Mount Nebo

What is known

• From the summit of Mount Nebo (Pisgah), God showed Moses the entire Promised Land — Gilead, Naphtali, Ephraim, Manasseh, Judah, and the plain of Jericho — which he would not be permitted to enter (Deuteronomy 34:1-4)
• Moses died on Mount Nebo at age 120 and was buried by God in an unknown location in the valley of Moab (Deuteronomy 34:5-7)
• The site was venerated by early Christian pilgrims; the nun-pilgrim Egeria described visiting a church there in her 4th-century travel diary
• The Memorial Church of Moses, first built in the late 4th century AD and excavated by Franciscan archaeologists beginning in 1933, contains an extraordinary collection of Byzantine floor mosaics dating from the 5th-6th centuries
• Pope John Paul II visited and planted an olive tree at the site in 2000, symbolizing peace; a modern serpentine cross sculpture (representing Moses' bronze serpent and the cross) now stands at the overlook

History

Founded

A Byzantine memorial church was first built on the summit in the 4th century AD, expanded into a basilica by the 6th century

Industry

Pilgrimage and monastic site from the Byzantine period onward

Coordinates

31.7678° N, 35.7256° E

Archaeology

The Memorial Church of Moses on Mount Nebo was excavated beginning in 1933 by the Franciscan Custody of the Holy Land and preserves extensive, well-documented Byzantine-era (5th-6th century AD) mosaic floors depicting hunting and pastoral scenes, among the finest surviving examples in Jordan.

Scripture references

• Numbers 27:12
• Numbers 33:47
• Deuteronomy 3:27
• Deuteronomy 32:49-52
• Deuteronomy 34:1-8

On a modern map

Mount Nebo today

Further reading

• Mount Nebo - Wikipedia

Reflect

Moses saw the promised land from Nebo but never entered it — can you make peace with work you won't see finished?