DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4643#0044
Lraiara nMutsaeci
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Laborde describes his course, towards the summit of Sinai, as lying through a ravine to the south-west.
The Monks had originally arranged a series of slabs in tolerably regular order, which once formed a
convenient staircase to the top of the Mountain. The rains, however, disturbed them, and as no repairs
have for a long time been attended to, the stairs are in many places in ruins. On approaching the foot
of Sinai, and immediately before quitting Horeb, the traveller sees a door built in the form of an arch;
on the key-stone of the arch, a cross has been carved. An affecting custom used to take place near
this door; one of the Monks of the Convent stationed himself there in prayer, and heard the confessions
of the pilgrims, who, when thus nearly at the end of their pilgrimage, were not in the habit of
accomplishing it until after they had obtained absolution. Laborde passed a similar door, before arriving
at the spot, whence he discovered the summit of Sinai, and the two edifices which surmount it.1
The condition of the staircase appears since to have grown more ruinous, for the Artist, twenty
years afterwards, observes, " In many places the steps have given way, and rolled down, and, at the time
when we ascended, the snow lay deep in the places sheltered from the sun, and the way was so slippery
from the ice, as to render the ascent not only a work of great difficulty, but of some danger."2 Those
steps are of great antiquity, and appear to have been constructed at least as early as the time of the
first devotees who established themselves in the Mountains of the Wilderness.
' Journey to Mount Sinai.
" Roberts's Journal.
■ '^4*4-
A^^mmT
M H
:r
>1F ISSfAIIo
Laborde describes his course, towards the summit of Sinai, as lying through a ravine to the south-west.
The Monks had originally arranged a series of slabs in tolerably regular order, which once formed a
convenient staircase to the top of the Mountain. The rains, however, disturbed them, and as no repairs
have for a long time been attended to, the stairs are in many places in ruins. On approaching the foot
of Sinai, and immediately before quitting Horeb, the traveller sees a door built in the form of an arch;
on the key-stone of the arch, a cross has been carved. An affecting custom used to take place near
this door; one of the Monks of the Convent stationed himself there in prayer, and heard the confessions
of the pilgrims, who, when thus nearly at the end of their pilgrimage, were not in the habit of
accomplishing it until after they had obtained absolution. Laborde passed a similar door, before arriving
at the spot, whence he discovered the summit of Sinai, and the two edifices which surmount it.1
The condition of the staircase appears since to have grown more ruinous, for the Artist, twenty
years afterwards, observes, " In many places the steps have given way, and rolled down, and, at the time
when we ascended, the snow lay deep in the places sheltered from the sun, and the way was so slippery
from the ice, as to render the ascent not only a work of great difficulty, but of some danger."2 Those
steps are of great antiquity, and appear to have been constructed at least as early as the time of the
first devotees who established themselves in the Mountains of the Wilderness.
' Journey to Mount Sinai.
" Roberts's Journal.