Monday, February 12, 2007

Exodus 19 - Where is the real Mount Sinai?

   Mount Sinai is mentioned 15 times in the books of Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers as the place where Yahweh met with Israel and revealed his law. In Deuteronomy 33:2 and Judges 5:5, it is more generally the place where Yahweh “dwells” or from which he comes. In Numbers 10:33, Sinai is called “the mountain of Yahweh” (elsewhere this name refers to Mount Zion in Jerusalem). In Deuteronomy 1–28 and some passages in Exodus (3:1; 17:6; 33:6) and elsewhere (1 Kings 8:9; 19:8; 2 Chronicles 5:10; Psalm 106:9; Malachi 3:22), the name Horeb is used, apparently for the same place.


   In the past, the location of the mountain was apparently well-known, as suggested by this description: “taking his station at the mountain called Sinai, he drove his flocks thither to feed them. Now this is the highest of all the mountains thereabout, and the best for pasturage, the herbage being there good; and it had not been before fed upon, because of the opinion men had that God dwelt there, the shepherds not daring to ascend up to it” - Josephus Flavius, Antiquities of the Jews, II:12.
The location was also known in the days of King Ahab of Israel, as recounted in the story of Elijah's journey: "And he arose, and did eat and drink, and went in the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights unto Horeb the mount of God." I Kings 19:8.
The location of the mountain was evidently forgotten in later times.


   The most common candidates for Mount Sinai are:



  1. Jebel Musa: (Arabic: "Mountain of Moses" - the "traditional" site in Sinai). This claim goes back to the time of Helena of Constantinople. Two monks claimed to have found the Burning Bush of Moses circa CE 300. This plant can be found today on the grounds of Saint Catherine's Monastery at the base of Musa. However, there is a considerable weight of historical counter-evidence to support the view that Jabal Musa and the Biblical Mount Sinai are not the same.

  2. Hashem el-Tarif: The James Cameron-produced History Channel special, The Exodus Decoded, suggests that this location, now in a military zone, is the best candidate for the Biblical Mount Sinai. Not only does it correspond to Biblical geographical clues, but it possesses three important traits described in Exodus:
    (a) a cleft that overlooks a natural amphitheater (b)
    evidence of an ancient spring (c)
    a plateau below large enough to hold several hundred thousand people and containing enough foliage to sustain large flocks.

  3. Jebel Sin Bishar: Located in west-central Sinai, this mountain was proposed to be the biblical Mount Sinai by Menashe Har-El, a biblical geographer at Tel Aviv University, in his book The Sinai Journeys: The Route of the Exodus.

  4. Helal: A mountain in northern Sinai.

  5. Jebel Serbal: A mountain in southern Sinai.

  6. Giza in Egypt:
    Ralph Ellis, in his books Tempest and Exodus and Solomon, Falcon of Sheba, asserts that the Great Pyramid of Giza is the actual Mount Sinai, and that the Ancient Israelites, in their avoidance of anything Egyptian, re-identified it.

  7. Har Karkom in Israel: Also called Jabal Ideid, this mountain is located in the south-west Negev desert in Israel, north of the Sinai peninsula.

  8. Jebel al-Lawz in Saudia Arabia: In his book The Gold of Exodus, Howard Blum opts for Jabal al-Lawz. Ron Wyatt has also postulated al-Lawz as Mount Sinai

  9. al-Manifa in Saudi Arabia:
    Located 20 kilometers north of Ajnuna near Wadi al-Hrob. As proposed, independently of each other, by Alois Musil and H. Philby

  10. Serabit el-Khadim in the central Sinai

  11. Hala'l Bedr in Saudi Arabia:
    Prof. Colin Humphreys has argued in favor of the volcano Hala-'l Badr in his book The Miracles of Exodus, claiming that an erupting volcano would explain many of the phenomena described in Exodus. Jean Koenig also espoused the theory in 1971.

  12. Baggir in Saudi Arabia: Proposed by Charles Beke in his 1878 book Sinai in Arabia and of Median, Jebel Baggir is located north-east of the Gulf of Aqaba in the Negev desert. Beke also states that nearby Jebel Ertowa is Mount Horeb. Both are located near Wady Yutm.

  13. Mt. Seir, in Saudi Arabia

  14. al-Madhbah in Jordan: Suggested by Ditlef Nielsen. In 1927, he visited Petra, the old Nabatean kingdom capital, in present-day Jordan. He considered Jebel-al-Madhbah (the high place) a strong candidate. This mountain, near Petra, is over a thousand meters high, presents millennia-old rock-excavated ceremonial structures such as a square altar and a round one, an open court able to receive multitudes, a ceremonial pool, and an uphill rock staircase, among other details. Furthermore, it fits well in Apostle Paul's location of Mount Sinai in Arabia.



Traditional site: St. Catherine's Monastery in the Sinai.



--http://www.wyattmuseum.com/images/wpe115.jpg



   The traditional location in the Sinai Peninsula didn't "come into being" until almost 2,000 years after the Exodus: "The origin of the present Monastery of Saint Catherine on the NW slope of Jebel Musa is traced back to A.D. 527, when Emperor Justinian established it on the site where Helena, mother of Constantine the Great, had erected a small church two centuries earlier." (The Interpreter's Dictionary of the Bible, 1962, p. 376).


   "There is no Jewish tradition of the geographical location of Mt. Sinai; it seems that its location was obscure already in the time of the monarchy…" (The Jewish Encyclopedia, Vol. 14, p. 1599).


   In 1761-1767, Von Haven, the member of a Danish expedition to the traditional site wrote, as reported in "Arabia Felix: The Danish Expedition of 1761-1767, by Thorkild Hansen: "I have observed earlier that we could not possibly be at Mount Sinai. The monastery [of St. Catherine] was situated in a narrow valley, which was not even large enough for a medium-sized army to be able to camp in, let alone the 600,000 men that Moses had with him, who, together with their wives and children, must have come to over 3,000,000."


   The fact is clear that the Sinai Peninsula was always considered to be Egyptian territory. There is an abundance of evidence that the Egyptians controlled the Sinai Peninsula during the time of the Exodus because of their mining operations there. This archaeological evidence is still present and evident today. The peninsula today doesn't even have any population to speak of except those who live around the few oases, many of which today contain the gasoline stations for travelers—travelers who are going to either the coast of the Gulf of Ababa to go scuba diving or those visitors who go to the traditional Mt. Sinai.


-- Mt. Sinai/Horeb- Where was It?: www.pilgrimpromo.com/WAR/discovered/html/chapter13.htm




   Identifying Mt. Sinai requires that the following considerations be taken into account:



  1. The mountain must have enough similarities to the Mt. Sinai and Mt. Horeb described in the Bible to have attracted the attention of Jews in the early post-biblical period.

  2. The mountain must be in northwestern Arabia (Septuagint, Demetrius, Josephus, probably Philo; possibly Jubilees and Paul; among later sources, Origen, Eusebius, Jerome, et al.)

  3. The mountain must be near Al-Bad' (ancient Madyan; Septuagint, Demetrius, Josephus, probably Philo; among later sources, Origen, Eusebius, Jerome, et al.).

  4. The mountain must be the highest mountain in the surrounding region (Philo) or, more precisely, the highest mountain near the city of Al-Bad' (ancient Madyan; Josephus)


   The only possible option in this case is Jebel al-Lawz. At 8,465 feet, Jebel al-Lawz is uncontested as the highest mountain in the region of ancient Madyan. Jebel al-Lawz also fulfills every other criterion stated above. Jebel al-Lawz is probably the most convincing option for identifying the mountain with which Jews identified Mt. Sinai in the Hellenistic and early Roman periods. But the present state of research on Jebel al-Lawz requires that this remain only a rather tentative hypothesis. It is nevertheless by far the most attractive hypothesis available.


   Like many other mountains scattered throughout the Near East, Jebel al-Lawz is reportedly identified with Mt. Sinai in the legends of the local Arabs. But the potential antiquity of the traditions associated with Jebel al-Lawz is without parallel in the traditions associated with other sites. Traditions relating Mt. Sinai to the site of ancient Madyan at modern Al-Bad' extend at least to the time of the oldest portions of the Septuagint in about 250 BC. In contrast, the earliest solid date for the appearance of traditions locating Mt. Sinai in the southern Sinai Peninsula is about 350 AD. Perhaps it is time for research on the location of the Mt. Sinai to shift its focus to Jebel al-Lawz, which is associated with local traditions 600 years older than the traditions locating Mt. Sinai in the southern Sinai Peninsula.


-- THE SEARCH FOR THE REAL MT. SINAI : Experts and Scholars Reviews: www.explorationfilms.com/sinai-experts-scholars-review.html



   If we go the Bible, the location of Mt. Sinai is not that difficult to ascertain. When God first spoke to Moses regarding the great work of leading the people out of their Egyptian bondage, He told Moses: Exodus 3:12 - God answered, “I will be with you. And this is your sign that I am the one who has sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God at this very mountain.” To find out exactly where Moses was when this conversation took place, we need to go to the beginning of chapter 3, Exodus 3:1-2 One day Moses was tending the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, the priest of Midian. He led the flock far into the wilderness and came to Sinai, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a blazing fire from the middle of a bush. Moses stared in amazement. Though the bush was engulfed in flames, it didn’t burn up. This conversation took place at the foot of the "mountain of God". Moses was even told to remove his shoes, as he was standing was "holy ground" (verse 5). So, we now know that Moses was in Midian, in the "backside of the desert", which seems to us to imply the area opposite the main portion of the desert or, the other side of the mountain which provided the border of the desert. We make this assumption simply because in order to have a "backside of the desert", there must be something which marks a separation of the "frontside" and the "backside".


   When Ron Wyatt studied the Biblical account, he noted these references- that the mountain to which Moses was to lead the people was in Midian; and that the place where Moses spoke to God in the burning bush was specifically stated to be in the "backside of the desert". With this information, along with the discoveries of the chariot parts in the Gulf of Aqaba, he looked for a mountain on the eastern side of the gulf which fit this description. There was only one candidate in his opinion, and this was Jebel el Lawz. His flight maps showed this mountain to be in an almost semi-circular range, with a vast desert area around it as well as more than enough room for the encampment of perhaps a couple of million people along with their flocks and herds. Not only that, but there was a single, large oasis located fairly nearby- an area that could have been the home of his father-in-law, Jethro- and this was the town of Al-Bad. He saw that there was desert area around Jebel el Lawz, between Al-Bad and the highest peak in this mountain range- and that there were valleys in the mountain range which Moses could have led his flocks through, taking him to the "backside of the desert". Ron was convinced that this mountain had to be the one.


Mt. Sinai - www.pilgrimpromo.com/WAR/discovered/html/chapter13.htm



God's Word, Renegade Explorers and The Search for the Real Mt. Sinai by Thomas Beard


   Since about 350 AD, Christians and Jews from all over the world have trekked to a craggy mountain in the southern part of Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, just west and across the Gulf of Aqaba from Saudi Arabia. They have been drawn, if not compelled, to this arid, rocky landscape to view and experience one of the holiest sites ever immortalized in the Old Testament. These pilgrims have spent enormous amounts of money to see with their own eyes what they have believed to be the exact location where, according to the biblical account, God gave to Moses the Ten Commandments: Mt. Sinai. There is only one small, seemingly insignificant problem: there is no physical evidence. No cave where Elijah took refuge from a murderous Queen Jezebel in 1 Kings 19. No altar upon which the Israelites raised a golden calf, dancing around it in drunken abandon in Exodus 32. No split rock where miraculous water gushed forth and saved the Israelite nation in Exodus 17, and no remains of a ferocious battle with the Amalekites in that same chapter. Nothing. If this is, indeed, the true location of the holy mountain, up to two million people on a trans-desert venture with families, flocks, and the riches of the ancient Egyptians in tow left absolutely no trace of their stay at the foot of Mt. Sinai.


   At precisely 8:41 a.m. on June 12, 1988, explorer Bob Cornuke stood on the highest peak of a mountain called Jabal al Lawz in a land that the Bible calls Midian, now a part of modern-day Saudi Arabia. The entire summit was blackened, its silica melted by such an intense heat that it appeared to be black plastic. When shattered, however, the solid granite revealed an interior that was ivory in color. Cornuke recalled that the Bible states that God descended on Mt. Sinai in a cloud of smoke and flames like a furnace. Under an already searing sun, Bob wrote in his Bible as he realized that life would never again be the same. "When I stood on those scorched rocks, it was like a floodgate opening in my life. My life was changed at that moment," Cornuke remembers from his office at the Bible Archaeology Search and Exploration (B.A.S.E.) Institute in Colorado Springs. "I could almost see the fires of the campsites as the children of Israel waited for Moses to return from his time with God on the top of the mountain. I knew in my heart that this was the place."


   He had spent years preparing for this moment, and had spent torturous hours climbing Jabal al Lawz, the highest mountain for hundreds of miles around. Cornuke and Williams had reached the pinnacle of an exhausting journey as they followed the literal directions in their Bible.


   They found caves that the local Bedouins told them were full of ancient writings telling of a multitude, led by Mussa (Moses) that came through the region. They also discovered a large V-shaped, sacrificial altar with ancient ash more than eight feet deep (Muslims don't offer burnt sacrifices). Another altar, man-made and of immense size, towered over them with petroglyphs of an Egyptian bull god engraved into the sides of the massive stones. Since cattle are not indigenous to the area, Cornuke and Williams concluded that this could have been the altar on which Aaron, the brother of Moses, erected the infamous golden calf.


   Standing like a solitary sentinel on the west side of Jabal al Lawz was a rock, 54 feet high with a nineteen-inch split down the middle. The granite hillside at the base of this obelisk was worn smooth by what would seem to be millions of gallons of water rushing over it and down into a granite floored reservoir...all in an area of the world that gets one half-inch of rain every 10 years. Could this be the rock at Horeb that Moses struck as his anger lashed out toward the Israelites?


   In spite of the teeth-grinding of some archaeologists toward these amateur adventurers (they were called "destructive scoundrels" by one religion writer), Ken Durham, professor of Old Testament history at Colorado Christian University, states, "I feel Bob Cornuke's work concerning the locale of Mount Sinai is right on the money. I hold a very high view of the veracity of the biblical text, and Scripture speaks for itself as to the correct Exodus route." Durham goes on to note that Cornuke's theory "fits the physical description throughout the Bible; it fits ancient Bedouin tradition."


-- God's Word, Renegade Explorers and The Search for the Real Mt. Sinai by Thomas Beard: explorationfilms.com/article-renegade-exploreres.html



   Exodus 3:1 plainly identifies Mount Horeb (Sinai) as being in Midian. What does Scripture reveal here? First, the region of “Midian” is undeniably the same as present-day Saudi Arabia. This has been established by numerous sources. Second, the traditional site for Mount Sinai on the Sinai Peninsula has nothing to do geographically with the “back” of a desert. By contrast, certain mountains in Saudi Arabia are on the far side or margin of a vast desert in ancient Midian.


   Exodus 2:15 reveals more. After killing an Egyptian, Moses fled Egypt for safer ground: And sure enough, Pharaoh heard what had happened, and he tried to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh and went to live in the land of Midian..


   Egypt and its holdings would not have been safe for Moses under any circumstances. He would not have fled to the Sinai Peninsula, where archaeology shows that Pharaoh had multiple mining interests and military outposts. The Bible is clear that Moses went out of Egypt, to the land of Midian east of the Gulf of Aqaba.


   The Bible makes several references to Moses returning to Egypt from Midian, including Exodus 4:19 where we read, Before Moses left Midian, the Lord said to him, “Return to Egypt, for all those who wanted to kill you have died.” All passages associated with Moses’ stay in Midian point toward present-day Saudi Arabia as the area to which Moses fled, subsequently met God at the burning bush, and then returned with the children of Israel.


   In the New Testament, Paul wrote in Galatians 4:25, And now Jerusalem is just like Mount Sinai in Arabia... As a “Hebrew of Hebrews,” Paul’s understanding of Arabia would have been one that was consistent with Old Testament passages like 1 Kings 10:15, 2 Chronicles 9:14, Isaiah 21:13, Jeremiah 25:24, and Ezekiel 27:21, in which Arabia is clearly identified with the region east of the Gulf of Aqaba, where “kings” ruled and the “Dedanites” co-dwelt with other nomadic peoples.


-- What is the location of the real Mount Sinai?: www.gotquestions.org/mount-Sinai.html





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