The Temple at Mount Horeb¹

In March 1904, the distinguished British archaeologist Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie² (1853-1942) made an astonishing discovery. He had gone to survey what the Old Testament referred to as Mount Horeb, the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments from God. Buried under the sacred site was the remains of a huge Egyptian temple; subsequently dated back to 2600BC.

Among the treasures were obelisks, pillars, statues, tables, an altar, vases, amulets and wands. These ended up in museums scattered around the world. However the most remarkable find was a metallurgist's crucible and several tons of pure white powder which had been hidden underneath flagstones. Petrie despatched a sample of the mysterious white powder to the British Museum but no record of it remains. Unfortunately when Petrie finished surveying everything, he left the powder exposed and it was scattered by the desert winds.

The hieroglyphics on the temple walls mentioned an unknown substance called mfkzt³. The same hieroglyph had been found at other sites in Egypt, but it had never been decyphered. The closest it had come to translation was an extremely valuable gem, metal or mineral, and it was an unstable element. The hieroglyph for mfkzt was almost the same as the one for 'bread' - although obviously not the staple diet kind of bread, could it mean 'spiritual bread'?

The scenes depicted on the temple walls were of gods and pharaohs being offered loaves of 'white bread' with inscriptions stating this was a magical, health-giving food. One carving read: 'The presentation of white bread that he may be given life'. Another showed a pharaoh feeding the bread to a god above the carving: 'He gave the gold of reward; the mouths rejoiced.'

Moses

While Moses was busy up Mount Horeb receiving the Ten Commandments, the Israelites, waiting below, got bored. They gathered together all their gold, melted it down, fashioned a calf and then started to worship it. This annoyed Moses when he returned - so much so that he smashed the tablets of stone on which God had written the Commandments. According to the Book of Exodus, Moses 'burnt the golden calf in the fire, ground it into powder, scattered it upon the water and made the children of Israel drink it.'

This was unusual because:

The Philosophers' Stone

It is generally thought that alchemists' aim was to discover the Philosophers' Stone which could change base metal into gold. However, alchemists' writings state that they believed the Stone itself was made of gold and their job was to study its magical properties, it supposedly having the ability to defy gravity. They were also interested in creating 'good medicines for general use' from it.

The 17th-century Eirenaeus Philalethes, an expert on alchemy, wrote:

'Our stone is nothing but gold digested to the highest degree of purity and subtle fixation. We call it a stone because of its incombustible nature, but its appearance is that of very fine powder.'

The mysterious mfkzt's literal description in hieroglyphics was 'the noble precious stone'. Could mfkzt be powdered gold? How could Moses or the ancient Egyptians turn gold into powder? The aim of alchemical lore in ancient Egypt was to achieve enlightened consciousness: e.g. to turn base human ignorance into spiritual gold.

The Bible states that Moses was raised in Egypt by the pharaoh's daughter. It is possible he was a follower of Pharaoh Akhenaten, the first ruler of Egypt to adopt monotheism⁴. His upbringing ensured he learned the secrets⁵ of the ancients. This is how he was able to turn the golden calf of the Israelites into white powder which could be safely ingested. Using this knowledge he was able to instruct craftsmen to create the Ark of the Covenant.

The Ark of the Covenant

The Ark was made of shittim⁶ wood and it was plated inside and out with pure gold. It was probably about 2 metres long by 1 metre wide and high. The lid was made of gold, with a solid gold cherub at either end, facing each other. In order to support the cherubim, the lid would have had to weigh more than a ton. The current market value for such materials would be approximately £7 million.

Something very special obviously warranted such a lavish container. It is generally thought that the Ark was built specifically to house the stone tablets on which God had written the Ten Commandments. However, Moses had smashed these in his anger at discovering the Israelites worshipping the false idol. God later commanded Moses to replace them, which he did, but these were the work of human hands, hardly warranting such a wondrous coffer.

According to the Book of Hebrews in the New Testament, the Ark also carried within it, a golden pot of white manna. The Ark hovered three fingers' width above the ground, so it could not be contaminated by the earth. How was this possible? Alchemists believed that powdered white gold had magical properties, including the ability to defy gravity. Perhaps this explains how four men could carry the Ark on poles between them. Even if the bearers had superhuman strength, the poles would have buckled under the weight of all that gold. There is an old Jewish saying:

'The Ark bore its bearers.'

Where is the Ark now?

The quest to find the Ark is as fabled as the hunt for the Holy Grail. Some believe it is guarded continually in the remote highlands of Kush⁷. There, a 'Guardian of the Ark of the Covenant' remains with it in St. Mary's of Zion church in Axum, until he dies. Then another guardian is trained in the rites of worship and installed until death.

In the chapel of the church, 30 robes from 30 previous guardians are on display. Every one of them had devoted their lives to protecting what they believed to be the Ark of the Covenant.

Another more fanciful tale is that the Great Pyramid at Giza (which contained no bodily remains in its burial chamber) was used with the aid of the mfkzt to transport the precious holy relic into another dimension.

Whatever you choose to believe, it is certainly a fascinating mystery.