DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4643#0042
ASCENT OF THE LOWER RANGE OF SINAI.
The whole career of the Israelites, from the passage of the Red Sea to their entrance into Palestine,
was a display of miracle. Yet, such is the Divine adherence to the great law of free agency, that
even Miracle was regulated by its action. The Divine Will might, obviously, at a word have transformed
the native stiff-neckedness of the Israelite into perfect obedience, have extinguished his recollections alike
of Egyptian enjoyment and Egyptian idolatry, and sent him at once into Palestine as its consecrated
possessor. But those essential results, instead of being the work of Miracle, were left to be the work
of Time. The nation was retained in the Wilderness until all the elder race had disappeared in the
course of nature; until the recollections of their house, at once of temptation and bondage, had sunk
with them into the grave; and until a new people had been formed, knowing no God but Jehovah;
trained only by His law, guided only by His presence, and prepared to triumph only in His name.
The Desert then remained a limit to them no more. The same resistless Power which had bound
up a whole nation in this sterile and awful place of discipline, threw open its barrier, and the
Israelite marched forth, invigorated in his frame by the simple life of the Wilderness, and enlightened
in his heart by its religion: a new and noble nature, prepared not only to conquer, but to govern;
not only to be the lord of Palestine, but to stand forth the model to the world.
This Sketch gives a portion of the Israelite march to Sinai. The scene is thus graphically
described:—"The black and frowning mountains before us, the outworks as it were of Sinai, rose
abrupt and rugged from their very base, eight hundred to a thousand feet in height, as if forbidding all
approach to the sanctuary within. On the west of the Pass, the cliffs bear the name of Jebel-el-
Haweit.....At 12f o'clock, we began gradually to ascend towards the foot of the Pass before us,
called by our Arabs Nukb Hawy (Windy Pass), and by Burckhardt Nukb er-Rahah, from the tract
above it. We reached the foot at a quarter past one o'clock, and dismounting, commenced the slow
and toilsome ascent along the narrow defile, about S. by E., between blackened, shattered cliffs of
granite, some eight hundred feet high, and not more than two hundred and fifty yards apart, which
every moment threaten to send down their ruins on the head of the traveller. Nor is this at all times
an empty threat; for the whole Pass is filled with large stones and rocks, the debris of those cliffs.
The bottom is a deep and narrow water-course, where the wintry torrent sweeps down with fearful
violence. A path has been made for camels along the shelving piles of rocks, partly by removing
the topmost blocks, and sometimes by laying down large stones side by side, somewhat in the manner
of a Swiss mountain-road. But although I had crossed the most rugged passes of the Alps, and made
from Chamouny the whole circuit of Mont Blanc, I never found a path so rude and difficult as that
which we were now ascending. The camels toiled slowly and painfully along, stopping frequently; so
that though it took them two hours and a quarter to reach the top of the Pass, the distance cannot be
reckoned at more than one hour."1
The Artist says, "After winding through this terrific Pass for about three hours, night closed
around us, before reaching the Plain, at the extremity of which stands the Convent. The effect of the
setting sun upon the high peaks which overhung the Pass, whilst the ravine below was enveloped in
shadow, was a sight of remarkable beauty. The pathway which wound up the face of the Mountain,
the work of a remote age, and which must have been one of prodigious labour, was now neglected and
broken by the mountain-torrents. Other parts were overgrown, and displaced by the roots of the wild
plants, which everywhere projected from the cliffs and hollows of the rocks. Huge fragments, which
had been loosened by the rains of winter, had rolled down, and choked the narrow pathway, rendering
it difficult for our small caravan to thread its course, especially when darkness overtook us."2
1 Biblical Researches, i. 1^9-
Roberts's Journal.
The whole career of the Israelites, from the passage of the Red Sea to their entrance into Palestine,
was a display of miracle. Yet, such is the Divine adherence to the great law of free agency, that
even Miracle was regulated by its action. The Divine Will might, obviously, at a word have transformed
the native stiff-neckedness of the Israelite into perfect obedience, have extinguished his recollections alike
of Egyptian enjoyment and Egyptian idolatry, and sent him at once into Palestine as its consecrated
possessor. But those essential results, instead of being the work of Miracle, were left to be the work
of Time. The nation was retained in the Wilderness until all the elder race had disappeared in the
course of nature; until the recollections of their house, at once of temptation and bondage, had sunk
with them into the grave; and until a new people had been formed, knowing no God but Jehovah;
trained only by His law, guided only by His presence, and prepared to triumph only in His name.
The Desert then remained a limit to them no more. The same resistless Power which had bound
up a whole nation in this sterile and awful place of discipline, threw open its barrier, and the
Israelite marched forth, invigorated in his frame by the simple life of the Wilderness, and enlightened
in his heart by its religion: a new and noble nature, prepared not only to conquer, but to govern;
not only to be the lord of Palestine, but to stand forth the model to the world.
This Sketch gives a portion of the Israelite march to Sinai. The scene is thus graphically
described:—"The black and frowning mountains before us, the outworks as it were of Sinai, rose
abrupt and rugged from their very base, eight hundred to a thousand feet in height, as if forbidding all
approach to the sanctuary within. On the west of the Pass, the cliffs bear the name of Jebel-el-
Haweit.....At 12f o'clock, we began gradually to ascend towards the foot of the Pass before us,
called by our Arabs Nukb Hawy (Windy Pass), and by Burckhardt Nukb er-Rahah, from the tract
above it. We reached the foot at a quarter past one o'clock, and dismounting, commenced the slow
and toilsome ascent along the narrow defile, about S. by E., between blackened, shattered cliffs of
granite, some eight hundred feet high, and not more than two hundred and fifty yards apart, which
every moment threaten to send down their ruins on the head of the traveller. Nor is this at all times
an empty threat; for the whole Pass is filled with large stones and rocks, the debris of those cliffs.
The bottom is a deep and narrow water-course, where the wintry torrent sweeps down with fearful
violence. A path has been made for camels along the shelving piles of rocks, partly by removing
the topmost blocks, and sometimes by laying down large stones side by side, somewhat in the manner
of a Swiss mountain-road. But although I had crossed the most rugged passes of the Alps, and made
from Chamouny the whole circuit of Mont Blanc, I never found a path so rude and difficult as that
which we were now ascending. The camels toiled slowly and painfully along, stopping frequently; so
that though it took them two hours and a quarter to reach the top of the Pass, the distance cannot be
reckoned at more than one hour."1
The Artist says, "After winding through this terrific Pass for about three hours, night closed
around us, before reaching the Plain, at the extremity of which stands the Convent. The effect of the
setting sun upon the high peaks which overhung the Pass, whilst the ravine below was enveloped in
shadow, was a sight of remarkable beauty. The pathway which wound up the face of the Mountain,
the work of a remote age, and which must have been one of prodigious labour, was now neglected and
broken by the mountain-torrents. Other parts were overgrown, and displaced by the roots of the wild
plants, which everywhere projected from the cliffs and hollows of the rocks. Huge fragments, which
had been loosened by the rains of winter, had rolled down, and choked the narrow pathway, rendering
it difficult for our small caravan to thread its course, especially when darkness overtook us."2
1 Biblical Researches, i. 1^9-
Roberts's Journal.