mount katherine

skyline high mountains

St. Katherine

AWAY AWAY

Mount Katherine
	top of Kharazet el Shagg, view on mount Katherine
Mount Katherine is the highest mountain of the Sinai with a height of 2642 meters. Their are 2 main routes to reach Mount Katherine, a mountain not as often climbed as Mount Sinai but with a view even more spectacular. Walk up wadi Arbaein until you reach Ramadan's hyrax farm. There a path goes up the slope on the right. Follow the gorge Shagg Musa that leads to Mount Katherine. While climbing up Shagg Musa you pass on the left a spring (dry in the summer) called Bir el Shanar or the Spring of the Partridges. According to monks their predecessors climbed the mountain in the 12th century to fetch St. Katherine's body. Half way up they began to falter from thirst. A partridge appeared miraculously and led them to the spring. Take the gorge left of the Abu Gifa pass, wadi Umm Sid, that leads up to wadi Shagg . Reaching wadi Shagg turn left, keeping to the left (keep your eye on the mountain) On the summit stands a white chapel marking the spot where St. Katherine lay, leaving an indent in the rock. Just before reaching the summit you pass a room where visitors can spend the night. 400 meters away is Mount Katherine's twin summit, Gebel Zebir, actually 2 meters higher than Mount Katherine. view from the summit
The legend of St. Katherine Katherine was born to a high ranking official of Roman Alexandria in the late 3rd century AD. She became a woman of exceptional intelligence, beauty and character. Katherine's mother, who in a period of Christian persecution kept her faith secret, introduced Katherine to a hermit living in the desert near Alexandria. After many visits Katherine became a zealous Christian . She tried to persuade Emperor Maximanus, a notorious persecutor of Christians, to forsake his idol worship for the true God. The emperor found her attractive so he met with her often. But in the end he became tired of her attempts to convert him and imprisoned her. He invited 150 scholars to debate with her, but she overwhelmed them with her faith and knowledge and they all converted. The emperor had all the scholars executed. When Katherine refused to marry Maximanus, insisting she was the bride of Christ, he ordered her execution. Four wheels studded with steel blades and sharp spikes were supposed to mutilate the woman, but at the execution an angel released her unharmed from the device. Katherine became the patron saint of all who work with wheels. The emperor continued to insist on marrying her but with no avail. Finally, on november 305, he beheaded her. Her body was transported by angels to rest on Mount Katherine. A hermit living somewhere in the area, saw, by day and night, a bright light from the place where her body lay. He went to the monastery at the foot of Mount Sinai and told them what he had seen. The monks climbed up the mountain and found the body and wondered who it was. An aged hermit appeared and declared that the body had been brought by angels and was the body of the blessed Katherine. The monks built a chapel over her remains and climbed up to say mass and tap the healing oil of her bodily remains. By the 12th century the monks had relocated her remains to a golden casket in the monastery's basilica, and renamed the monastery from the Monastery of St Mary to that of St Katherine.

For more information contact us at: katherine@awayaway-sinai.net or call 00 20 122270443