heavens and spread them over Sinai,[12] and thePirke De-Rabbi Eliezer argues that a hole was torn in the heavens, and Sinai was torn away from the earth and the summit pushed through the hole. "The heavens" could be a metaphor for clouds and the "lake of fire" could be a metaphor for the lava-filled crater.[13] Severalbible critics[who?] have indicated that the smoke and fire reference from the Bible suggests that Mount Sinai was avolcano;[14] despite the absence of ash.[14] Otherbible scholars have suggested that the description fits a storm[14] especially as theSong of Deborah seems to allude to rain having occurred at the time.[15] According to the biblical account, God spoke directly to the Israelite nation as a whole.[16][17]
Sinai is mentioned by name in ten other locations in theTorah:Exodus 31:18; 34:2,Leviticus 7:38; 25:1; 26:46; 27:34,Numbers 1:1; 3:1; 9:1 andDeuteronomy 33:2. Sinai was also mentioned once by name in the rest of the Hebrew Bible inNehemiah 9:13. In theNew Testament,Paul the Apostle referred directly to Sinai inGalatians 4:24;4:25.
The oldest reference to Sinai is found on a stele of the11th Dynasty Egyptian official Khety, who mentions an area calledṮnht, probably an early transliteration of Sinai.[18]
Scholars suggested thatBiblical Hebrew:חֹרֵבḤōrēḇ meant "glowing/heat," which seems to be a reference to thesun, whileסיניSinay may have derived from the name ofSin, theMesopotamian deity of themoon,[19][20] and thus Sinai and Horeb would be the mountains of the moon and sun, respectively. However,William F. Albright, an American biblical scholar, has argued:[21]
... there is nothing that requires us to explain Him as a modified moon-god. It is improbable that the nameSinai is derived from that of the SumerianZen (olderZu-en), AkkadianSin, the moon-god worshiped at Ur (in his form Nannar) and at Harran, since there is no indication that the nameSin was ever employed by the Canaanites or the Semitic nomads of Palestine.It is much more likely that the nameSinai is connected with the place-nameSin, which belongs to a desert plain in Sinai as well as to a Canaanite city in Syria and perhaps to a city in the northeast Delta ofEgypt. It has also been recognized that it may somehow be connected withseneh (Aram.sanya), the name of a kind of bush where Moses is said to have first witnessed the theophany of Yahweh.
According to thedocumentary hypothesis, the name "Sinai" is only used in theTorah by theJahwist and thePriestly source, whereasHoreb is only used by theElohist andDeuteronomist.[22] The incongruity between the two names would be resolved, however, if Sinai and Horeb refer to two peaks of the same mountain formation.
In his bookSinai and Zion, American Hebrew Bible scholarJon D. Levenson discusses the link between Sinai and theburning bush (Biblical Hebrew:סנה,romanized: səne) that Moses encountered at Mount Horeb in verses 3:1–6 of Exodus. He asserts that the similarity ofSinay andsəne is not coincidental; the wordplay might derive "from the notion that the emblem of the Sinai deity was a tree of some sort."[23] Deuteronomy 33:16 identifiesYHWH with "the one who dwells in the bush."[24] Consequently, Levenson argues that if the use of "bush" is not a scribal error for "Sinai," Deuteronomy might support the connection between the origins of the word Sinai and tree.[23]
Classicalrabbinic literature mentions the mountain having other names:[citation needed]
Also mentioned in most Islamic sources:
The earliest references toMount Sinai inEgypt, or Mount Sinai being located in the present-daySinai Peninsula, are inconclusive. There is evidence that before 100CE, well before the Christian monastic period, Jewish sages equated Jabal Musa with Mount Sinai. Graham Davies of theUniversity of Cambridge argues that early Jewish pilgrimages identified Jabal Musa as Mount Sinai so Christian pilgrims adopted this identification.[30][31] R.K. Harrison states that "Jebel Musa ... seems to have enjoyed special sanctity long before Christian times, culminating in its identification with Mt. Sinai."[32][full citation needed] In the 2nd and 3rd centuries BCE,Nabataeans were making pilgrimages there, which is indicated in part by inscriptions discovered in the area.[33][full citation needed] In the 6th century CE,Saint Catherine's Monastery was constructed at the base of this mountain at a site which is believed to be the location of the biblicalburning bush.[34]
Saint Catherine's Monastery lies on theSinai Peninsula, at the mouth of an inaccessible gorge at the foot of Mount Sinai at 1,550 metres (5,090 ft). The monastery is anautonomousEastern Orthodox church called theChurch of Sinai and is aUNESCO World Heritage Site. According to theUNESCO report (60 100 ha / Ref: 954), Saint Catherine's Monastery is considered to be theoldest working Christian monastery in the world, although theMonastery of Saint Anthony, situated across theRed Sea in the desert south of Cairo, also lays claim to that title.
Christian monks settled upon this mountain in the 3rd century CE.Georgians from theCaucasus moved to theSinai Peninsula in the 5th century CE, and aGeorgian colony was formed there in the 9th century CE.Georgians erected Orthodox churches in the area of Mount Sinai. The construction of one such church was connected with the name ofKingDavid IV (d. January 1125), who contributed to the erection of Orthodox churches in theKingdom of Georgia as well as abroad. There were political, cultural, and religious motives for locating the church on Mount Sinai.
TheSinai Peninsula is associated withAaron andMoses, who are also regarded asprophets inIslam.[19] In particular, Mount Sinai is mentioned several times in theQuran,[2] where it is calledṬūr Sīnā’,[35]Ṭūr Sīnīn,[36] andaṭ-Ṭūr[37][38] andal-Jabal (both meaning "the Mount").[39] As for the adjacentWādī Ṭuwā, it is consideredmuqaddas "sacred",[40][41][42][43] and a part of it is calledal-Buqʿa al-Mubāraka (Arabic:ٱلْبُقْعَة ٱلْمُبَارَكَة, "The Blessed Place").[38]
Some modern biblical scholars explain Mount Sinai as having been a sacred place dedicated to one of theCanaanite deities even before theIsraelites encountered it.[28][full citation needed] Others regard theset of divine laws given to Moses on the mountain to have originated in different periods from one another, with the later ones mainly being the result of natural evolution over the centuries of the earlier ones, rather than all originating from a single moment in time.[44][full citation needed]
Modern scholars differ as to the exact geographical position of biblical Mount Sinai.[1][28] TheElijah narrative appears to suggest that when it was written, the location ofHoreb was still known with some certainty, as Elijah is described as travelling to Horeb on one occasion,[45] but there are no later biblical references to it that suggest the location remained known;Roman–Jewish historianFlavius Josephus specifies that it was "between Egypt and Arabia", and withinArabia Petraea, aRoman province encompassing modernJordan,southern Syria, theSinai Peninsula, andnorthwestern Arabia, with its capital inPetra. ThePauline Epistles are even more vague, specifying only that it was in northern Arabia, which at the time referred toArabia Petraea. The Sinai Peninsula has traditionally been considered the location of biblical Mount Sinai byChristians, although the peninsula gained its name from this tradition, and was not called that in Josephus' time or earlier.[28]
Roman–Jewish historianFlavius Josephus wrote that "Moses went up to a mountain that lay between Egypt and Arabia, which was called Sinai." Josephus says that Sinai is "the highest of all the mountains thereabout", and is "the highest of all the mountains that are in that country, and is not only very difficult to be ascended by men, on account of its vast altitude but because of the sharpness of its precipices".[52] The traditional Mount Sinai, located in the Sinai Peninsula, is actually the name of a collection of peaks, sometimes referred to as the Holy Mountain peaks,[53][54][full citation needed] which consist of Jabal Musa,Mount Catherine, andRas Sufsafeh. In the 4th century, a Christian pilgrim woman namedEtheria wrote that "the whole mountain group looks as if it were a single peak, but, as you enter the group, [you see that] there are more than one."[55] The highest mountain peak is Mount Catherine, rising 2,610 metres (8,550 feet) above the sea and its sister peak, Jabal Musa (2,285 m [7,497 ft]), is not much further behind in height, but is more conspicuous because of the open plain calleder Rachah ("the wide"). Mount Catherine and Jabal Musa are both much higher than any mountains in the Sinaitic desert, or in all ofMidian. The highest tops in the Tih desert to the north are not much over 1,200 m (4,000 ft). Those in Midian, East of Elath, rise only to 1,300 m (4,200 ft). Even Jabal Serbal, 30 kilometres (20 mi) west of Sinai, is at its highest only 2,050 m (6,730 ft) above the sea.[56]
Some scholars[57] believe that Mount Sinai was of ancient sanctity prior to the ascent of Moses described in the Bible.[57][full citation needed] Scholars have theorized that Sinai in part derived its name from the word for Moon which was "sin" (meaning "the moon" or "to shine").[58][full citation needed]Antoninus Martyr provides some support for the ancient sanctity of Jabal Musa by writing that Arabian heathens were still celebrating moon feasts there in the 6th century.[58] Lina Eckenstien states that some of the artifacts discovered indicate that "the establishment of the moon-cult in the peninsula dates back to the pre-dynastic days of Egypt."[59] She says the main center of Moon worship seems to have been concentrated in the southern Sinai peninsula which the Egyptians seized from the Semitic people who had built shrines and mining camps there.[59] Robinson says that inscriptions with pictures of Moon worship objects are found all over the southern peninsula but are missing on Jabal Musa and Mount Catherine.[60][full citation needed] This oddity may suggest religious cleansing.[61][full citation needed][62]
Groups ofnawamis have been discovered in southern Sinai, creating a kind of ring around Jabal Musa.[63] Thenawamis were used over and over throughout the centuries for various purposes.Etheria,c. the 4th/5th century CE, noted that her guides, who were the local "holy men", pointed out these round or circular stone foundations of temporary huts, claiming the children of Israel used them during their stay there.[64][full citation needed]
The southern Sinai Peninsula contains archaeological discoveries but to place them with the exodus from Egypt is a daunting task inasmuch as the proposed dates of the Exodus vary widely. The Exodus has been dated from the early Bronze Age to the late Iron Age II.[65][66][full citation needed]
Egyptian pottery in the southern Sinai during the late Bronze Age and early Iron Age I (Ramesside) periods has been discovered at the mining camps of Serabit el-Khadim and Timna. Objects which boreProto-Sinaitic inscriptions, the same as those found in Canaan, were discovered at Serabit el Khadim in the Southern Sinai. Several of these were dated in the later Bronze Age.[67] These encampments provide evidence of miners from southern Canaan.[68] The remote site of Serabit el-Khadem was used for a few months at a time, every couple of years at best, more often once in a generation. The journey to the mines was long, difficult and dangerous.[69] Expeditions headed by Professor Mazar examined thetell of Feiran, the principaloasis, of southern Sinai and discovered the site abounded not only in Nabateansherds but in wheel-burnished sherds typical of the Kingdom of Judah, belonging to Iron Age II.[70]
Edward Robinson insisted that the Plain of ar-Raaha adjacent to Jabal Musa could have accommodated the Israelites. Edward Hull stated that, "this traditional Sinai in every way meets the requirements of the narrative of the Exodus." Hull agreed with Robinson and stated he had no further doubts after studying the great amphitheater leading to the base of the granite cliff of Ras Sufsafeh, that here indeed was the location of the camp and the mount from which the laws of God was delivered to the encampment of Israelites below.[31]
F. W. Holland stated[71][full citation needed] "With regard to water-supply there is no other spot in the whole Peninsula which is nearly so well supplied as the neighborhood of Jabal Musa. ... There is also no other district in the Peninsula which affords such excellent pasturage."[56] Calculating the travels of the Israelites, theBible Atlas states, "These distances will not, however, allow of our placing Sinai farther East than Jabal Musa."[56]
Some point to the absence of material evidence left behind in the journey of the Israelites but Dr. Beit-Arieh wrote, "Perhaps it will be argued, by those who subscribe to the traditional account in the Bible, that the Israelite material culture was only of the flimsiest kind and left no trace. Presumably the Israelite dwellings and artifacts consisted only of perishable materials."[72][full citation needed] Hoffmeier wrote, "None of the encampments of the wilderness wanderings can be meaningful if the Israelites went directly to either Kadesh or Midian ... a journey of eleven days from Kadesh to Horeb can be properly understood only in relationship to the southern portion of the Sinai Peninsula."[32]
Local Bedouins who have long inhabited the area have identified Jabal Musa as Mount Sinai. In the 4th century CE small settlements of monks set up places of worship around Jabal Musa. An Egyptian pilgrim namedAmmonius, who had in past times made various visits to the area, identified Jabal Musa as the Holy Mount in the 4th century.Empress Helena,c. 330 CE, built a church to protect monks against raids from nomads. She chose the site for the church from the identification which had been handed down through generations through the Bedouins. She also reported the site was confirmed to her in a dream.[73][74][75]
Egyptologist Julien Cooper has suggested that the name Sinai corresponds with a toponymṮnht, attested in the itinerary of an Egyptian official of the11th Dynasty (c. 2150–1990 BCE). He notes that this toponymn was located in the southern parts of the Sinai Peninsula, corresponding with the geographical location of Jabal Musa.[76][77]
Bedouin tradition consideredJabal Musa, which lies adjacent to Mount Catherine, to be the biblical mountain,[28] and it is this mountain that local tour groups and religious groups presently advertise as the biblical Mount Sinai. Evidently this view was eventually taken up by Christian groups as well, as in the 16th century a church was constructed at the peak of this mountain, which was replaced by a Greek Orthodox chapel in 1954.
In early Christian times, a number ofAnchorites settled onMount Serbal, considering it to be the biblical mountain, and in the 4th century a monastery was constructed at its base.[78] Nevertheless, Josephus had stated that Mount Sinai was "the highest of all the mountains thereabout",[79] which would imply thatMount Catherine was actually the mountain in question, if Sinai was to be sited on the Sinai peninsula at all.[28]
According to textual scholars, in theJE version of the Exodus narrative, the Israelites travel in a roughly straight line toKadesh Barnea from theYam Suph (literally meaning "theReed Sea", but considered traditionally to refer to theRed Sea), and the detour via the south of the Sinai peninsula is only present in thePriestly Source.[14][80] A number of scholars and commentators have therefore looked towards the more central and northern parts of the Sinai peninsula for the mountain.Mount Sin Bishar, in the west-central part of the peninsula, was proposed to be the biblical Mount Sinai by Menashe Har-El, a biblicalgeographer atTel Aviv University.[81]Mount Helal, in the north of the peninsula has also been proposed.[82][83] Another northern Sinai suggestion isHashem el-Tarif, some 30 km west ofEilat,Israel.[84][85]
Since Moses is described by the Bible as encounteringJethro, a Kenite who was a Midianite priest, shortly before encountering Sinai, this suggests that Sinai would be somewhere near their territory in Saudi Arabia;[14][44] the Kenites and Midianites appear to have resided east of theGulf of Aqaba.[14][44] Additionally, theSong of Deborah, which some textual scholars consider one of the oldest parts of the Bible,[14] portrays God as having dwelt atMount Seir, and seems to suggest that this equates with Mount Sinai;[28][15] Mount Seir designates the mountain range in the centre ofEdom.
Based on a number of local names and features, in 1927 Ditlef Nielsen identified theJebel al-Madhbah (meaningmountain of the Altar) atPetra as being identical to the biblical Mount Sinai;[86] since then other scholars[who?] have also made the identification.
The valley in which Petra resides is known as theWadi Musa, meaningvalley of Moses, and at the entrance to theSiq is the Ain Musa, meaningspring of Moses; the 13th century ArabchroniclerNumari stated that Ain Musa wasthe location where Moses had brought water from the ground, by striking it with his rod. The Jebel al-Madhbah was evidently considered particularly sacred, as the well known ritual building known asThe Treasury is carved into its base, the mountain top is covered with a number of different altars, and over 8 metres of the original peak were carved away to leave a flat surface with two 8-metre-tall (26 ft)obelisks sticking out of it; these obelisks, which frame the end of the path leading up to them, and are now only 6 metres tall, have led to the mountain beingcolloquially known asZibb 'Atuf, meaningpenis of love inArabic. Archaeological artifacts discovered at the top of the mountain indicate that it was once covered by polished shiny blueslate, fitting with the biblical description ofpaved work of sapphire stone;[87] biblical references tosapphire are considered by scholars to be unlikely to refer to the stone calledsapphire in modern times, assapphire had a different meaning, and wasn't even mined, before the Roman era.[88] Unfortunately, the removal of the original peak has destroyed most other archaeological remains from the late Bronze Age (the standard dating of the Exodus) that might previously have been present.
Some have suggested a site in Saudi Arabia, also noting theApostle Paul's assertion in the first century CE that Mount Sinai was in Arabia, although in Paul's time, the Roman administrative region ofArabia Petraea would have included both the modern Sinai peninsula and northwestern Saudi Arabia.
A suggested possible naturalistic explanation of the biblicaldevouring fire is that Sinai could have been an eruptingvolcano; this has been suggested byCharles Beke,[89][full citation needed]Sigmund Freud,[90][full citation needed] andImmanuel Velikovsky, among others. This possibility would exclude all the peaks on the Sinai peninsula and Seir, but would make a number of locations in north westernSaudi Arabia reasonable candidates. In 1873, C. Beke proposedJebel Baggir which he called theJabal al-Nour (meaningmountain of light), a volcanic mountain at the northern end of the Gulf of Aqaba, with Horeb being argued to be a different mountain – the nearby Jebel Ertowa.[91] Beke's suggestion has not found as much scholarly support as the suggestion that Mount Sinai is the el Jaww basin volcanoHala-'l Badr, as advocated byAlois Musil in the early 20th century, J. Koenig,[92] andColin Humphreys in 2003.[93][full citation needed]
A possible candidate within the Arabia theory has been that ofJabal al-Lawz (meaning 'mountain of almonds'). Advocates for Jabal al-Lawz includeL. Möller[94][full citation needed] as well asR. Wyatt,[95]R. Cornuke, and L. Williams.[96][97] A. Kerkeslager believes that the archaeological evidence is too tenuous to draw conclusions, but has stated that "Jabal al Lawz may also be the most convincing option for identifying the Mt. Sinai of biblical tradition" and should be researched.[98] A number of researchers support this hypothesis while others dispute it.[c]
One of the most recent developments has been the release of a documentary[99] which identifies a peak within the Jabal al-Lawz mountain range,Jabal Maqla, as Mount Sinai;[99] the film includes video and photographic evidence in the project.[100][101]
Jabal al-Lawz has been rejected by scholars such asJ. K. Hoffmeier who details what he callsCornuke's "monumental blunders" and others.[6][102] G. Franz published a refutation of this hypothesis.[citation needed]
While equating Sinai withPetra would indicate that the Israelites journeyed in roughly a straight line from Egypt viaKadesh Barnea, and locating Sinai in Saudi Arabia would suggest Kadesh Barnea was skirted to the south, some scholars have wondered whether Sinai was much closer to the vicinity of Kadesh Barnea itself. Halfway between Kadesh Barnea and Petra, in the southwestNegev desert in Israel, isHar Karkom, whichEmmanuel Anati excavated, and discovered to have been a majorPaleolithic cult centre, with the surrounding plateau covered with shrines, altars, stone circles, stone pillars, and over 40,000 rock engravings; although the peak of religious activity at the site dates to 2350–2000 BCE, the exodus is dated 15 Nisan 2448 (Hebrew calendar; 1313 BCE),[103] and the mountain appears to have been abandoned between 1950 and 1000 BCE, Anati proposed thatJabal Ideid was equatable with biblical Sinai.[104][105] Other scholars have criticised this identification, as, in addition to being almost 1000 years too early, it also appears to require the wholesale relocation of the Midianites, Amalekites, and other ancient peoples, from the locations where the majority of scholars currently place them.[106]
According to contested research byIsrael Knohl (2012),[107][full citation needed] Mount Hermon is actually the Mount Sinai mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, with the biblical story reminiscent of an ancient battle of the northern tribes with the Egyptians somewhere in the Jordan valley or Golan heights.[51]
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Comprising a full and exact account of their various rites and ceremonies, from the moment of birth till the hour of death.
Christian tradition generally claims Ras es-Safsaf as the Biblical Horeb and Jebel Musa as Sinai.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)Containing an account of their manners and customs and rites.
Bob Cornuke doesn't have a degree in archaeology; he holds a doctorate in Bible and theology from Louisiana Baptist University.
Media related toMount Sinai at Wikimedia Commons