Mount Sinai

Overview

Mount Sinai is a granite peak in the south of Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, traditionally identified as the biblical mountain where Moses received the Ten Commandments from God. Sacred to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, it draws pilgrims from all three faiths, and Saint Catherine's Monastery stands at its foot. The mountain forms part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Present

Mount Sinai is a major pilgrimage and tourist destination. Visitors climb to the summit, traditionally arriving for sunrise. Saint Catherine's Monastery, a Greek Orthodox monastery at the foot of the mountain, is the area's main religious institution. The surrounding region is the subject of a state-led plan to develop it for tourism, which has drawn objections and concerns about its scale and its impact on the area.

Religious Significance

Judaism (from antiquity) According to Jewish tradition Mount Sinai is the site where God spoke to the prophet Moses through a burning bush, established a covenant with the Israelites, and gave Moses the Ten Commandments, a set of moral and religious guidelines, focusing on devotion to one God, honoring one's parents, and prohibitions against actions like murder, theft, and dishonesty.

Christianity (from the 4th century CE) Christianity reveres Moses and the giving of the Law. According to Christian tradition God spoke to Moses out of a burning bush, traditionally placed at the mountain's foot, where the Christian Saint Catherine's Monastery was built in the sixth century.

Islam (from the 7th century CE) In Islam, Mount Sinai is revered as the place where God spoke to the Prophet Musa (Moses) directly, calling to him from a fire around a tree, where Musa received the divine law, where God declared his absolute oneness and commanded Musa to establish regular prayer.

History & Structure

Mount Sinai, known in Arabic as Jabal Musa, the Mountain of Moses, is a granite peak rising to 2,285 metres in the south of the Sinai Peninsula, Egypt. Its identification is not historically certain. In the fourth century the Byzantine empress Helena had a chapel built at the traditional site of the burning bush, at the foot of the mountain, and in the sixth century the emperor Justinian I enclosed it within Saint Catherine's Monastery, built between 548 and 565. At the top of the mountain stand the Chapel of the Holy Trinity, a Greek Orthodox chapel rebuilt in 1934 on older foundations, and a small mosque. Mount Sinai and Saint Catherine's Monastery were together inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2002.

Resources

• Official website: Holy Monastery of Sinai
• UNESCO: Saint Catherine Area