THE SANCTUARY OF SERABIT
THE existence of the sanctuary at Serabit in Sinai was unknown to
Europeans till the year 1762, when it was chanced upon by Carsten
Niebuhr, who did not, however, record its name. Seetzen who visited it
between 1809 and 1810 noted this as Serrabit-el-Chadem.[20] _Sarbat_ is
Arabic for height, _khadem_ signifies slave. But Prof. Sayce claims for
the name a different derivation. In ancient Egyptian _ba_, plur. _bit_,
signifies hole or mine, _khetem_ signifies fortress. Serabit el Khadem
thus signifies mine fortress, with the prefix _sar_, which probably
stands for exalted.
Other place names in the district probably date from the ancient
Egyptians also. Thus the valley leading up from the coastal plain of El
Markha to the mine district is called Wadi Baba, _i.e._ mine valley.
Again, a tributary of the Baba, with its valley head close to Serabit,
is the Wadi Bateh, a name which probably includes the word for mine
also.
The sanctuary of Serabit[21] at the outset consisted of a cave, or
rather of two caves adjacent to one another, of which the larger, which
has been squared, measures 20 by 10 feet, the smaller one measures 6
by 4 feet with three steps leading up to a round-headed apse or recess
(Fig. 9).
These caves have separate entrances and lie in a knoll facing a plateau
in the midst of wild, upland scenery. The plateau lies some 2680 feet
above sea level, and is difficult of access on all sides (Fig. 6).
To the north it communicates with the Wadi Suweig along the steep and
tortuous Wadi Dhaba, which is marked number 6 on the map. The word
_dhaba_ signifies panther, probably in allusion to the feline animal
which was at one time associated with the presiding female divinity at
Serabit. Another valley, marked number 7 on the map, leads up to the
temple ruins, with a path passing the mines which contain inscriptions
in an early Semitic script. But it was not along these gorges, but
along a path leading up from the plain El Markha along the Wadi Baba
and the Wadi Nasb that the ancient Egyptians approached the sanctuary.
This path has been included in the Ordnance Survey of 1871. A rock
tablet marked P on the map, which commemorates the Pharaoh Amen-em-hat
IV (XII 7), lies near the watershed, and this shows that the Egyptians
passed here. A small Egyptian shrine (Q) was also discovered at the
western end of the plateau.
To the south of the plateau, and separated from it by several ravines
and valley heads, extends the Wadi Umm Agraf which is comparatively
remote from the valleys communicating with the Wadi Suweig and the Wadi
Baba, and relatively close to the sanctuary. The approach to the temple
from this side was unknown to Europeans till the winter of 1905-6,
when Prof. Flinders Petrie and his party, who worked at excavating the
temple ruins, pitched their tents here. A path was constructed from the
camp up the mountain side to the temple by clearing away the stones. In
parts an old path was re-used, the existence of which showed that there
was at one time frequent intercourse between the sanctuary and the Wadi
Umm Agraf. Some way down the Wadi Umm Agraf the valley floor is crossed
by a wall made of rough stones piled together, the purpose of which was
to mark off the upper reaches of the Wadi as is seen by a glance at the
map. These upper reaches evidently constituted a tract of land the use
of which was reserved to the sanctuary. A copious supply of good water
is obtainable at a well some miles down the valley. The separation
wall across the valley is undoubtedly old. A similar wall crosses the
Wadi Maghara, which was dated by Prof. Petrie to at least the Fourth
Dynasty. Its purpose, like that near Serabit, was to mark off the
upper reaches of the valley, which in this case may have represented
the _hima_ or tract of land that was originally appropriated to the
sanctuary of the moon-god.
[Illustration: VALLEYS OF SERABIT EL KHADEM
Fig. 6—Sanctuary surroundings at Serabit. (Petrie: _Researches in
Sinai_.)]
The plateau of Serabit falls away abruptly on its southern and western
edge, and the stratum here appears which anciently yielded turquoise.
The wish to control access to this turquoise no doubt originally led
to the permanent occupation of the caves, and we shall probably not be
far wrong if we imagine this in the possession of a clan or hereditary
priesthood, who, in return for offerings brought to their cave, gave
turquoise or the permission to work it inside the appropriated area.
The offerings brought to the cave naturally led to a sacrifice and
feast which, in the course of time, would hallow the precincts of the
place. Prof. Robertson Smith remarked that almost every sacred site in
Palestine had its cavern or grotto which served to store the vessels
and utensils that were used at the sacrifice that took place near it.
No religious significance originally attached to the cave. But the
holiness of the sacrifice reflected on it, and in the course of time it
was identified as the abode of the divinity.[22]
The plateau in front of the caves at Serabit served as a High Place of
Burning. Such high places were in use in Canaan before and after the
Exodus. Prof. Robertson Smith showed how the barren and unfrequented
hill top would be one of the most natural places chosen for the
holocaust, and in this connection recalled the proposed sacrifice of
Isaac on the mountain.[23] We read in the history of Samuel how he
was called upon to sanctify the sacrifice on the height, of which the
people would not partake until it had received his blessing (1 Sam. ix.
12); also that Solomon visited Gibeon, where he burnt sacrificial flesh
and offered a thousand burnt offerings upon the altar (1 Kings iii. 4).
In consequence of the building of the Temple at Jerusalem efforts were
made to draw to it all the offerings, but the High Places seem to have
continued till the Captivity. They finally came under the ban of the
ceremonial law.[24]
The use made of the plateau of Serabit as a High Place of Burning was
shown by the excavations. In front of the caves, beneath the stone
floor of the Temple buildings that were erected by the Egyptians after
their appropriation of the site, there was found a continuous bed of
wood-ashes which extended all across the temple area and out as far
as the buildings and stone walls on the south, in all fifty feet in
breadth. Outside the area covered by the stone floor the ashes would
be carried away by wind and rain. In the words of Prof. Petrie: “We
must therefore suppose a bed of wood ashes at least 100 by 50 feet very
probably much wider, and varying from 3 to 18 inches thick, in spite
of all denudation that took place before the XVIII dynasty. There must
he on the ground about 50 tons of ashes, and these are probably the
residue of some hundreds of tons of ashes. The ashes are certainly
before the XVIII dynasty.” In further explanation of the way in which
the sacrifice was treated, Prof. Petrie tells us that “the fires were
not large, as the ash is all white, and no charcoal of smothered fire
remains. No whole burnt sacrifice was offered, as no calcined bones
were found; and some kind of feeding at the place is suggested by the
finding of a few pieces of pottery jars and of thin drinking cups.
These belonged to the age of the XII dynasty.”[25]
The space in front of the caves was fenced in by a wall built of rough
stones loosely piled together, similar in construction to the walls
that cross the Wadi Umm Agraf and the Wadi Maghara. The temple area
which the wall enclosed varied at different periods. It was finally
200 feet in its greatest length and 140 feet at its greatest breadth.
Behind the caves across the knoll its course was doubled. It thus
enclosed a vast temenos of oblong form which included large open spaces
that were again partitioned off, besides the ground that was covered by
the Egyptian temple buildings (Fig. 11).
Outside the temenos wall and well in view of the knoll, rough circular
enclosures lie scattered here and there on the plateau, which were made
by clearing the ground of stones and piling these together in the same
way as the walls were built up. These stone enclosures are for the most
part four to six feet inside measurement, a few are larger, and many
of them contain one stone of larger size that was set up at one side
of the enclosure and propped up by other stones. There were also some
uprights without enclosures.
Similar uprights and enclosures are found in Syria; their devotional
and commemorative origin is apparent from incidents related in the
Bible.
Thus in the story of Jacob we read how, coming from Beersheba, he
lighted on a certain place that was holy ground, and tarried all night
because the sun was set. “And he took of the stones of that place and
put them for his pillows” (Gen. xxviii. 11; LXX at his head). In the
night he had his wonderful dream and on the following morning he set up
the stone and poured oil on it and called it Bethel (_i.e._ house of
El), saying, “And this stone which I have set for a pillar (_mazzebh_)
shall be God’s house” (Gen. xxviii. 22). On another occasion he made a
covenant with Laban in ratification of which he took a stone and set it
up for a pillar (_mazzebh_), and called his brethren to take stones and
make an heap (perhaps an enclosure), “and they did eat there upon the
heap” (Gen. xxxi. 45, 46). Again when the Israelites camped in Sinai,
Moses erected an altar, and set up twelve pillars (_mazzeboth_), and
when they crossed the Jordan, Joshua took twelve stones from the river
which he set up at the place which was known as Gilgal (Joshua iv. 1-9,
19-20). The name Gilgal in this case was associated with “rolling” away
the reproach of Egypt (Joshua v. 9). But the word Gilgal signifies
“circle of stone.”[26] In the Septuagint the word generally stands
in the plural Galgala (Joshua iv. 19, 20, etc). If the single stones
(_mazzeboth_) were set up inside circular stone enclosures, this would
correspond with the way the uprights were set up at Serabit.
In the course of the Twelfth Dynasty, the Egyptians secured a foothold
in Serabit where they erected inscriptions and steles, and commemorated
the female divinity of the place under the name of Hathor. A statuette
of Hathor was the usual gift to the shrine of the Pharaohs of this
dynasty. Her cult was at first coupled with that of the moon-god Thoth
as the representative of the neighbouring Maghara, later she appears
alone or associated with the local divinity Sopd.
At Wadi Maghara, Hathor appears on one tablet following the ibis-headed
Thoth, who faces the Pharaoh Amen-em-hat III (XII 6), as already
mentioned (Fig. 5). On a corresponding tablet found at Serabit she is
seen holding out to the same king a sceptre which supports the _ankh_
and the _dad_. There were many Hathors in Egypt, for Hathor here
took the place of earlier mother-divinities in much the same way as
the Virgin Mary took the place of local mother-divinities in Europe.
The goddess Hathor in Sinai was generally represented wearing a
head-dress that consists of a pair of horns which support the orb of
the full moon, and she is described as mistress of the turquoise land,
and later simply as mistress of turquoise (_mafkat_). Hathor stands
for the unwedded mother-goddess who appears as Ishtar in Babylonia,
as Ashtoreth in Canaan, and as the Queen of Heaven generally. At
Serabit her name appears in script which may be Semitic. One of these
inscriptions is on a figure of the usual squatting type that came out
of the sanctuary (Fig. 7). Another is on a peculiar sphinx that is
now in the British Museum. Others are on much-battered steles that
were carved on the rock in the mine along the valley marked number 7
(Fig. 6). The name consists of a sequence of four signs, which Dr. Alan
Gardiner reads as Ba-alat: “Almost every Egyptian inscription from
Serabit names the goddess Hathor, and there could not possibly be a
better equivalent for the name of this goddess than Ba-alat.”[27]
[Illustration: Fig. 7.—Figure with Semitic Script. (Petrie:
_Researches in Sinai_.)]
The name Ba-alat recalls Alilat whom Herodotus (_c._ B.C. 450) named
as the chief divinity of Arabia (iii. 8), and who reappears as Al-Lat
in the Koran (_c._ A.D. 630). Al-Lat had her sanctuary at Taïf, about
forty miles north-north-east of Mecca, which consisted of a cave in an
upland plain in which clothes, jewels, incense, silver and gold, were
stored. The goddess was held to be incarnate in a white rock that was
afterwards seen lying under the mosque, and which was described by
Hamilton and by Doughty as a mass of white granite now shattered with
gunpowder and shapeless.[28] Appropriated to the sanctuary at Taïf was
a guarded and reserved tract of land, the _hima_, where no _idah_-tree
might be cut and no animal hunted, and the reluctance of Mohammad to
dislodge the goddess was shared by the Taïfites, to whom the gatherings
near the shrine were a source of wealth.
Another cave sanctuary at El Nakhl, not far from Mecca, which was
associated with El Uzza, likewise consisted of a cave with accumulated
wealth and owned a reserved tract of land or _hima_.[29] The
arrangement at Serabit was apparently the same, and proves the Arabian
or Semitic origin of the place.
The excavations at Serabit, moreover, led to the discovery of temple
furniture such as served the “Queen of Heaven” elsewhere.
Thus several short stone altars were found, of which one, broken in
half, was 22 inches high with a cup hollow on the top, 3½ inches wide
and one inch deep. Another was described as “well finished, and on the
top the surface was burnt for about a quarter of an inch inwards, black
outside and discoloured below. This proves that such altars were used
for burning, and from the small size, 5 to 7 inches across, the only
substance burnt on them must have been highly inflammable, such as
incense,”[30]
Two rectangular altars cut in stone were also found, each with two
saucer-like depressions, ten inches wide all over, and seven inches
across inside, which “might well be for meat offerings, or cakes
of flour and oil, a kind of pastry.”[31] According to a passage in
Jeremiah, the Israelite women, who repudiated visiting the sanctuary
of the Queen of Heaven without their husbands, which was forbidden to
them, said, “And when we burned incense to the queen of heaven, and
poured out drink-offerings unto her, did we make her cakes to worship
her, and pour out drink-offerings unto her, without our men?” (Jer.
xliv. 19). The utterance shows that offerings in food and drink as well
as incense burning was customary in the cult of the Semitic goddess.
Offerings that consisted of cakes continued in Arabia into Christian
times. For Epiphanius of Cyprus († 403), in his book, _Against all
Heresies_, denounced certain Christians as Collyridians, from the
cakes which they placed under an awning and offered in the name of the
Virgin.[32]
Hathor, however, was not the only divinity whose cult was located at
Serabit. While the larger of the two caves was appropriated to her,
the smaller adjacent cave was associated with Sopd, who was repeatedly
named here from the reign of Amen-em-hat III (XII 6) onwards. One
inscription of the sixth year of this king named him together with
Hathor. Another of the forty-second year mentioned Sebek-didi who set
up an inscription and described himself as “beloved of Hathor; mistress
of the _mafkat_-country; beloved of Sopd, lord of the east; beloved of
Sneferu and the gods and goddesses of this land.”[33]
The special association of Sopd with the Pharaoh Amen-em-hat III is
shown by an open hall that was erected outside the temple at Serabit in
the course of the Eighteenth Dynasty, the decoration of which caused
Prof. Petrie to call it the hall of the kings. On the inner wall of
this building are the figures of the divinities and the kings who
were especially associated with Serabit. Among them is Sopd who is
seen holding in one hand an _ankh_, in the other a staff of justice,
and who follows the Pharaoh Amen-em-hat III.[34] Sopd during the
Eighteenth Dynasty was reckoned the equal of Hathor. For the entrance
to a mine that was opened conjointly by Queen Hatshepsut and her nephew
Tahutmes shows Tahutmes offering incense to Hathor and Hatshepsut in a
corresponding scene offering incense to Sopd.
The divinity Sopd has no place in the older Egyptian pantheon, and is
to all appearance an Egyptianised divinity of Semitic origin. He is
named among the gods who are favourable to the Pharaoh Sen-usert I (XII
2) in the so-called _Tale of Sanehat_, which describes an incident of
the time and is looked upon as a genuine historical account.[35] The
cult of the god seems to have gained a firm foothold in connection with
the forced retreat of the Mentu people. For it says in a nome text of
Edfu, “Shur is here Sopd, the conqueror of the Mentu, lord of the east
country, and in Edfu golden Horns, son of Isis, powerful god Sopd.”[36]
One mention of Sopd in Egypt is on a tablet of Sen-usert II (XII 4)
that was found in the temple of Wadi Qasus in the desert of Kossayr on
the borders of the Red Sea. On it Sopd is described as “lord of the
eastern foreigners (_sut_), and of the east (Neb-Apti).”[37]
The description “lord of the east,” refers to the cult of Sopd in the
land of Goshen, the twentieth nome of Lower Egypt, the capital of
which, Pa-kesem, was known also as Per-Sopd, _i.e._ the House of Sopd.
The amulet of Sopd at Per-Sopd was of turquoise, which bore out his
connection with Sinai. An Egyptian text, moreover, described Sopd as
“noblest of the spirits of Heliopolis.”
Now the Syrians or Hebrews, as already stated, had a foothold at
Heliopolis since the days of Abraham, while the land of Goshen, as we
know, was allotted to the Israelites. The inference is that Sopd who
had a sanctuary in Sinai, had sanctuaries in Heliopolis and in the land
of Goshen also. The study of these sanctuaries shows that they had
features in common with some of the early sanctuaries in Palestine.
The ancient city Per-Sopd in Egypt, known as Phakusa in Greek, and
as Kesem in the Septuagint, is now called Saft-el-Henneh. The change
from Sopd to Saft suggests a possible origin of certain place names in
Palestine, including Tell-es-Safi, which is situated between Jerusalem
and Gaza, and Safed, which is situated north of the Sea of Galilee.
Both of these were hallowed by ancient religious associations.
[Illustration:
CAVE OF HATHOR. CAVE OF SOPDU.
Fig. 8.—Caves at Serabit. (_Ancient Egypt_, a periodical, 1917, Part
iii.)]
Modern Safed occupies a conspicuous position on the summit of a
mountain. Together with Jerusalem, Hebron and Tiberias, it ranked as a
holy city of Palestine.[38] It is named Tsidphoth in the _Travels of an
Egyptian Mohar_,[39] and is Tsapheth in the Talmud, and Sephet in the
Vulgate of Tobit.
On the other hand Tell-es-Safi, situated between Jerusalem and Gaza,
was identified as a High Place of Burning by recent excavations.
Possibly it was Gath of the Bible, one of the five holy cities of
Palestine. The excavations at Tell-es-Safi led to the discovery of
features which recall the arrangements at Serabit in Sinai. At a depth
of 11 to 21 ft. the pre-Israelite ground was reached, on which stood
several pillars (_mazzeboth_), some of which were enclosed in the
largest of several chambers that were built on slightly higher level.
The long wall of the chamber which included the uprights, had a break,
roughly in the form of an apse that was 4 feet 5 inches wide and 2 feet
4½ inches deep. A rude semicircle built of stone stood 20 inches high
from the ground a distance of a few feet, facing it.[40] This apse
corresponds with the recess at the back of the cave of Sopd in Sinai.
The likeness between the place names Per-Sopd, modern Safet in Egypt,
and the place names Sephet, modern Safed, and Safi in Palestine,
suggests that the cities in Palestine also were the site of a shrine
of the Semitic divinity who figures in Egypt and in Sinai under the
name Sopd. It is possible that Sopd is the verbal equivalent of the
Hebrew word _shophet_, Phœnician _sufet_, which signifies judge. Among
the early Semites the sanctuary was the seat of justice, and the
priests were its administrators, who, in this capacity, gave out the
pronouncements. As such they were sacred and, with reference to the
joint divinities (El) of the tribes, they were at first called Elohim,
later Kohanim. The word shophet itself indicates the Supreme Judge,
as in the passage, “Shall not the Judge (shophet) of all the earth do
right?” (Gen. xviii. 25), while the relation between the Judge and
His administrators is indicated by the words, “And the heavens shall
declare his righteousness, for Elohim is Shophet himself” (Psa. l. 6).
The shrine of Sopd in Sinai and the one at Per-Sopd in Egypt, perhaps
the one at Heliopolis also, served the same purpose as the shrine
at Tell-es-Safi. The priest would stand in the recess with his face
towards the suppliant, who, at Safi, stood in the low semicircle.
In Sinai the cave of Sopd was adjacent to that of the moon-goddess
(Fig. 8). According to information already cited, a shrine at
Heliopolis where Sopd was “noblest of spirits” dated from the
“Hermiouthians,” who came there with Abraham, while Hermiouthian
sanctuaries were erected in Goshen by the brethren of Joseph. We are
left to infer that a shrine of Sopd, presumably a centre for the
administration of justice, was connected here also with the localised
cult of the moon.
Other features at Serabit confirm the non-Egyptian character of the
cult of Sopd. Thus, on the northern approach to the temple stood a
stone tank measuring 54 by 32 inches, with a hollow of 37 by 17 inches.
Inside the temple area, in one of the courts which were built in the
Eighteenth Dynasty, stood a circular tank, 31 inches across with a
hollow of 25 inches, and another rectangular tank, 44 by 30 inches
stood in the same court, and a further rectangular tank in the hall
on the approach to the lower cave. The disposition of these tanks was
such that the worshipper who approached the temple from the north,
passed the tank outside and the various other tanks on his way to
the lesser cave. The use of tanks outside and inside the temple, is
foreign to Egypt. They are in keeping with the _apsu_ or stone tank
of the Babylonian temple; and with the regulations of Moses regarding
the laver that stood between the entrance to the temple and the altar
(Exod. xxx. 18). In Jerusalem in the temple of Solomon was a “molten
sea” that was round about, and there were ten lavers of brass, five on
the right and five on the left side of the house. (1 Kings vii. 23, 38,
39). A similar arrangement prevails to this day in the Arab mosque.
Outside stands the well or place for legal washings _ghusl_, and inside
is the circular tank for ablution _wazur_.[41] The tanks at Serabit
were therefore connected with the cult of Sopd, and their presence
confirms the Semitic character of the place.