TRADITION - B - Mount Sinai

My most sincere thanks to Michelle and the rest of the family.

This map is about the same as you would find in any Bible that has a map section in it. This purports to be a map showing the route of the children of Israel as they followed Moses out of Egypt. On closer inspection of this map, we can see a number of irregularities, irregularities that are common to most of the Bible maps portraying the exodus route.

Notice the names of the places along the route; PiHaHiroth, Marah, Elim, Dophkah, Rephidim and finally Mt. Sinai, and on to Ezion-geber. But, is that what we see? If we take another look will we see more? Will we see the names of the places again, or will we see: PiHaHiroth?, Marah?, Elim?, Dophkah?, Rephidim? and finally Mt. Sinai? Every name for every location along the way has a question mark after the name. Well, they're honest anyway.

I've had a similar map in the Bible I've had for 40 years, and now you know who produced that Bible, don't you? The same people who produced the map above. This came from one of their sites, but the map above and the one in my old Bible are no different than the 'exodus' map in most Bibles, even today. They all use the words; "Possible route of the Exodus" in the legend. That's because they have no idea where the route went.

I'd like to say that the reason they don't know where the exodus route went is because they haven't read the Bible, and if I said that I would be absolutely correct, but there is another reason, and her name is Helena. You guessed it. Constantine's mommy strikes again. The location of Mount Sinai was just one more place on her tour. She looked up at the mountains to the south and declared that it was the mountain known as Sinai in the Old Testament.

Now, who's going to argue with the mother of the emperor of the empire? Nobody.

Hundreds of years have passed since that time, and most people still think that's where Mount Sinai was/is. When a name was chosen for the peninsula where those mountains stand, Sinai was the name, and we're still calling it that. But, Moses and the children of Israel didn't go anywhere near that place on their exodus from Egypt. How can we be so sure?

Let's test our understanding of the events leading up to their departure from bondage in Egypt. When Moses killed an Egyptian and ran away from Pharaoh, where did he go?

"Now when Pharaoh heard this thing, he sought to slay Moses.
But Moses fled from the face of Pharaoh, and dwelt in the land
of Midian: and he sat down by a well." (Exodus 2:15)

He dwelt in the land of Midian? He tended sheep for his new father-in-law, and one day:

"Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father in law, the priest of
Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came
to the mountain of God, even to Horeb." (Exodus 3:1)

That's where he met God in the burning bush.

"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)

And God gave Moses a task to perform.

"And he said, Certainly I will be with thee; and this shall be a
token unto thee, that I have sent thee: When thou hast
brought forth the people out of Egypt, ye shall serve
God upon this mountain." (Exodus 3:12)

When they finally left Egypt, Moses and the Israelites headed straight for that mountain, just like God had directed. That's where they were when God gave Moses the tablets of stone. It took them quite a while to get out of Egypt, but once they were out of Egypt, it was only a short time before they arrived at the mountain. They left Goshen on the 15th day of the 1st month, and:

"In the third month, when the children of Israel were gone forth out
of the land of Egypt, the same day came they into the wilderness of
Sinai. For they were departed from Rephidim, and were come to
the desert of Sinai, and had pitched in the wilderness; and
there Israel camped before the mount. " (Exodus 19:1)

Now, once again, where was that mountain located? Let's see; what are the facts?

They had finally left Egypt: (Exodus 19:1)
They were at the base of the holy mountain: (Exodus 19:1)
God's holy mountain was near to where Moses tended sheep: (Exodus 3:1)
Moses tended sheep for his father-in-law, the priest of Midian: (Exodus 3:1)
Moses, his wife and his father-in-law lived in Midian: (Exodus 2:15, 3:1-2)

Midian must be outside of Egypt, but where is it? Let's look at our map again. There is no question mark by the name 'Midian'. There is no doubt as to where it was.

It's down in the lower, right-hand part of the map. The name, MIDIAN, is written vertically.

That's it; you found it. Did you notice that the land of Midian is not part of the Sinai Peninsula? The land of Midian is on the other side of the gulf of Aqaba from the Sinai Peninsula. The land of Midian is part of Saudi Arabia, but it's only in the 20th century that it was called 'Saudi' Arabia. That's because in the 20th century, the house of Saud became the ruling family there. I have a map of that area that was made in 1950, and shows it as "Arabia; house of Saud".

The land of Midian has been part of Arabia for a long time. Midian is where Mount Sinai/Horeb is located still today, but we knew that didn't we. The apostle Paul used Mount Sinai in an allegory he wrote to the believers in Galatia:

"For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answers to Jerusalem
which now is, and is in bondage with her children." (Galatians 4:25)

We all remember the miraculous event that happened to the Israelites on their way to Mount Sinai; God parted the waters of the Red Sea. Did you happen to see on the map that the "possible route" of the exodus didn't cross the Red Sea. Oh, this particular map shows the route going across some river or lake right at the beginning of the trip, but we just read that they were close to Mount Sinai before they finally got out of Egypt. (Exodus 19:1)

The place they crossed the Red Sea has to be part of the Red Sea, not some dippy little river or lake. And, the crossing site has to be relatively close to Mount Sinai in the land of Midian. They crossed the gulf of Aqaba, the Eastern extension of the Red Sea. We know that the Gulf of Aqaba is part of the Red Sea because of what we can read in scripture. Look at the map, and find the port of Ezion-geber on the Northern tip of the gulf of Aqaba. Now look what scripture says about that port city.

"And king Solomon made a navy of ships in Eziongeber, which is beside
Eloth, on the shore of the Red sea, in the land of Edom." (1st Kings 9:26)

Scripture tells us that Solomon built his navy on the Red Sea port of Eziongeber. The children of Israel watched as God parted the waters of the gulf of Aqaba, and they they walked on dry land, from Egypt to the land of Midian (in Arabia). They walked all the way across the so called Sinai Peninsula, arrived at the gulf of Aqaba, watched God part the water and walked across into the land of Midian.

Peter wrote:

"Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers,
walking after their own lusts, And saying, Where is the promise of
his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as
they were from the beginning of the creation. For this they willingly
are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and
the earth standing out of the water and in the water" (2nd Peter 3:3-5)

Last days scoffers are willingly ignorant (dumb on purpose) of God's truth. They deny the Biblical account of the parting of the Red Sea on the grounds that they can't find any evidence of the villages and artifacts that they should be able to find if the story were actually true. Why can't they find any evidence? I like to tell a story to illustrate the problem.

An young woman, walking down a dark street one night came upon a man crawling around on his hands and knees under the sole street light within a hundred yards. She question him; "What are you doing down there?" "I'm looking for a fifty-dollar bill I dropped" he replied. "Where did you drop it?" she continued. "Over there about fifty feet away." he snapped. "Well, why are you looking here?" she mocked him. Stupid response: "Because the light is better'.

The scoffers are not looking in the right place. Someone shined a light on the southern end of the Egyptian peninsula, so they are looking there to find evidence. They haven't read the book. They're just looking where the light was shining for centuries.

Who shined that light the first time? Helena. Constantine's mommy. She was wrong.

And so, we see that, once again tradition gets in the way of what God's word says, and many people would just as soon hang on to tradition as be bothered with the facts. But, what is ever so much worse; Those who have taught that Mount Sinai is at the southern end of the peninsula so named, oppose recognizing the facts presented in the Bible text because they don't want to look like they were wrong.

Now, that never happens. Or does it?

We owe a debt of thanks to Mr. Ron Wyatt, an amateur archeologist who first discovered the real Mount Sinai in Arabia, and the site for the crossing of the Red Sea. This gentle, 7th-Day Adventist man has been slandered and blackballed by none other than the Christian Churches of America and their pastors, who would rather deny his findings than admit that they have taught it all wrong for decades. Heaven forbid that a 7th-Day Adventist be the one God would use to bring the truth to the evangelical churches. May God rest his soul. He went to be with the Lord in the late 1990s. My thanks to him personally, and to his family who continues to take this truth to the world.