Note 114 — LETTER XXXIII.

Ritter (p. 31), when he mentions that Sinai was almost simultaneously regarded by the Egyptian, Cosmas, to be Serbâl; and by the Byzantine, Procopius to be Gebel Mûsa; adds another supposition, which I will mention here. “Might there not,” he says, “have, perhaps, existed a different tradition or party-view on this matter in convents, and among the monks at Constantinople and Alexandria, which might proceed from a jealous feeling to vindicate the superior sanctity of one or the other locality? It is remarkable that such different views of the matter should be held simultaneously by the most learned theologians of their day.”