The Top of Mount Sinai with the Chapel of Elijah

Miner Kilbourne Kellogg, born Manlius Square, NY 1814-died Toledo, OH 1889 · after 1844

Miner Kilbourne Kellogg painted several pictures of Mount Sinai and was fascinated by its religious significance as the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments. This painting shows the artist himself, seated on the summit next to the Chapel of Elijah. Through his studies of the area, Kellogg found evidence of a valley called Es-Seba’îyeh, where Moses and the Israelites may have camped. Back in America, he gave many lectures about his travels, using this painting along with others to illustrate his findings. (Davis, The Landscape of Belief, 1996)