Mount Sinai – Jebel Musa and Saint Catherine's Monastery

Sinai and Horeb in the Bible

The burning bush (Exodus 3)

While tending the flocks of his father-in-law Jethro, Moses comes to "the mountain of God, even to Horeb". The text sometimes uses the name Sinai and sometimes Horeb for what most readers take to be the same mountain.

"And the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed."

Exodus 3:2 (KJV)

God calls to him from the bush: "put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground" (Exodus 3:5), and introduces himself as "the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob" (Exodus 3:6).

The theophany and the Decalogue (Exodus 19–20)

Three months after leaving Egypt, the people camp at the foot of the mountain. On the third day, thunder, lightning, a thick cloud and the sound of a trumpet announce God's coming.

"And mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the LORD descended upon it in fire: and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly."

Exodus 19:18 (KJV)

Then come the "ten words", which open by recalling the liberation:

"I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other gods before me."

Exodus 20:2-3 (KJV)

The covenant and the tablets of stone (Exodus 24)

After the covenant is sealed, Moses goes up with Joshua to receive "tables of stone" (Exodus 24:12). God's glory covers the mountain for six days; on the seventh, Moses enters the cloud.

"And Moses went into the midst of the cloud, and gat him up into the mount: and Moses was in the mount forty days and forty nights."

Exodus 24:18 (KJV)

The people then leave Sinai for forty years in the wilderness, until they reach Mount Nebo, from where Moses looks out over the Promised Land before he dies.

Elijah at Horeb (1 Kings 19)

Centuries later, the prophet Elijah, fleeing Queen Jezebel, walks "forty days and forty nights unto Horeb the mount of God" (1 Kings 19:8) and spends the night in a cave, where he hears "a still small voice". Sinai tradition has given his name to a plateau on the mountain, "Elijah's Basin".

Where was Mount Sinai? An unproven identification

The Bible gives neither coordinates nor a precise geographical description of Sinai, and most stages of the Exodus route (Numbers 33) remain unlocated. Several peaks have been proposed:

• Jebel Musa (South Sinai) — the identification of Christian tradition, attested by monks and pilgrims from the 4th century.
• Jebel Serbal, near the Feiran oasis — another early monastic centre, proposed in particular in the 19th century by the Egyptologist Richard Lepsius.
• Har Karkom, in Israel's Negev — championed by the archaeologist Emmanuel Anati for its many shrines and rock engravings, although their main phases are much earlier than the dates usually given for the Exodus.
• Jabal al-Lawz (or Jabal Maqla), in Saudi Arabia — proposed because of the mention of Midian; most archaeologists and biblical scholars reject this hypothesis.

For the Egyptian background to Bronze Age Sinai, see the page on Serabit el-Khadim, where the pharaohs' mining expeditions left temples and inscriptions; the whole story is set out on the page The Exodus and the Conquest of Canaan.

Saint Catherine's Monastery: sixteen centuries of tradition

Hermits and pilgrims (4th century)

From the 4th century, hermits lived in the valleys of Jebel Musa. Around 383, the pilgrim Egeria was guided there by monks: she describes a church on the summit, another at the site of the bush, and a garden where the bush was shown. Tradition attributes a first Chapel of the Burning Bush to Empress Helena, mother of Constantine; this attribution is not documented by contemporary sources.

Justinian's fortress (6th century)

In the mid-6th century, Emperor Justinian had the site enclosed by fortified granite walls and built the basilica, whose apse preserves a famous mosaic of the Transfiguration. The monastery, first dedicated to the Transfiguration, later took the name of Saint Catherine of Alexandria, whose relics it keeps. A small Fatimid-era mosque stands inside the walls. The monastery is Greek Orthodox and belongs to the autonomous Archdiocese of Sinai.

Library and icons

The library is one of the oldest in the Christian world still in use. It once held the Codex Sinaiticus, a 4th-century Greek manuscript of the Bible: most of it is now in the British Library, other leaves are in Leipzig and St Petersburg, and fragments found at the monastery in 1975 have remained there. The icon collection includes 6th-century pieces from before the Iconoclast crisis, among them a Christ Pantocrator painted in encaustic.

Climbing Jebel Musa

Two paths to the summit

• The camel path (Sikket el-Bashait) — longer and gently graded, it winds up the eastern flank; a camel can be hired for part of the climb.
• The "Steps of Repentance" (Sikket Sayidna Musa) — a stone stairway of about 3,750 steps according to tradition, laid by the monks in a ravine behind the monastery. More direct, it is also much steeper.

The two routes meet at Elijah's Basin, a small plateau with a cypress tree and a chapel dedicated to the prophet; from there, some 750 steps remain to the summit. On the steps, two stone arches recall the old "gates" where pilgrims made their confession before going on.

At the summit

The summit has a Greek Orthodox Chapel of the Holy Trinity, built in 1934 on the ruins of earlier churches, and a small mosque. Tradition associates a cave there with Moses' stay. The view takes in a sea of granite peaks, including Jebel Katherina (2,629 m), the highest mountain in Egypt.

Many visitors set off in the middle of the night to watch the sunrise from the top. It is cold at the summit, especially in winter, when snow is possible: bring warm clothes, a head torch and water. The climb is normally made with a local Bedouin guide.

Latest: the monastery's status and the redevelopment project

Situation as of 29 September 2026, based on published sources; things are changing and should be checked before any trip.

A court case over the monastery's land

In late May 2025, the Ismailia Court of Appeal ruled in a long-running land dispute between the monastery and the Egyptian state. According to published reports, it assigned ownership of the land and buildings concerned to the state, while guaranteeing the monks the use of the site for their religious life. The monks then temporarily closed the monastery to visitors in protest. Greece and Egypt opened talks at the highest level; in October 2025 the Greek prime minister announced an agreement in principle, but no final text had been signed by August 2026. An appeal is pending before Egypt's Court of Cassation, whose hearing has been postponed to allow time for negotiations; press reports mention a "dual status" formula combining state ownership with perpetual rights for the community.

The community has also changed leadership: Archbishop Damianos, head of the monastery since 1973, was removed by the council of monks in July 2025 and then resigned; Archimandrite Symeon Papadopoulos was elected in September 2025 and consecrated Archbishop of Sinai in October 2025.

The "Great Transfiguration" project

The Egyptian government is carrying out a large tourism development project around the town of Saint Catherine, known as the "Great Transfiguration" (hotels, a visitor centre, housing, roads). The authorities present it as a way of showcasing the site; several heritage organisations are concerned about its impact on the landscape. In July 2026, the UNESCO World Heritage Committee asked, for the third time, for the works to be suspended pending a heritage impact assessment; Egypt had told UNESCO that a presidential directive of September 2025 suspended the works until that assessment.