Talk:Hashem El Tarif

Deletion?

Not sure why this article is being nominated for deletion. It seems like this is relevant and in fact should be expanded due to the recent claims put forth about the mountain.

According to the Torah, Moses health was fine

Simcha Jacobovici claimed Moses was "frail" having "poor health" and thus too old to have walked up Jebel Musa. Even calling him "thy old guy" which I think is offensive content to devout Jews, Samaritans, Christians and Muslims. This is not supported by the Torah at all! Jebal Musa is the site of the traditionally identified Mount Sinai (as known: "Horeb")

• According to the Bible: Moses was 120 years old too at the time. Moses was said has having vigor, having vital strength & manifested in his eyes, and he was alert. - Deuteronomy 34:7

• Moses lived in the region previous to the Exodus for some 40 years herding sheep. He was well educated by his fleshy parents too. Moses was nursed by his Jewish mother. See: Acts 7:23-25 the Egyptian court: Exodus 2:1-10; Acts 7:20-22 and the nomadic Midian bedouins for many years.

"And Moses was a hundred and twenty years old when he died: his eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated." - Deuteronomy 34:7 Jewish Tanakh, 1917 (JPS)

The Assertion: The traditional Mt. Sinai (Jebel Musa) is not in Midian's Territory

• - Simcha Jacobovici thought the traditionally Mt Sinai (Jebel Musa) is too far anyway from Timna. Midians were noted as nomads sheep herders - Exodus 3:1.
• - Timnah doesn't = Midian. The land of Midian was not just confined to one city.
• - Also was Moses family-in-law a "Midian" by blood (a descendant of Abraham's son, Midian)? Or was it a geographic term? or maybe even a cultural term?

Was he father-in-law a Midianite in Midian? Does a Lebanese man have to stay living in Lebanon to be Lebanese?

• - Quoting "Insight on the Scriptures:"
• -At times the Bible seemingly refers to them (Midians) as Ishmaelites. (When talking about Midianites) (Ishmael was a son of Abraham, thru Hagar) [Compare: Genesis 37:25, 27, 28, 36; 39:1; Judges 8:22, 24.) This may imply that the descendants of Abraham through his sons Ishmael and Midian were much alike in their way of life, and there may have been a further amalgamation through intermarriage among the two peoples. It also appears that at least some of the Kenites were known as Midianites.

• - (Ishmaelite, Midianites and Kenites could refer to location)
• - Just because Moses shepherded he father-in-laws flock at Horeb, who was a Midianite (Moses's father-in-law) does not mean that Mt.Sinai/Horeb is in the Land of Midian.

• - Exodus 18:27; Numbers 10:30 – Sinai/Horeb is near but not in the land of Midian. Jetro and Hobab visit the Israelites and then depart afterward, went off to their land and country)

Belief the Northern Route (El Haj route) was the Exodus route b/c the "need" of food:

• - Simcha Jacobovici also thought the southern route couldn't the right b/c of "lack of food".

• - The Bible mentions manna being provided Exodus 16 & the works of rabbinic Jewish oral tradition concerning the manna provided food and nutrients for them. Not to mention the bible said that they were in a "wilderness." They were not going to planting stuff they were migrating northwards to the future land of Israel, "the land of the promise."
• - Another name for Mount Sinai is Mount Horeb. The name Horeb meant (dry waste) the word is a perfect piece of evidence they were not in some food land yet.

The Stones Organized at Hashem-El-Tarif

• - The Bedouins left their "marks" in the desert too. It just does not make it the real Mt. Sinai.
• - Many mountains have some sign of life being there, but what proof is it that is was the Israelites and not the bedouins?
• - Is the site of Hashem el-Tarif really ancient? Has a professional dating research been done there? or wait a minute. That's right, please don't forget the words: "Permission for archeological excavation must be granted by the Egyptian government, which closely guards and often denies access to any locations which may be related to Biblical history". Interesting there they said "may" but everywhere else it was said it was the correct site, interesting!

--72.38.211.144 (talk) 19:37, 10 April 2008 (UTC)Assumed: The Traditional Mount Sinai Jebel Musa (Arabic: طور سيناء , Hebrew: הר סיני), is not the right one, as if a fact ==

• - Simcha never even examined pros vs. cons of the traditional Mount Sinai (Jebel Musa) its days and route on the program.

• (http://theexodusdecoded.com/ve.jsp?ID=10) assumes the old traditional, site is totally wrong.

• == The traditional route as a whole ==

• - The traditional route believed as such has an old history, it is one thing to suggest it is the wrong route or scholar should menetion it should be considered (according to his view). But it he said it was without question,as if it was flat-out wrong, plus never showing good evidence to the claim.

• - 1. The Southern route which it is namely a route. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.38.211.144 (talk) 20:43, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
• - 2. It believe The Haj route of the Sinai Peninsula is not the Exodus route, it was where there where intense heat baked the gravel & limestone plateau it was built more for trade (it was a trade route) more then a place for a mass exodus with children and sheep.

• - Compare with: Deuteronomy 8:15

Mt Sinai: High or Low?

• - Simcha Jacobovici thought the bible supports Mountain of Sinai being humble: small in size. My question is where? Where in the bible
• - Not to mention: to God all mountians are small anyway! - Isaiah 40:12-14.
• - Also this goes against the tradition mentioned by Flavius Josephus, it was actually the highest.

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• - Jewish Antiques, Book 2, Chapter 12:

• - 1. NOW Moses, when he had obtained the favor of Jethro, for that was one of the names of Reuel, staid there and fed his flock; but some time afterward, taking his station at the mountain called Sinai, he drove his flocks thither to feed them. Now this is the highest of all the mountains thereabout, and the best for pasturage, the herbage being there good; and it had not been before fed upon, because of the opinion men had that God dwelt there,

• - Jewish Antiques, Book 3, Chapter 5:

• - 1. (76)"He ascended to the highnest mountain that in that country, and is not only very diffcult to be ascended by men, on account of it vast altitude, but because of the sharpness of it precipices also, indeed it cannot be looked at without pain." Sound like Jebel Musa, not "Hasem el-Tarif.

• - Jewish Antiques, Book 2, Chapter 11:

• - 1. (257) ". . . When he came to the city, Midian, which lay upon the Red Sea. . ."

• - Flavius Josephus also menetioned Letopolis, a location near Memphis.

• - Jewish Antiques, Book 3, Chapter 1:

1. (3) ". . . Marah which had that name from badness of it water, for Mar denotes bitterness. There came afflicted both by the tediousness of their journey, and by their want of food, for it entirely failed them at that time."

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• - A "trend?

• - Just because a few believe that is posssible, doesn't make it in anyway a fact.

The assertion:: is was a holy mountain before Moses no direct evidence in the Torah:

An “interesting” assertion but there’s no evidence which is in the Torah at all, nor does it suggests or support it in anyway found. And through out the thousands of years of the writing of bible interestingly not one reference says it, yet somehow, it’s menetion, as if, (which it is not) a fact in the show.

• - If he’s basing it on the Mishnah or the Talmud, most experts agree the history in both books in better for the 1st century B.C.E., to 1st Century C.E., over a thousands years and half since the writings. The Torah said God did call it holy, but this does not suggest or prove that it was really that before Moses.

"Tombs" at the foot of the hill?

• - Do the "tombs" give support the cause? The "tombs" do not prove anything.
• - The bible neither says mount Sinai had tombs near it.

'Jebel Musa needs more archeological proof'?

• - They were migranting not planting or leaving stuff.
• - Sandals lasted longer. - Deuteronomy 29:3.
• - Manna was provided.
• - They mostly left footprints.
• - According to Rabbinic tradition, manna was consumed by their bodies, thus no need to excerete if this is accurate.
• - They were not taking the easy route.

Jebal Musa

• - The Tradition Mount Sinai:

• Ancient Tradition (Information Josephus (having access to jewish tradition also), bedouin, & tradition sources since the 4th Cenutry C.E) even in the 3rd Century maybe much, much longer. The Ancient tradition is not infallible true, but the tradition surrounds the area & many the sites near-by are claim to be linked. Tradition is not vital but serves as a reference. Has Hashem el-Tarif any ancient tradition?

• - Has a cleft that overlooks a natural amphitheatre:
• - Has an ancient spring! A monastry built on it.
• - Has a plateau below large enough to hold several hundred thousand people and containing enough foliage to sustains large flocks.
• - Remember the food for flocks differ greatly in ancient times then now even more.
• - A long traditional belief it was the Mountian.

• - Supporting Geographry.

• - Perhaps on the plain of Er-Raha, is the site where they camped, & listened to Moses.
• - Traditional site of the Cave where Elijah hid [1 Kings 19:8-13].
• - Site of Spring has a tradition said to linked with [Exodus 33:21-23].
• - Seems to agree with Flavius Josephus.
• - Traditional site of the burning bush.
• - Even a bush said to be the descendant the burning bush moses approach.
• - A traditional site on the mount where Moses recieved the ten commandments or words.
• - A traditional site of trail of Moses.
• - A traditon site of rock which struck for water.
• - A traditional route to there.
• - Connections to other traditional sites on the route.

• - The basics on Jebel Musa:

• - "Mount Sinai (Arabic: طور سيناء , Hebrew: הר סיני), also known as Mount Horeb, Mount Musa, Gebel Musa or Jebal Musa ("Moses' Mountain") by the Bedouins, is the name of a mountain in the Sinai Peninsula. At 2,285 meters high, Mount Sinai is a minor mountain next to Mount St. Catherine, at 2,637 meters high the highest in the Sinai peninsula. It is surrounded on all sides by higher peaks of the mountain range. According to Bedouin tradition, this is the mountain where God gave laws to the Israelites. However, the earliest Christian traditions place this event at the nearby Mount Serbal, and a monastery was founded at its base in the 4th century, it was only in the 6th century that the monastery moved to the foot of Mount Catherine, following the guidance of Josephus's earlier claim that Sinai was the highest mountain in the area. Jebel Musa, which is adjacent to Mount Catherine, was only equated with Sinai, by Christians, after the 15th century."

The Red Sea (Yam-suph′) menetioned in the Exodus is the Red Sea!

• - The Red Sea is not a swamp! Plus to miss location where they crossed as Simcha J. did it will effect the timing of the route being about some 50 kilometers from the traditonal site of the crossing, thus change the diagram again.

• - "it should be noted that the waters were sufficient to cover Pharaoh’s military forces. [Exodus 14:28, 29] This would have been impossible in a mere swamp.
• - Also, Acts 7:36 and Hebrews 11:29 rule out a mere swampy place, for these texts mention the same incident and use the Greek expression e·ry·thra′ tha′las·sa, meaning “Red Sea.
• - The historian Herodotus (fifth century B.C.E.) used the same Greek expression to refer, not to a swamp or an insignificant body of water, but to “the Indian Ocean, in which the Red Sea” is located.—A Greek-English Lexicon, by H. G. Liddell and R. Scott, revised.
• - Since Israel crossed the sea in one night, it could hardly be assumed that the waters parted in a narrow channel. Rather, the channel may have been a kilometer or more in width. Though in fairly close marching formation, such a group, along with what wagons they had, their baggage, and their cattle, even when rather closely ranked, would occupy an area of perhaps 8 sq km (3 sq mi) or more. It appears, therefore, that the sea-opening allowed the Israelites to cross on a fairly wide front. If there was about a 1.5-km (1 mi) front, then the depth of the Israelite column would probably be about 5 km (3 mi) or more. If it was about a 2.5-km (1.5 mi) front, the depth might be about 3 km (2 mi) or more. It would take such a column several hours to get into the seabed and travel across it. While they did not go in panic, but maintained their battle formation, they would no doubt move with considerable haste. It is obvious that such an overwhelming inundation would be impossible in a marsh.
• - Moreover, in a shallow marsh dead bodies would not wash up on the shore, as actually took place, so that “Israel got to see the Egyptians dead on the seashore. In so holding, however, they do not agree (those who diagree as it being the Red Sea) with the translators of the ancient Greek Septuagint, who translated yam-suph′ with the Greek name e·ry·thra′ tha′las·sa, meaning, literally, “Red Sea.” ””

Did Pharaoh die at The Red Sea?

• Psalms 136:15 seems to indicate he did.
• If we got the wrong pharaoh as the Candidate it would change everything.
• There is much detate of which pharaoh is believed to the one of the Israel that fact that his name is anonymous adds more diffculty in knowing which one it was of the pharoahs he was.

"But overthrew Pharaoh and his host in the Red Sea, for His mercy endureth for ever." - Psalms 136:15 Jewish Tanakh (JPS).

Egyptian Dates & History:

. . . This is important it is "vital" to his theory, if wrong on this, it changes locations of the assumed sites. . .

• - Quoting insight on the scriptures:

"Modern historians rely principally on certain documents in the form of Egyptian king lists or annals. Among these are: the fragmentary Palermo Stone, presenting what are considered to be the first five “dynasties” of Egyptian history; the Turin Papyrus, very fragmentary and giving a list of kings and their reigns from the “Old Kingdom” into the “New Kingdom”; and additional inscriptions in stone, likewise fragmentary. These separate lists and other independent inscriptions have been coordinated in chronological order by means of the writings of Manetho, an Egyptian priest of the third century B.C.E. His works, dealing with Egyptian history and religion, arrange the reigns of the Egyptian monarchs into 30 dynasties, an arrangement still used by modern Egyptologists. These sources, together with astronomical calculations, based on Egyptian texts dealing with lunar phases and the rising of the Dog Star (Sothis), have been used to produce a chronological table.

Problems of Egyptian chronology. Uncertainties are multiple. The works of Manetho, used to give order to the fragmentary lists and other inscriptions, are preserved only in the writings of later historians, such as Josephus (first century C.E.), Sextus Julius Africanus (third century C.E., hence over 500 years from Manetho’s time), Eusebius (fourth century C.E.), and Syncellus (late eighth or early ninth century C.E.). As stated by W. G. Waddell, their quotations of Manetho’s writings are fragmentary and often distorted and hence “it is extremely difficult to reach certainty in regard to what is authentic Manetho and what is spurious or corrupt.” After showing that Manetho’s source material included some unhistorical traditions and legends that “introduced kings as their heroes, without regard to chronological order,” he says: “There were many errors in Manetho’s work from the very beginning: all are not due to the perversions of scribes and revisers. Many of the lengths of reigns have been found impossible: in some cases the names and the sequence of kings as given by Manetho have proved untenable in the light of monumental evidence.”—Manetho, introduction, pp. vii, xvii, xx, xxi, xxv.

The probability that concurrent reigns rather than successive reigns are responsible for many of Manetho’s excessively long periods is shown in the book Studies in Egyptian Chronology, by T. Nicklin (Blackburn, Eng., 1928, p. 39): “The Manethonian Dynasties . . . are not lists of rulers over all Egypt, but lists partly of more or less independent princes, partly . . . of princely lines from which later sprang rulers over all Egypt.” Professor Waddell (pp. 1-9) observes that “perhaps several Egyptian kings ruled at one and the same time; . . . thus it was not a succession of kings occupying the throne one after the other, but several kings reigning at the same time in different regions. Hence arose the great total number of years.”

Since the Bible points to the year 2370 B.C.E. as the date of the global Flood, Egyptian history must have begun after that date. The problems in Egyptian chronology shown above are doubtless responsible for the figures advanced by modern historians who would run Egyptian history all the way back to the year 3000 B.C.E.

Greater confidence is placed by Egyptologists in the ancient inscriptions themselves. Yet, the carefulness, truthfulness, and moral integrity of the Egyptian scribes are by no means above suspicion. As Professor J. A. Wilson states: “A warning should be issued about the precise historical value of Egyptian inscriptions. That was a world of . . . divine myths and miracles.” Then after suggesting that the scribes were not above juggling the chronology of events to add praise to the particular monarch in power, he says: “The historian will accept his data at face value, unless there is a clear reason for distrust; but he must be ready to modify his acceptance as soon as new materials put the previous interpretation in a new light.”—The World History of the Jewish People, 1964, Vol. 1, pp. 280, 281.

Absence of information concerning Israel. This is not surprising, since the Egyptians not only refused to record matters uncomplimentary to themselves but also were not above effacing records of a previous monarch if the information in such records proved distasteful to the then reigning pharaoh. Thus, after the death of Queen Hatshepsut, Thutmose III had her name and representations chiseled out of the monumental reliefs. This practice doubtless explains why there is no known Egyptian record of the 215 years of Israelite residence in Egypt or of their Exodus.

The pharaoh ruling at the time of the Exodus is not named in the Bible; hence, efforts to identify him are based on conjecture. This partly explains why modern historians’ calculations of the date of the Exodus vary from 1441 to 1225 B.C.E., a difference of over 200 years."--72.38.211.144 (talk) 19:44, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

The thoughts on the burning bush

• - I can't prove the acclaimed bush at the monastary is the same as the exact same burning bush that Moses saw, I can't used this evidence to argue Hashem-el-Tarif for not having a traditional burning bush site.

• - Jebel has a traditional bush a Blackberry bush (rubus santus) in the monastary. It is a thorn bush in union with the Torah, (Exodus 3:2-5; Deuteronomy 33:16) (Hebrew: seneh′), & in the works of Flavius Jospehus Jewish Antiques book 2 chapter, 12, 1 (-266). Quoting a good reference book: "In referring to this event, the Christian writers of the Greek Scriptures employed the Greek word ba′tos, which means a bramble or any thorny bush. (Mr 12:26; Lu 20:37; Ac 7:30, 35) In Greek the blackberry is called ba′ton (derived from ba′tos) and hence some lexicographers connect the thorny bush (seneh′) with the blackberry bush (Rubus sanctus)."
• The traditional tree which just happens to a Rubus sanctus. So it would not be so much of an argument but as a reference to Jebel Musa. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.38.211.144 (talk) 04:33, 21 September 2007 (UTC) --Standforder (talk) 21:45, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Quote from the wiki article on him

• - The list of scholars who signed the open letter's criticism included:

• - Professor Jodi Magness, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• - Professor Eric M. Meyers, Duke University
• - Choon-Leon Seow, Princeton Theological Seminary
• - F.W. Dobbs-Allsopp, Princeton Theological Seminary
• - Lee McDonald, Princeton Theological Seminary, visiting
• - Rachel Hachlili, Haifa University
• - Motti Aviam, University of Rochester
• - Amos Kloner, Bar Ilan University
• - Christopher Rollston, Emmanuel School of Religion
• - Shimon Gibson, University of North Carolina at Charlotte
• - Joe Zias, Science and Antiquity Group, Jerusalem
• - Jonathan Price, Tel Aviv University
• - C.D. Elledge, Gutavus Adolphus College--Standforder (talk) 00:16, 3 February 2012 (UTC)