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Is Mt. Sinai the Mountain of YEHOVAH? 21

field of Edom, the earth trembled and the heavens poured, the clouds also poured water; the moun-
tains gushed [flowed] before the LORD, THIS SINAI, before the Lord God of Israel. (Verses 4-5,
NKJV).

Notice, now, the book of Psalms: "O god, when You went out before Your people, When
You marched through the wilderness, THE EARTH SHOOK; The heavens also dropped rain at the
presence of God; SINAI ITSELF WAS MOVED at the presence of God, the God of Israel." (Verse
7-8).

If we take all these verses together it becomes obvious that tremendous forces of nature
were unleashed during the time of the Exodus and the giving of the law at Sinai!

Immanuel Velikovsky, in his revolutionary work entitled Ages in Chaos, CLEARLY saw
this discovery of Beke's in the pages of the Bible:

If we do not limit ourselves to the few passages from the Book of Exodus cited in support
of the idea that MOUNT SINAI WAS A VOLCANO, the activity of which impressed the
Israelites, but turn our attention to the many other passages in the various books of the
Scriptures referring to the Exodus, we soon feel bound to make the unusual admission
that, if the words mean what they say, the scope of the catastrophe must have exceeded
by far the extent of the disturbance that could be caused by one active volcano [Sinai].
Volcanic activity spread far and wide, and MOUNT SINAI WAS BUT ONE FURNACE
in a great plain of smoking furnaces.

Earth, sea, and sky participated in the upheaval (Vol.I. Sidgwick and Jackson, London.
1977. P.19).

Beke, therefore, was not at all unreasonable when he deduced that Mount Sinai must have
been a VOLCANO. To prove his theory, Beke set out for the Sinai region in an attempt to identify
the precise peak that might have been responsible. But he returned to England disappointed after
learning that there is NOTHING CONCEIVABLY VOLCANIC about south Sinai's JEBEL
MUSA -- the traditional Mount Sinai of the Bible! Not only that, but Beke discovered the other
mountains in the Sinai peninsula are also NON-VOLCANIC!! With this in mind, Beke opted in-
stead for ARABIA as being the location of Mt. Sinai.

All down the western side of the Arabian peninsula are vast lava and ash fields known as
"HARRAS" -- evidence of massive volcanic activity in the past.

Notes James Montgomery:

In the LAND OF MIDIAN there are extensive HARRA-DISTRICTS, and to the northeast
of Medina lies that of Khaibar, famous as an oasis in pre-Muslim times....These volcanic
deposits raise the question whether the biblical language has not been inspired in some of its
descriptions by actual VOLCANIC OUTBURSTS.

Montgomery goes on to relate:

The Berean Voice September-October 2002