A mountain, about 2,288 m (7,500 ft) high, of the south-central Sinai Peninsula. It is thought to be the peak on which Moses received the Ten Commandments.
Dictionary:
Si·nai (sī'nī') , Mount
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A mountain, about 2,288 m (7,500 ft) high, of the south-central Sinai Peninsula. It is thought to be the peak on which Moses received the Ten Commandments.
| Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: Mount Sinai |
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| Encyclopedia of Judaism: Mount Sinai |
Although some placed Sinai's location in Arabia, modern scholarship is almost unanimous in locating the mountain in the Sinai peninsula, the "great and terrible wilderness" (Deut. 1:19) between Egypt and the Land of Israel. Various suggestions have been made as to the route of the Exodus and the site of the mountain. The biblical text names the various Israelite encampments en route from Egypt to Kadesh-Barnea, but nothing definite can be learned either from such names or from archeological discoveries in the area. Jebel Musa (the "Mount of Moses") in southern Sinai is widely regarded as the place of Revelation, but this is a Christian identification. Byzantine monks first hallowed Jebel Musa as the site of the burning bush and settled there in the early fourth century CE. The Roman emperor Justinian built the monastery of St. Catherine ("Santa Katerina") in the mid-sixth century.
Jewish tradition has been indifferent toward the problem of Mount Sinai's location, preferring to concentrate on the meaning and implication of the Sinaitic Revelation (Ma'amad Har Sinai). That historic event is also known as Mattan Torah, "the Giving of the Law" (Ber. 58a). Jewish tradition also interprets biblical references to "statutes, ordinances, and laws" (Lev. 26:46, etc.) as indicating that two parallel "laws" were given at Sinai, the Oral Law and the Written Law. All authoritative teachings form part of the Revelation and, according to the Midrash, all future generations of Israel were present in spirit at the Mount Sinai Revelation. Hence the concept of Torah mi-Sinai ("Torah from Sinai") formulated in the Mishnah (Avot 1:1), of ancient "received tradition" known as Halakhah Le-Mosheh Mi-Sinai, and the Ashkenazi corpus of ancient melodies designated "Mi-Sinai" niggunim (i.e., tunes dating from "olden times").
| Bible Dictionary: Sinai, Mount |
In the Book of Exodus, the mountain that Moses ascended to receive the tablets of the law (the Ten Commandments) from God. God shrouded the mountain in a cloud, and made thunder, lightning, and trumpet blasts come forth from it. The Israelites were commanded to stay away from it while Moses went into God's presence.
| Wikipedia: Mount Sinai |
| Mount Sinai | |
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View from the summit of Mount Sinai |
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| Elevation | 2,285 m (7,497 ft) |
| Location | Saint Katherine city, Sinai Peninsula, Egypt |
| Coordinates | 28°32′23″N 33°58′24″E / 28.53972°N 33.97333°E |
Mount Sinai (Arabic: طور سيناء ,toor sinaa'i) (Hebrew: הר סיני ,har sina'i), also known as Mount Horeb, Mount Musa, Gabal Musa (Egyptian Arabic accent), Jabal Musa (standard Arabic meaning "Moses' Mountain") by the Bedouin, is the name of a mountain in Saint Katherine city, in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt. In Arabic the words 'Jabal' and 'Toor' have similar meanings, and a Mount Sinai is mentioned in the Quran chapter 'The Fig' (Surah at-Tin) as "Toor-i-Sineen"[1]. Furthermore a Scottish individual by the name of Thomas Stratton compared ancient Hebrew languages and Gaelic languages to find that a translation of "toor" in either language produces "a mount."[1] It is the Bedouin and Christian traditional location of the Biblical Mount Sinai.[2]
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Mount Sinai is a 2285 m-high mountain in Saint Katherine city, in Sinai region. It is next to Mount St. Catherine (at 2,629 m,[3] the tallest peak on the Sinai peninsula)[4]. It is surrounded on all sides by higher peaks of the mountain range.
Mount Sinai rocks were formed in the late stage of the Arabian-Nubian Shield's (ANS) evolution. Mount Sinai displays a ring complex that consists of alkaline granites intruded into diverse rock types, including volcanics. The granites range in composition from syenogranite to alkali feldspar granite. The volcanic rocks are alkaline to peralkaline and they are represented by subaerial flows and eruptions and subvolcanic porphyry. Generally, the nature of the exposed rocks in Mount Sinai indicates that they originated from different depths. (M. G. Shahien, Geol. Dept., Beni Suef, Egypt)
The Monastery of St. Catherine in Saint Katherine city is sited at the foot of the adjacent mountain - Mount Catherine - at an elevation of around 1260 m.
According to Bedouin tradition, this is the mountain where God gave laws to the Israelites. However, the earliest Christian traditions place this event at the nearby Mount Serbal, and a monastery was founded at its base in the 4th century; it was only in the 6th century that the monastery moved to the foot of Mount Catherine, following the guidance of Josephus's earlier claim that Sinai was the highest mountain in the area. Jebel Musa, which is adjacent to Mount Catherine, was only equated with Sinai, by Christians, after the 15th century. Also, for Muslims, there is a chapter named after this mountain in the Quran, entitled, Surah-Tin; surah/chapter 95, in which God promises by[clarification needed] the fig, the olive, by Mount Sinai and the city of Makkah. Christian orthodoxies settled upon this mountain in the third century, Georgians moved to Sinai in the fifth century, although a Georgian colony was formed in the ninth century. Georgians erected their own temples in this area. The construction of one such temple was connected with the name of David The Builder, who contributed to the erecting of temples in Georgia and abroad as well. There were political, cultural and religious motives for locating the temple on Mount Sinai. Georgian monks living there were deeply connected with their motherland. The temple had its own plots[clarification needed] in Kartli. Some of the Georgian manuscripts of Sinai remain there, but others are kept in Tbilisi, St. Petersburg, Prague, New York, Paris and in private collections.
Many modern biblical scholars now believe that the Israelites would have crossed the Sinai peninsula in a straight line, rather than detouring to the southern tip (assuming that they did not cross the eastern branch of the Red Sea/Reed Sea in boats or on a sandbar), and therefore look for Mount Sinai elsewhere.
The Song of Deborah, which textual scholars consider to be one of the oldest parts of the bible, suggests that Yahweh dwelt at Mount Seir, so many scholars favour a location in Nabatea (modern Arabia). Alternatively, the biblical descriptions of Sinai can be interpreted as describing a volcano, and so a small number of scholars have considered equating Sinai with locations in northwestern Saudi Arabia; there are no volcanoes in the Sinai Peninsula.
There are two principal routes to the summit. The longer and shallower route, Siket El Bashait, takes about 2.5 hours on foot, though camels can be used. The steeper, more direct route (Siket Sayidna Musa) is up the 3,750 "steps of penitence" in the ravine behind the monastery.[5]
The summit of the mountain has a mosque and a Greek Orthodox chapel (which was constructed in 1934 on the ruins of a 16th century church) neither of which are open to the public. The chapel supposedly encloses the rock from which God made the Tablets of the Law. [6] At the summit also is "Moses' cave" where Moses waited to receive the Ten Commandments.
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![]() | Bible Dictionary. The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Edited by E.D. Hirsch, Jr., Joseph F. Kett, and James Trefil. Copyright © 2002 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin. All rights reserved. Read more | |
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