In Search Of... Season 4 # 12, The Ten Commandments

Mount Sinai is believed to be the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments more than 3.000 years ago. The wilderness of Mount Sinai is sacred to all Jews and Christians all over the world and it is the same today as it was in the time of the bible.

The bible says that 2.000.000 Israelites were camped at Mount Sinai for 10 months. For 60 years Moses was exposed to the elementary forces of the desert. The Lord told him in a burning bush that he is standing on Holy Ground. Moses was a simple shepherd who stood before mighty rulers to tell them "Let my people go" on behalf of the invisible God. Three months later the Israelites arrived at Mount Sinai. Only 1.500 years later the search for that mountain began. Meanwhile the first Chinese dynasties were in power, the Roman empire had collapsed and Jesus Christ has been born and has died.

Jevel Mosah, the Mountain of Moses, attracted attention to be the place. It is said that Moses spent 40 days at the mountain, a time in which the people began to create a golden calf which they worshiped as their god. So far no physical sign of the Exodus has been found. In spite of that the site was believed to be the Mount Sinai, simply because it was believed to be the place. There is no proof.

There is a place which was called 'The Land of God' at the time of the Exodus. Jericho was the first city the Israelites reached after they have crossed the desert. The actual crossing took 2 years, 38 years they spent at an Oasis near Mount Sinai. Leaving Ramses II, who built more cities than any Egyptian monarch, they might have aimed for an area at their time already known to be sacred and they had incorporated Egyptian customs and religion.

In 1762 Karsten Niebuhr, a Danish traveler, discovered what the Bedouin had always known: On a plateau, Sarabit-el-Hadem in the southern Sinai there is a 4.000 year old Egyptian temple. Sarabit-el-Hadem, Hathor, would have been the ideal location to receive the Ten Commandments and researcher agree because that land had been holy to the Israelites already. The plateau before the mountain annually hosts Bedouins who gather in huge masses to celebrate there. It could have hosted the 2.000.000 Israelites. The goddess for whom the Egyptian temple had been build does not appear as human only, but as a calf, too.

Temple carvings show Semite servants. In caves nearby more startling evidence was found in the late 19^th century: Letters have been carved there which are the earlier forerunners of our alphabet. Other carvings show that religious Hebrews stood here thousands of years ago at a cave nearby: The word "El", the name for the Hebrew God, is found there.