The real location of Mount Sinai

Consult with a biblical scholar or geographer, and you will hear about other locations such as Mount Sin Bishar and Mount Helal in the peninsula, Jebel al-Madhbah at Petra in Jordan, Jabal al-Lawz in northwest Saudi Arabia, and Hashem el-Tarif near the Israeli city of Eilat.

But review the Torah itself, the actual document given by G-d on Mount Sinai, and you will find no reference to the exact location. You will learn what happened when G-d spoke directly to the Jewish people, but not where. What is more, the many commentators on Torah seldom discuss it either.

This anomaly was troubling for an Israeli soldier named Moshe Berhab, who examined the issue further when he had the opportunity to visit the Jabal Mousa location in 1956. This was after Israel captured the Sinai peninsula during the Sinai War to end the Egyptian blockage of Israeli shipments through the Straits of Tiran.

Berhab had fought in that battle and was excited to stand on the ground where our forefathers gathered some 3,300 years ago. He was possibly walking on the same Earth where our people became a nation and received the Ten Commandments.

Upon climbing up the mountain, he expected to feel spiritual enlightenment or divine energy. Instead, he felt none of that and was left with deep disappointment. Upon his safe return home and in search of an explanation, Berhab wrote a letter to the Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of blessed memory.

The Rebbe wrote back a letter (published in Igros Kodesh 14, page 495) pointing out that the word Torah is rooted in the Hebrew word hora’ah, meaning instruction and a roadmap on how to live life.

The Rebbe explained that it is called the Torah of life and the eternal Torah (Toras Chaim and Toras Olam). This means that it is an eternal teaching that is binding for every Jew in every generation at any time and location. And it is through that that we are an eternal nation.

The Rebbe continued, “The importance of Mount Sinai is the Torah that we received upon it, once the Torah becomes part of our life. But the physical identification of the mountain does not have any special significance.”

Other commentators explain that had the Torah been given in an urban and perhaps more appropriate setting, such as the holy city of Jerusalem or Hebron, it could have been reduced to a specific class in society, period and space.

Instead, it was given on a mountain surrounded by open land to teach that everyone has equal access to follow its timeless wisdom and the right to practice its divine teachings. Once the Torah was given, Mount Sinai went on to live through us.

My friend, author Rabbi Eli Wolff, commented that if you are asked what is the exact location of Mount Sinai, you can easily point to your own heart. That is where your soul resides and your soul is intrinsically bound to the Torah.

The upcoming holiday of Shavuot (the evening of Tuesday, June 11, through Thursday June 13) commemorates the date when G-d gave the Torah to the Jewish people at Mount Sinai. The custom is for men, women and children to hear the reading of the Ten Commandments at the synagogue. Why? Because we need Mount Sinai there and you are the only one who can bring it.