Horeb, Moses came upon a burning bush that was, miraculously, unconsumed by its own flames. A voice speaking out of the fire Exodus commanded him to lead his people out of bondage in Egypt and return with them to the mountain. Upon his return Moses twice climbed the mountain to commune with god. Regarding the second ascent, Exodus states: And the glory of the Lord abode upon mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days; and the seventh day God called unto Moses out of the midst of the cloud.
And the appearance of the glory of the Lord was like devouring fire on the top of the mount in the eyes of the children of Israel. And Moses entered into the midst of the cloud, and went up into the mount; and Moses was in the mount forty days and forty nights. During this time on the mountain Moses received two tablets upon which God had inscribed the Ten Commandments, as well as precise dimensions for the Arc of the Covenant, a portable box-like shrine that would contain the tablets.
Soon thereafter, the Arc of the Covenant was constructed and Moses and his people departed from Mt. The Arc of the Covenant and its supposedly divine contents are one of the great mysteries of antiquity.
According to archaic textual sources the Arc was a wooden chest measuring three feet nine inches long by two feet three inches high and wide. It was lined inside and out with pure gold and was surmounted by two winged figures of cherubim that faced each other across its heavy gold lid.
Some scholars believe that the Arc may have contained, in addition to the Tablets of the Law, pieces of meteorites and highly radioactive rocks. In the ensuing two hundred and fifty years, between the time it was taken from Mt. Sinai to when it was finally installed in the temple in Jerusalem, the Arc was kept for two centuries at Shiloh, was captured by the Philistines for seven months, and then, following its return to the Israelites, was kept in the village of Kiriath-Jearim.
During this entire time it was associated with numerous extraordinary phenomena, many of which involved the killing or burning of often large numbers of people.
Passages in the Old Testament give the impression that these happenings were divine actions of Yahweh, the god of the Hebrews.
Contemporary scholars, however, believe that there may be another explanation. Writing in The Sign and the Seal concerning his search for the lost Arc of the Covenant , Graham Hancock suggests that the Arc, and more precisely its mysterious contents, may have been a product of ancient Egyptian magic, science and technology.
Moses, being highly trained by the Egyptian priesthood, was certainly knowledgeable in these matters and thus the astonishing powers of the Arc and its 'Tablets of the Law' may have derived from archaic Egyptian magic rather than the mythical god Yahweh. Currently there is no archaeological evidence that the foot meter granite peak of Jebel Musa on the Sinai Peninsula is the actual Mt. Sinai of the Old Testament, and various scholars, such as Emmanuel Anati, writing in his comprehensive study, The Mountain of God , have proposed several alternative locations.
The association of Jebel Musa with the Biblical Mt. Sinai seems to have first developed in the 3rd century AD when hermits living in caves on the mountain began to identify their mountain with the ancient holy peak.
On the peak of Jebel Musa stands a small chapel dedicated to the Holy Trinity. This chapel, constructed in on the ruins of a 16th church, is believed to enclose the rock from which God made the Tablets of the Law. In the western wall of this chapel is a cleft in the rock where Moses is said to have hidden himself as God's glory passed by Exodus Seven hundred and fifty steps below the summit and its chapel is the plateau known as Elijah's Basin, where Elijah spent 40 days and nights communing with God in a cave.
Nearby is a rock on which Aaron, the brother of Moses, and 70 elders stood while Moses received the law Exodus Northwest of Elijah's plateau hardy pilgrims visit Jebel Safsaafa, where Byzantine hermits such as St. Gregory lived and prayed. Beneath the meter summit of Ras Safsaafa stands the Plain of ar-Raaha, where the Israelites camped at the time Moses ascended the mountain and where Moses erected the first tabernacle.
The assumed identification of Jebel Musa with the Biblical Mt. Sinai was a powerful attraction to hermits and pilgrims of the early Christian era. Certainly the most famous of these pilgrims was Helena, a 4th century Byzantine empress who confirmed her belief in the authenticity of Jebel Musa by constructing the first church in the area. Traditionally called the Chapel of the Burning Bush, it was constructed at the exact site where grew a rare specimen of Rubus sanctus , the still-living shrub which the monks believe is the original Burning Bush.
A monastic community soon developed around this chapel and, to protect both the monks and the chapel from the attacks of roving Bedouin marauders, the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I built a fortress-like basilica around the chapel in AD. The basilica was called the Church of Transfiguration, in memory of the transfiguration of Jesus in the presence of Moses and Elijah on sacred Mt. The Monastery of the Transfiguration is also called St.
Catherine's Monastery after the early Christian martyr, St. Born as Dorothea of Alexandria in AD, she was later tortured and beheaded by the Roman emperor Maximus for incessantly criticizing him for his worship of pagan idols. Contrasting the powerful displays which accompanied the receiving of the Law at Mount Sinai, now God is revealing Himself to His servant the prophet, at the very same mountain, through a still small voice that can only be heard in the human heart.
The events that took place at Mount Sinai made it holy, but once the Torah was given and the covenant was established, Mount Sinai was just another mountain.
After claiming in to have discovered the Red Sea crossing at Newaba in the Gulf of Akaba the eastern branch of the Red Sea , Wyatt concluded that the real Mount Sinai must be located east from the path of the miraculous Red Sea crossing, in the territory of western modern-day Saudi Arabia. The best possibility, Wyatt thought, was Jebel al-Lawz, because it presented the highest peak in the entire western Saudi Arabian mountain range. In Wyatt and his two sons illegally crossed into Saudi Arabia to explore and photograph the area, but they were captured, their films confiscated, and they actually were jailed for 78 days by the Saudis as Israeli spies.
Subsequent delegations and researchers followed in the coming years, producing impressive results, yet, as most scholars agree, these are still speculative and lack definitive and indisputable archeological proofs.
Quoting a Saudi archaeologist from Riyadh University as saying that these were Egyptian-style cows and bulls who had never been found anywhere else in Saudi Arabia, Wyatt surmised though it was later questioned by other scholars that this was the great altar of Israel at the foot of Mount Sinai in Saudi Arabia, and possibly the one mentioned in the Golden Calf story.
Researchers of the Saudi Arabia site found the markings of a large water flow snaking down the mountainside which appear to start from nowhere. They claimed that this ancient watershed which is filled with large water-polished boulders is clear evidence of a fast-moving strong stream that came out of a rock and carved its path down the mountainside.
In an arid landscape, this was the miracle they were looking for, and finding a large rock that seemed to be split apart in the middle, they suggested that it could be the rock that Moses struck to bring out water for the thirsty nation Exodus and Psalm Further, while it is true that the region is classified as an arid desert, it does receive roughly mm 4 inches of rain per year; heavy rains that mostly come in the form of tropical monsoons often create flash floods sufficient to polish these rocks.
His research also pointed to what he believed were chariot fragments crystalized at the bottom of the Red Sea. The fact is that the Galatian's reference could be used to support the notion that Mount Sinai is in Saudi Arabia only if the Apostle was looking at a modern political map. She wrote of Goshen that the region is called "the land of Arabia, the land of Goshen … a region which, while it is part of Egypt, is a great deal better than any of the rest.
Therefore, when the Apostle Paul wrote that Mount Sinai was in Arabia, he was referring to the First Century view of the region, placing Mount Sinai somewhere in the Sinai Peninsula which was part of Arabia at the time. Deuteronomy , Judges , and Habakkuk all state that Seir, Mt. Paran, and Teman are located in the territory of Edom which is presumably on the eastern side of the Aravah, the arid territory that stretches between the Dead Sea and the Red Sea.
Yet, a careful examination of the Scriptures places the territory of Edom on both the east as well as the west side of the Aravah Numbers 3 and Joshua This area is considered the Central Negev Highlands today, and if this were the case, then the locations of Seir, Mt. Since some scholars associate Mt. The teams excavating and researching this mountain discovered evidence of rich religious activities all across the large surrounding plateaus including shrines, altars, stone circles, stone pillars, and over 40, rock engravings!
To compensate for that time lag, the Israeli researchers placed the Exodus from Egypt earlier, between — BC, citing other archaeological evidence to support their hypothesis. Wherever the actual site of Mount Sinai is, it seems the Lord has not provided indisputable archeological proofs as is the case of other biblical sites whose location is positive such as the City of David, Temple Mount, Nazareth, or Capernaum.
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