A wavy, sea-like plain, its surface rolling in
billowy hills, two clusters of mountains islanded in the distance—one
cluster grouping itself round the serrated and shattered crown of Serbal,
the other towering up before us in vast forms, beyond the most distant
of which we knew was the sacred "Mount of God;"—such was the character
of the scenery in the Wady Es Sheikh, on which we were travelling from
Feiran to Sinai. We journeyed amidst these tangled hills towards the
latter mountain-group, drawing ever nearer and nearer, until at last the
noble Wady ran along its very skirts. Yet there seemed at first, to our
eye, no entrance into its secret labyrinths; for, as far as we could
see, it was surrounded by an unbroken wall of rock, that in a low line
of blackened granite, about 800 feet high, girdled round the whole of
the inner and grander masses. As we rode for some time along this vast
inclosure, and realised that the sacred Horeb-altar of the lawgiving was
there, withdrawn far within, we felt, indeed, as if encircling the outer
walls of a mighty temple. Nor was this feeling a bit lessened, when
suddenly we turned into the majestic portal of natural rock, where, as
if cut for it by the chisel of a great king, the road, as even as an
avenue, passed through a cleft about forty feet wide, on either side of
which rose the frowning gateway of weather-stained and gloomy granite.
It was, indeed, an imposing, nay, even solemnising approach to the
sacred shrine of our pilgrimage. But this gateway has an interest for us
of a more distinct character. In all likelihood it was here, or in the
immediate neighbourhood, that Rephidim was, with its smitten rock, and
the battle with Amalek. There are two circumstances in the history that
lead us to this determination. We know, first, from Exod. xix. 2, that
Hephidim was at least a day's journey from the Mount of God; and,
secondly, from Exod. xvii. 6, that the rock in Rephidim was at the same
time a rock in Horeb. If Horeb, then, be assumed as the general name for
the whole group of mountains of which Sinai was one, we have to find a
place where the Israelites would be a day's march from Sinai, and yet
close to the same range of hills. Now, we have at the point mentioned,
such a locality, where the Israelites would be thus a day's march from
the Mount, and yet where they would naturally, and for the first time,
reach the cluster of Horeb. It may therefore have been this very rock
which was struck, and around which the multitudes gathering, with
parched lips, eagerly bent to quench their burning thirst from the cool
and copious stream. It does now seem strange, as the traveller gazes on
that bare and silent hill of granite, recalling, at the same time, the
words of St Paul, "And that rock was Christ," to realise the difference
between the earthly and the heavenly, the material and spiritual. How
emptied of all glory is the one, how real the other! The contrast is
indeed great between the thought of the thousands in the world who are
learning living lessons from what is pictured, and that everyday-looking
lonely rock around which the association has been hung. One is made thus
to feel the deep fitness of God's whole Word for man, as he sees how
common are the features of the outer history, and knows how the events
have yet woven themselves into human life in all ages. As he gazes, for
instance, on the green "lasaf," the hyssop of the wilderness, clinging
to the bare walls of solitary valleys, and thinks of the millions who,
in their deep sinfulness, still breathe the old prayer of Israel, "Purge
me with hyssop, and I, shall be clean." If this, then, be Rephidim, we
must believe that the battle with Amalek took place also in this
neighbourhood. It was probably outside of the rock-gateway we have
described, and in the comparatively open country around it, that Israel
fought their first combat, and learned to trust the God of Battles. If
so, then we can well imagine how it may have been on the summit of this
very barrier hill [The word "Gibeah," hill, in contradistinction to "Hor,"
mountain, is as strictly applicable to this hill, or, indeed, to any of
the lower hills in its neighbourhood, as to the rocky eminence of Paran
in the Wady Feiran.] of granite that Moses stood, with on either side
Aaron and Hur—the great leader, and the great priest—while below them
surged the doubtful line of conflict. From morning till sunset did they
mark the fierce onset of Amalek—doubtless similar in its character to
that of their almost unchanged descendants—the wild Arab charge, the
gleam and flutter of the tufted lances, the mingled shouts of war and
screams of pain!—"And it came to pass, when Moses held up his hand, that
Israel prevailed; and when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed;"
until, at last, statue-like in his firm attitude, and as some great
intercessor, he appealed to God, holding to heaven the banner of His
power, the tide of war was turned, the red sun set on the red field of
slaughter, and the altar Jehovah-nissi was erected at once for triumph
and thanksgiving.
Passing through the great natural gateway which we
have described, we entered at once the great mountain-cluster of Horeb.
We were again amidst vast granite ranges, and advancing by a broad and
majestic avenue towards Sinai. A ride of an hour or two brought us to a
point where three or four wadys meet, forming an open among the hills.
Here stands the tomb of Sheikh Saleh, a low, rude hut of stones, but
reverenced as their most sacred shrine by the Arabs of the Peninsula. We
dismounted, and entered the building. There was nothing inside in the
way of ornament, or to shew that the Arabs were disposed to be
extravagant in their expressions of respect for the memory of the dead
Sheikh, whoever he may have been. A few scraps of soiled linen, and
handkerchiefs and camel-halters, formed the sole adornments; and these
were presented, I suppose, as votive offerings, for diseases cured, or
camels saved from breaking down in awkward places. Around the rude hut
were one or two graves, where, as in consecrated ground, were deposited
the remains of devout Towara. Once a year the open plain, in which
stands the tomb, is filled with the black tents of the tribe ; for from
all parts of the peninsula they then assemble here to perform some sort
of religious service in honour of their saint—but of what nature I know
not, as an Arab's religion is about as invisible an adjunct of his
existence as need be. Theoretically, it seems to be to link Mohammed on
to every age and individual history, from "Mousa" downwards; and,
practically, to be useful for asseverating the most honest motives
before discussing the terms of a bargain in which he is resolved to
cheat if he can.
When we had examined the tomb, and again resumed our
journey, one or two of our escort stayed behind to pray. I think it was
the only time I saw them thus engaged during our whole journey.
Leaving a more open country behind us, we now entered
on that long stretch of the Wady Es Sheikh, which leads up to the Plain
Er Rahah and the Mount of God. We were now only eight miles from Sinai,
and before us ran this great avenue—like some vast cathedral aisle, by
which we were aproaching the still vaster and more solemn altar. In
about an hour. we caught our first view of the Gebel Mousa. For as. the
Wady Sebaiyeh opened up on our left, (of which more anon,) we saw at its
further end, the high top of Sinai—a bold crown of rock, with the
mountain not sloping, but falling down at once from its summit in a vast
precipice. In a minute or two we again lost sight of it, and continued
on in the same great Wady Es Sheikh for about an hour, when at last we
emerged on the noble plain of Er Rahah, beheld the famed cliffs of
Safsafeh frowning above us, and encamped by the so-called Hill of the
Golden Calf. It was now about two in the afternoon, so considering it
impossible to attempt the mountain that day, we determined to devote the
rest of it to a visit to the Convent of St Catherine. The point where we
were encamped was at the mouth of the valley in which the convent
stands, called after the old Sheikh of Midian—the Wady Shouaib, or of
Jethro. It runs up from the plain Er Rahah, towards Gebel Mousa, with
the vast shoulders of that mountain enclosing it on the right, while the
bare rocks of the Gebel ed Deir are on the left. The summit of Gebel
Mousa, or the traditionary scene of the lawgiving, is quite concealed
from the view by these shoulders which I have described, and it is not
until you have gone as far as the convent, more than a mile up the
valley, that it is visible. We found, to our astonishment, a regular
road, almost macadamised, leading up from the Er Rahah to the convent,
and which appeared to us, as the sea-weed did to Columbus—a harbinger of
humanity further on. The "House of the Desert" is nobly situated, with
its massive and quaint pile of gray battlements rising abruptly and
boldly on the first rocky slope of Mount Sinai. As we drew near it, the
green plot of garden-ground, the dark cypress trees, mingled with the
fresher colouring of the fig and almond, afforded quite a new and most
grateful contrast to the bare desolation of the wilderness. I had been
reading that morning, while riding my camel, Stanley's description of
the great convent of Justinian, "with its massive walls, its gorgeous
church hung with banners, its galleries of chapels, of cells, and of
guest-chambers, its library of precious manuscripts, the sound of its
rude cymbals calling to prayer, and changed by the echoes into music, as
it rolls through the desert valley—the double standard of the Lamb
and Cross floating high upon its topmost towers." This last touch,
in spite of our experience of the writer's almost invariable accuracy,
was, of course, put down to poetical licence, and we thought it a very
fair and excusable flourish. But at our first glimpse of the convent,
there, to be sure, we beheld a broad red flag floating lazily "high upon
its topmost towers." I confess 1 felt a throb when I saw this. There
seemed something of the old days of the Crusaders in that gray Christian
fortress thus hanging out its defiant banner in the face of Paynim and
Moslem. The horror of the denouement may, however, be imagined,
when drawing nearer, within a few hundred yards of the house, a stronger
air rolled out in a heavy flap the stars and stripes of our dear cousin
Jonathan. Finding little Tomkins seated in the lap of Memnon, or Joe
Smith smoking his cigar in the sarcophagus of the sacred Apis, was
nothing to this. But what could it mean? Had General Walker, tired of
Panama, brought his filibusters to colonise the Er Rahah? Or had the
Greek monks, in some dream of their constant sleep, thought of an
"annexation" and "plumping" for Douglass? Ought we to go near the
convent at all? What if, instead of Christian greeting we find revolvers
and bowie-knives?—instead of the clash of " the rude cymbals calling to
prayer," we find ourselves "gouged" to the tune of "Yankee
Doodle?" The mystery was not solved till we heard our names called by an
old transatlantic friend we had met in Egypt, who, with no waistcoat on,
but with an exquisite shirt-front and diamond studs, sat smoking a
little black pipe of "Virginny" under his own flag, which he had thus
hoisted on " the topmost tower," in order that he might have the
gratification of informing the wilderness that a "citizen of the Yew-nited
States" was "calculating" within her territory. Dear fellow! I
believe that was the first happy day he had spent since he left Cairo ;
and as he cast a glance now up at the flag, and now up at the vast
solitary mountain-top, he was evidently "guessing" that that day was a
proud day for Mount Sinai.
And now that we were under the high walls of the
fortress, the question was, how to get in. At the highest part there was
a little covered stage, with a windlass and a rope dangling from it,
such as one sees on the side of a cotton mill at home, but no door was
visible. The primitive and feudal appearance of the whole place made one
almost expect to find a horn hanging, on which, as true pilgrims, we
might summon the warder to the walls. In absence, however, of the
ancient horn, and there being neither modern bell nor knocker, we
shouted lustily, and in a short time a little, old, wizened, cross,
dirty face presented itself at the windlass. We passed up to him our
commendatory letter from Cairo; and while the old man shuffled off to
read it, we ensconced ourselves to lunch under the walls. A crowd of
lean, hungry Arabs,
the servants of the monks, gathered round us, ready
to pounce on all fragments, worrying up any stray orange-peel, and
crunching the chicken bones like dogs. As we finished, the padre again
appeared, and requested to know how we wished to enter. He informed us
that there was a door near the garden, and the windlass, and to make our
choice. Preferring the old-fashioned way of the rope, I asked the old
monk to lower it for me ; and so down it came with a stick tied to it to
act as seat. Getting stride-legs on the stick, the signal was given to
haul, when two stout fellows began slowly and solemnly to wind me up
like the weight of a clock. The barrel of the windlass was very small,
and they were very lazy, so that I had full time to enjoy the process.
Slowly, higher and higher, now spinning round and round, now swinging
hitch against the wall, with all the sensations which I can conceive a
bale of cotton to have when subjected to a similar operation, I was
pulled gradually up to a level with the cross, dirty, old monk, and by
him hooked in and landed. And when in, what a strange spot is this same
convent!—a perfect hive of buildings!—a multum in parvo!—a little
city, with its houses, churches, streets —all squeezed within the four
walls of a not very large edifice. In the centre, the long-pointed roof
of the church rose beside the minaret of a mosque, and all about were
labyrinths of galleries, and wooden stairs, balconies, dormitories,
mysterious-looking passages, and numberless little gables and angular
pieces of roofing. When I had joined my friends who had entered by the
garden-door, we were led into a comfortable room, where, seated on
divans, we were regaled by the monks with palm-wine, date-bread, and
coffee. A young monk attended us, whose whole stock of language, beside
his native Greek, consisted of about twenty words of Italian and six of
Arabic. Mustering up as much Attic as I could, I informed him that I was
a "Diakonos" of the Church as well as he, when he became very kind, came
over and took me by the hand, and commenced leading me by it, like a
child, to see the convent. A most inhuman noise, as if a multitude of
old iron pots were being extremely ill used, startled him however from
his amiable task; and as we concluded that the sound proceeded from "the
rude cymbals calling to prayer," we went up to see them. High up on the
battlements, under a long low roof, we found suspended a lump of metal
and a beam of wood, about ten feet in length, on the latter of which an
athletic acolyte was labouring with all his might, swinging a huge
hammer as at a forge, while another servitor kept up a running
accompaniment in the shape of a sort of kettle-tinkering fantasia
per-formed ad libitum with a smaller hammer on the piece of
metal. The combined sound was deafening and perfectly distracting, nor
could I imagine a better defence for the convent against any enemy with
ears, than to keep the cymbals going. They say there are no fleas in St
Catherine's; if so, I can divine the cause, for I am certain no
respectable flea could possibly put up with this frequent disturbance.
When the last echo of the wood and iron had died away, the clash of a
bell summoned us to vespers, and we went down to the chapel. We found
the chapel a fine, massive building, rich in mosaics, silver lamps,
curious Byzantine pictures, and deliciously cool, still, and peaceful,
after the hot sun and the cymbals. 1 felt happy in the prospect of
worshipping once more with a Christian community, and was prepared to
overlook many differences. The ceremony was, of course, according to the
Greek ritual, but alas! performed with such irreverence and
indifference, that I found it impossible to associate the least idea of
devotion with what was going on. The Litany was repeated as fast as
possible, and in that nasal twang, harsh and reedy, which is, I think,
peculiar to the Eastern Church. The "Kyrie Eleison" (Lord, have mercy on
us) was poured forth thirty or forty times at once, with a rapidity of
utterance that was at once marvellous and horrible. Taking a long
breath, the priest began it in a high pitch, and ran on, gradually
coming down the gamut, until, wind failing him, he ended it in a sort of
mournful drone, like the last note of an exhausted bagpipe. But what was
still more abominable, was a little scene which occurred when the time
came for the lessons. There were two reading-desks, one on either side
of the chapel, and turned towards the altar. At one desk it was the duty
of a monk to read the prayers, and another was stationed at the other
for the gospels. After a great deal of searching for the lesson for the
day, the reader at the latter desk began in a loud key, intoning through
his nose like a boy at a country school. He had not gone very far,
however, when his brother monk at the opposite desk, stopped him
abruptly, evidently informing him that he was at the wrong place. This,
the first seemed to deny, and there they stood arguing fiercely, while
the whole service was interrupted; until the second, bustling across the
floor, turned the right place angrily up, and set his learned brother on
again, at the old see-saw pitch. The only really interesting feature in
the service was to hear the Gospels and Epistles read in the original
Greek. After the prayers and lessons were ended, a very curious ceremony
took place. A low table being placed on the floor, there was laid on it
a good quantity of bread divided into portions, and round the bread were
stuck a number of lighted candles. A sort of chant was then begun, a
small procession formed, and the whole fraternity marched round and
round the table. When the bread had been thus blessed sufficiently, each
monk took his portion with him and retired.
In company with our old friend, who, again taking me
by the hand as a brother "Diakonos," led me in front, we proceeded to
inspect the convent. In the library were numerous manuscripts, evidently
very ancient, some of which we examined, but could make nothing of. Had
we been able to value it, there is no saying but we might then have had
in our hands the magnificent manuscript which Tischendorf has since
discovered, and so have forestalled him in his brilliant achievement.
But as it was, we, in our ignorance, knew not the treasure that was near
us. In the library we found a strange old man, towards whom the younger
monks seemed to entertain a deep respect, and were evidently anxious to
hear him converse with us, but he at first pretended ignorance of every
language but that of his native Boeotia. By and by, however, a casual
observation elicited an unwary remark on his part in Italian, and when
once the ice was broken, we found him a master of that language, as well
as of French and German. He told us that he had been connected with a
church choir in Vienna, had travelled much, seen much, and had come here
to die. He seemed to shun the society of the other monks; and there was
altogether that about him which indicated that his history had been a
curious and a sad one. He invited me into his little dormitory, and
shewed me one or two lovely little pictures, and an English hymn-book
that had been presented to him by a Scotch minister. He seemed in a
state of cynical indifference to everything, could not tell what were
all the hours of prayer, without referring to another monk, and seemed
heartily glad when we left him. After seeing numerous chapels and
dormitories, and the other lions within the convent, we proceeded to the
garden to enjoy, amidst these sterile wastes, the trees, and plants, and
flowers, that are there so lovingly tended by these exiles of Zante and
Euboea. It was indeed deliciously refreshing to. see apple-trees, and
pears, and vines, and fig-trees; but the monks evidently considered this
sight nothing in comparison with a visit to their charnel-house, which
is placed in the garden. Here, in a dark catacomb, are preserved the
bones of departed monks; all the arms parcelled here, the legs there,
the ribs in another place, while the sacred bones of the superior clergy
are kept by themselves in little wooden boxes. When a monk dies, he is
stretched on an iron grating in another cellar, and remains there for
two or three years, until the flesh having all departed, he is broken up
and distributed as I have mentioned. However disgusting the spectacle
was to us, it seemed to be looked on with great satisfaction by the
brethren— the prospect of themselves being thus piecemealed, and
literally shelved, being evidently highly appreciated by them. And these
are the representatives of Christianity among the Arabs ! Shut up within
their own walls, lazy, ignorant, cheating, utterly useless, and utterly
soured, they seemed more like the inhabitants of a penal settlement,
than the members of a Christian community placed in the midst of pagans.
Here, as in many another place, one is made painfully to feel that the
greatest obstructions to the advance of the gospel are Christians
themselves ; for certainly as it is represented to Jew and Mohammedan by
the Coptic, Greek, or Armenian Churches, there is not much to commend
our faith.
In the evening we returned to our tents at the Hill
of the Golden Calf, and when the sun had set, we strolled up the wide,
silent plain of Er Rahah. It was only when we had thus gone for some
distance up in front of it, that the true character of the Ras Safsafeh
was seen by us. Travellers usually approach Sinai from Feiran by the
Nakb el Hawie—the Pass of the Winds—and thus entering Er Rahah at its
further end, have the advantage of seeing the Safsafeh form the first,
in all its glory, rising abruptly like a vast altar, at the east end of
the magnificent plain, which slopes down to its base. As we, however,
advanced to it from the Wady Es Sheikh, and so scarcely saw it until we
were encamped at its base, the peak, which is supposed by many to have
been the scene of the lawgiving, was lost to our eyes in the confusion
of other summits. But when we had thus gone for some distance up the Er
Rahah, we could easily conceive the strict accuracy of the description
which Stanley gives of the appearance of these cliffs in drawing slowly
near them from the west. ''Far in the bosom of the mountains before us,
I saw the well-known shapes of the cliffs which form the front of Sinai.
At each successive advance, these cliffs disengaged themselves from the
intervening and surrounding hills, and at last they stood out—I should
rather say the columnar mass which they form, stood out alone against
the sky. On each side, the infinite complications of twisted and jagged
mountains fell away from it. On each side the sky encompassed it round,
as though it were alone in the wilderness. And to this great mass we
approached through a wide valley, a long-continued plain, which,
enclosed as it was between the precipitous mountain-ranges of yellow and
black granite, and having always at its end this prodigious mountain
block, I could compare to nothing else than the immense avenue—the 'dromos,'
as it is technically called, through which the approach was made to the
great Egyptian temples!"
It seemed to our eyes, too, in the dim twilight, with
its deep and gloomy scaurs seaming it from base to summit, and fronted
by the wide and solitary plain, on whose surface and surrounded by the
vast mountain walls, you felt shrivelled into insignificance, to be
indeed a suitable scene for the imposing solemnities of the lawgiving.
And it was with a sense of deep awe that in the still moonlight we again
returned under the awful shadow of the dark cliffs—and ere we retired
for rest, gazed up on those bare and silent masses, rising high into the
starry sky, whose rocks we knew had once echoed to the voice of the
great thunderings, when "even that Sinai itself was moved at the
presence of the Lord, the God of Israel." A.