Sin

A city in Kgypt mentioned in Ezk 3o'^''- along with Patliros (Upper Egyiit), Zoan (Tanis), .Sin, No (Thebes), Jioph (Memphis), Aven (Helio- polis), I'i-beseth (Bubastis), and Tehaphnehes (Daphn*). Arranging these in geographical order, we hnd them to be the mo.st important cities in the N.E. of the Delta and along its eastern edge leading to Memphis, the capital of Lower Egypt, followed by Pathros (Upper Egypt) and its capital No. Sin is characterized by Ezek.

as ' the strong- hold of Egypt' (RV), yet it is not mentioned by .lereiuiah. LXX tr. it by .Sais (the capital of the 2()th Dynasty, in power at the time of the prophecy), or Syene, the southern frontier. The latter identification is, however, impossible. In all probability Sin is Pelusium. The name Sin seems, like I'elusiiim, to be connected with ' mud ' ; and a modern name that clings to the neighbourhood of Pelusium j.s et-'Pineh. whicli is from the same root as .Sin.

Unfortunately, nothing is known of the history of Pelusium before the time of Hero- dotus, in whose days it w'as a place of importance owing to the development of commerce by sea ; and soon it became the key of Egypt on the N.E., as in the Persian war and long afterwards (Her. ii. 17, 1.54, iii. 10). From the wording of Ezek. it would seem to have held this position at a date when Daphnie was still a great garrison city, guarding tlie approach to Memphis.

The ancient Egyptian name of Pelusium is still unknown. In Coptic it is Perfmiin, in Avuh-el-Feniiit. The ruins are about a mile distant from the sea in the ex- treme N.E. corner of the Delta. They consist of a long narrow mound parallel to the sea, containing ruins of a temple and a large red brick enclosure, evidently a Byzantine or Arab fortress. At the E. extremity, after a slight gaji, is anotlier high mound, ntarly touching the desert, and crowned by a structure of red brick.

These brick buildings are of the Arab, period. West and south all is barren salt marsh, without a living .soul for miles ; the marsh is now indeed intersected by the Suez canal, whicli brings human beings within 20 miles. Yet even down to the 11th cent. A.l>. el-FermS was a large city, and the country round, though marshy, was to u great extent cultivated and populous. Near the shore were salt-pans, and places for salting fish. F. Ll. Gi{1KI, itii. SIN, 'Wll.

DKIiN'KSS OF (fP'"'17':; LXX J) (pTjMOS ^{()lf ; Vulg. desertum Sin). — This ' wilderness ' is described in Ex IG^ as between Elim and Sinai ; in 17' an encanipment in Hephidira is mentioned between .Sin and the wilderness of Sinai ; and in the itinerary of Nu ;)8 an encampment by the Red Sea is inserted between Elim and tlie wilderness of Sill, and two other eam])i!ig-places besides Rcjihidim between the wilderness of Sin and the wilderness of .Sinai.

On the supposition tliat the traditional site of Sinai is the correct one, the encamimient by the sea is generally placed at the end of Wililij Tayibrh, near Ras Ahu Sclimeh, and the wilderness of Sin may be the open plain a little to the south of this headland. Others put it in Wddij ScheUal or Wddij Budrrih. Tliis wilder- ness appears to be different from the wilderness of Zl.N- (Nu i:3-i 20' 27" ;!8i U^, Dt 32''>. Jos \5<"), in which the Lsraclites encamjied after leaving Mt.

Sinai, but the student cannot fail to notice the close similarity of the three names Sinai, Sin, Zin. A. T. Chap.man. SINAI, MOUNT (•:•?, 2(e)ini).— The impressions derived from a study of the wanderings of the children of Israel <as they are recorded in the Scriptures, are found to undergo important modi- fications as soon as the biblical tradition is supple- mented by an actual topographical survey of the peninsula at the bead of the Red .Sea, which takes its name from Mt.

Sinai, and is supposed to contain the famous mountain where the Law was said to have been given to Israel. For w hile the student of the Scriptures without their toiiographical supplement would conclude th.

at the route of the Exodus lay entirely outside the pale of civilization, the student of the country is able to affirm witli certainty that there was an actual civilization in the peninsula itself ; that there were important mines, with at least one port of debarkation for ships coming from Egj-pt ; and that the country was intersected by trade routes which connected the upper end of the Red Sea with regions lying farther nortli and e.a.

st ; the mines alluded to being contemporary with the earliest Egyptian dynasties, and the tnade routes behig also, in all probability, of extreme antiquity. And not only are there within the limits of the so-called Sinaitic peninsula the marks of an astonishingly early stage of civilization, but there is al-so the indication of the existence of early forms of religion, far removed from the semi-fetishism of wandering Arab tribes.

One of these forms of religion was the Egyptian, represented by the temples at Sarbut el-Kadeem on the northern route to Mt. Sinai ; it was the natural concomitant of the imported Egyptian influence which came in with the officials who had charge of the mining operations in the west of the peninsula. But besides this form of religion there is reason to siLspect th.

at Babylonian religion was also represented, for there are traces in the Babylonian literature of mining and quarrying operations in the ea.stern part of the i)eniiisula and in the adjacent country of Mitlian. and these traces are very suggestive of religious concomi- tants, especially wlien we find a reflexion of the Babylonian theology in the very name of the sacred mountain. Mount Sinai, in fact, is named after the moon-god Sin (cf.

the formation of ilordccai from the name of Marduk) ; and if this be so, it was from the earliest times a place of .sanctity, ami the routes that converge upon it would easil.v acipiire the character of haj routes or pilgrim ro;ids. There is therefore no a priori difficulty in tlie account of the wandering of tlie children of Israel to a s,acred mount, nor any need to regard the sanctity of the pl.ace as acquired in the time of the Exodus, or projected back upon the story by later chroniclers.

The real problem lies in the identification of the SINAI, MOUNT SIXAI, MOUNT 331 mountain described in the Pent., especially in view of tlie fact that the whole of the penin>ula is a mass of mountains, manj- of which are conspicuous objects in the landscape, and certain to have early attracted attention and invited nomenclature. \\ e are a.<.-^iiriunr; that Mt. Sinai is somewhere in the tongue of laud at tlie head of the Ked Sea, between the two arms of that .

sea which constitute respec- tively the Gulf of'Akaba and the Gulf of Suez. It should, however, be remembered that Sayce thinks he has grounds for locating Mt. Sinai outside the peninsula and in the land of Midian itself. In this he is following in some points an earlier and more fantastic suggestion of IJcke. The advantage of such a theorj' lies in the fact (1) tliat Mt. Sinai is closely connected with the land of Midian in the biblical account.

Thither Moses escapes from the wrath of Pharaoh, and while engaged in pastoral occupations in that land he sees the theopliany of the ouniing bush. Moreover, his wile and her relations are Midianite. The general opinion is that Midian is on the farther side of 'Akaba to the ea.st and north, and that si)ecial evidence is needed if we would include in it the surroundings of the traditional Mt. Sinai.

(2) The theory furnishes a new explanation of the encampment of the Israelites by the sea, which on this theory is the Gulf of Akaba ; (3) it finds a site for the much-disputed Eliiii in the modem Aileh (ancient Elotli) ; (4) it explains why nothing is .

said about the exquisite valley of Feiran by a writer who is so careful to record the palm-trees and springs (certainly of a much inferior c|ualitv) at Klim ; the identification of I{epl)idim witli Feiran is, on this hypothesis, incorrect 1}' made. The theory is not lightly to be set aside ; the main objection to it lies in the itinerary (wliicli appears to have been one of daily marches aloni; a conventional road). Xo satisfactory attempt has been made to trace this itinerary to the E. or N.

of the Gulf of 'Akaba. Setting aside, then, the theorj'of a (trans-'Aljaba) Midianite Sinai as inconsistent with the most natural interpretation of the biblical traditions, we proceed to determine the most likely spot within the peninsula to which those traditions can be referred. And first of all we may clear away the apparent confusion between Horeb and Sinai whicli occurs in the Pent.

, and has often been perplexing to commentators who had to reconcile such ex- pressions as ' to the minintain of God, even to Horeb' (Ex 3'), with which cf. 1 K 19*, where Elijah is said to have come ' to tlie mountain of God, even to Horeb.' Here and in otlier places 'the mountain of God ' is identified with lloreb, i.e. Sinai and Horeb are practically interclian''e- able.

An examination of the sources of tlio narrative will show that Horeb is the term used for the seat of the Deity in E and D, while Sinai is the term used in J and P. According to the sources, then, we can only say that the centre of the worship of J" is in Hoieb according to the northern tribes, and in Sinai according to the southern ; and no further help is forthcoming for the location of Horeb (which may simi>ly mean 'waste').

Heturning to the ijuistion of the actual moun- tain involved in the trailition, we have a remark- able divergence of opinion amongst critics and travellers, not a few of whom (especially Lepsius anil Ebers) have sought to identify the biblical Sinai witli Mt. Serbal, which rises just above the oasis of Feiran to the south. It ma}' be admitted that Serbal is a much more conspicuous object than Jebel Miisa (the traditional mountain of the Law), altliough it is not so lofty.

It is also true that tlie centre of early Christian life in the peninsula in the first centuries of the occupation of the holy jilaces is in the Wady Feiran, which stands for the ancient Paran, the seat of an episcopate and the home of iniiiiiuer- able ascetics, whose caves and rude dwellings may still be traced.

We need not be surprised, then, if it should be maintained that the special place of sanctity in the peninsula was not far from the Wadj' Feiran, in which case Serbal can hardly fail to be the holy mountain. In further support of this it is urged that immediately after the battle witli Amaiek the Israelites are said (Ex I'J-) to have come to Mt.

Sinai, or at all events to the wilderness which bears the name of that mountain, and it would therefore seem that the mountain w;us at no great distance from Kephidiin, which is almost universally identified with the Wady Feiran. So that, when we combine the biblical statement of the proximity of Itepliidim to Alt.

Sinai with the undoubted fact that Feiran is the primitive Christian metropolis, a strong case is made out for identifj'ing the beautiful and imposing Mount Serbal with the biblical Sinai. Various attempts have further been made, by means of quotations from Cosmas Indicopleustes, Eusebius, Jerome, etc., to show that there has been a monastic translation of the accepted site of Sinai from Serbal to Jebel Musa (cf. Lepsius, Tour from Thebes and the Peninsula of Sinai, 1846, tr.

by Cottrell ; and Eber.s, Durch Gosen ztim Sinai, 2nd ed. Leipzig, ISSl). And it has been afiirmed in accordance witli this liypothesis that there was no monastery or monastic settlement in the neighbourhood of Jebel Musa before the convent, called popularly after the name of St. Catherine, was buUt by Justinian.

Unfortunately for this ingenious hypothesis, it has been reduced almost to absurdity oy the dis- covery of a document which is in itself one of the most interesting of pilgrim itineraries, and which for the settlement of the early Christian tradition has immense weight. We refer to the document known as the Peregrinatio Silniw, edited in Koine in 1887 by Ganiurrini from an imperfect JIS, and since re[)rinti'd by J. H. Bernard as a volume of the Palestine Pilgrims' Text Society.

The pilgrimage in question is dated in the j'ears 385-388 by its editor, and its authorship is assigned with good reason to a lady from Aquitaine. The imperfect MS opens with topographical details which certainly identify the plain of er-Kahah in front of Jebel Musa (' vallem infinitam ingens* planissima et valde piilchraiii, et trans valleni apparebat nions sanctus Dei Syna').

And, in fact, the whole of the route which Silvia describes between Egypt and Sinai, and the holy places which she visits, coincide closely with the route and the sanctities recorded in modern hooks of travel. The theory of the dis- placeiiiciit of tlie traditional Sinai from Serbal to Jebel Musa in the early Christian centuries may therefore be abandoned, and this practically amounts to the final abandonment of the Serbal- Sinai theory itself and the acceptance of the traditional site.

Any residual dilliculties which are connected with the account of the Exodus and the last stages of the journey to Sinai are probablv due to unhistorical elements in the tradition. \lt. Sinai must therefore be sought in the cluster of eminences which includes .lebel Katerina, Jebel Musa, etc. Of these the highest is Jebel Katerina, but it docs not appear that any attempt has been successful to find at the foot of Jebel Katerina a suitable place for an Israelite encampment.

And in so far as this is the ea.se, (lie traditional site must be allowed to retain the identilication until further light can bo thrown on the subject from unexpected quarters. * Ingena-valde in thU document rrequentl>"f but here In ita natural sonsa, tor Bhe nuj-ii a little later valte Uta quam dixi iuyeiu.

53S SINCERE SINITES Tlie traditional Sinai is bounded on the north side by the Rreat plain er-Rahah, out of wliich it rises iirecipitonsly ; on its east and west sides are wadis named respectively, the one on the east M'ady ed-Deir antl the one on the west Wady el-Leja. The former takes its name (Valley of the Convent) from the celebrated convent of St. Catherine, which stands upon the slope of the mountain ; the derivation of the other name is more obscure.

In tliis western wady are the remains of the convent of the Forty Martyrs [Dcir d-Arbdin) and a number of otlier traces of early monastic life, and by tliis vallej- it is customary to make the ascent of Johol Katerina, which lies to the S.W. of Jebel Musa. The northernmost peak of Jebel Musa is called Ras esSufsafeh (' Head of the Willow,' probably from a tree growing in one of its gullies), and is commonly taken !

is the place of promulgation of the Law, for which it is a very striking and suitable site. The height of Sufsafeh is 6937 ft., while the south- ern peak is somewhat lower. The latter is the true holy place according to the Greek and Arab tradition. There is an ascent to it by a flight of rude steps commencing not far from the convent, and extending, with slight intermission, almost to the summit. Abditional Notb. — Objectiimg to the traditimuil site of Mt, Sinai.

— In the foregoing we have found ourselves closely in accord with the traditional view of the route of the Exodus, and of the location of Mt. Sinai. If the Israelites really went into the Sinaitic peninsula, the route and the goal of their wandering's have probably been correctly identified. We have shown that the tradition in favour of Jebei Mii^a is earlier and more constant than has generally been recognized. But the real dithculty begins with the question whether the biblical .Mt.

Sinai was in the peninsula, after all. Objection after objection has been raised under this head, and some of theui are not easy to refute. (1) The biblical references to Mt, Sinai do not seem to warrant an identification in the limits of the peninsula. Dt 12 gives a distance of 11 days from Horeb to the mountains of Seir, and this would agree well enough with the distance from Jebei Musa.

But in other passages, such as Dt 33^, Hab 3S, the contiguity between Sinai and Edom seems to be more pro* Lounced : even if we grant a certain freedom of expression to poetical passages, still such language as Dt 33^ — J" came from Sinai, And rose from Seir unto them, might, in view of Heb. parallelism of the members, imply more than that Sinai was in the direction of Seir. It might be urged In reply that the passage continues — He shined forth from Mt.

Paran, And came from Meribah Eadesh, and Paran has been commonly identified with Feiran in the peninsula. But this identification has also been questioned on account of the parallelism with Kadesh and other references. (2) Some of the places in the itinerary of Exodus have apparently been found outside the limits of the peninsula, as Elini in Elath-Eloth, and the encampment by the sea in tlie Oulf of 'Akaba. (3) Mt.

Sinai is suspiciously connected with the land of Midian, ind it has to be shown that the Sinaitic peninsula could be thus iescribcd. At the time of the Exodus it was an Egyptian province. These and other objections have been raised against the traditional theory ; their resolution depends upon the final discrimination of the dociuuents underlying the Pent, and upon the results of further archreological investigations, not only in the peninsula of Sinai but to the N. and E. of it. LiTERATtmi!.

— Robinson, BRP^i. 9011., 119 ff.; Stanley, SP 42 f. ; Palmer, Desert of the Exodus, passim ; Hull, Mount Seir, Sinai, etc., 61 flf. [all these 8ul>port the identitication of Sinai with Jebel Musa); Lepsius, Brie/e, 345 ff., 41tj; Ebei-s, Dutch Gosen zum Sinai, 302 ff. (both advocate the claims of -Mt. Serbal] ; Sayce, liCM 203 ff. (his view is discussed above). There is a full account of the controversy as to the identity of Sinai in Dillm.- Rvssel on Ex 19*. For the sacred character of Mt.

Sinai see W. R. Smith, RSi 117(.,and Smend, Alttest. Rtlinioruiges<J.:i, 82 ft. J. Rendel Harris.