Mount Hor

Mount Hor (Hebrew: הֹר הָהָר, romanized: Hōr hāHār) is the name given in the Hebrew Bible to two distinct mountains. One borders the land of Edom in the area south of the Dead Sea, and the other is by the Mediterranean Sea at the Northern border of Israel. The first Mount Hor is especially significant to the Israelites, as Aaron the high priest, brother of Moses, died there.

Mount Hor in Edom

This Mount Hor is situated "in the edge of the land of Edom" (Numbers 20:23, 33:37) and was the scene of Aaron's divestiture, death and burial. The exact location of Mount Hor has been the subject of debate.

Jebel Harun

Based on the writing of Josephus, it has customarily been identified with the Jebel Nebi Harun ("Mountain of the Prophet Aaron" in Arabic) or simply Jebel Harun, a twin-peaked mountain 1,350 metres (4,430 ft) above sea-level in the Edomite Mountains on the east side of the Arabah section of the Jordan Rift Valley, not far from Petra. On the summit is a mosque from the Mamluk period, traditionally marking the so-called "Tomb of Aaron" and built over the remains of a Byzantine church, and in the saddle west of it are the remains of a Byzantine monastery dedicated to Aaron. A memorial church built there in the 5th century became the nucleus of a monastic-pilgrimage centre, referred to in a document from among the Petra Papyri dated to 573, as "the House of our Lord the Saint High-Priest Aaron" outside Petra.

Jebel Madara

Some investigators from the mid-19th until the beginning of the 20th century dissented from this identification: for example, Henry Clay Trumbull preferred the Jebel Madara, a peak about 15 miles northwest of 'Ain Kadis (possibly Kadesh Barnea), near the modern border between Israel and Egypt. Among others who favor this location are Wilton (The Negeb, 1863, pp.