Horeb is the name the Bible uses, mainly in Exodus, Deuteronomy and Psalms, for the mountain where God revealed himself in a striking way to his people. Most biblical references treat Horeb and Mount Sinai as the same place.
It was at Horeb that Moses, tending the flock of his father in law Jethro, saw the bush that burned without being consumed and received from God the mission to free Israel from Egypt.
Decades later, the people of Israel camped at the foot of this mountain and there received the Ten Commandments, when God made a covenant with the nation he had just brought out of slavery.
But Horeb was also the scene of failure: it was there, while Moses was still on the mountain, that the people made a golden calf and worshiped it as if it were God.
Centuries later, fleeing from Queen Jezebel, the prophet Elijah walked all the way to Horeb, and there God did not reveal himself in the wind, the earthquake or the fire, but in a gentle whisper.
Horeb thus carries both sides of God’s relationship with his people: the Law he gave and the grace that sustains those who are exhausted and afraid.
