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The area round Mount Sinai (also called Gebel Musa,
“the Mount of Moses”) has derived its immense
religious significance and its sanctity, despite its
poverty, from its strong, direct association with prophets,
hermits, and ascetics. Moses passed through this area
with the Children of Israel on his return to the land
of Canaan crossing the Red Sea, probably from the Springs
of Moses, on his way to Palestine.
When Moses was forty years old he killed an Egyptian
and was forced to flee Egypt. He travelled to the land
of Midian, in the northwest of the Arabian Peninsula,
and during this journey he met and married Zipporah,
one of the seven daughters of Nabi Shoeib (Jethro in
the Bible), and lived for forty years with his father-in-law,
tending his cattle. And the time came when the Lord
appeared to Moses out of the Burning Bush and told him
to return to Egypt and lead his people to Canaan.
Moses was eventually able to convince Pharaoh (probably
Merneptah [1236 – 1223 B.C.]) that it was to his
advantage to allow the children of Israel to leave and
they began the journey that was to last for forty years.
During this time he had to provide food and water for
his people and to defeat his enemies the Amalekites,
warlike nomads from the Arabian Peninsula, but the supreme
care of God protected the children of Israel from complete
destruction and blessed them with grace and benevolence
in this desert land. |
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Monastery
of St Katherine. |
Summit of
Mount Katrina |
Summit
of Mount Sinai |
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Chapel of the Lady of the Steward |
Chapel
of St Theodore |
Spring of Symeon
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Hermitages
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Chapel
of the Prophet Aaron |
Monastery of the Forty Martyrs
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Nun’s
Monastery (Deir el-Banat)
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Deir el-Wadi
in el-Tur |
Deir el-Mohared
|
El-Floosiat
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Pelusium
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