Fārān

Faran, or Pharan, lies in a palm-filled oasis in the mountains of southern Sinai. In late Roman times it was the peninsula's largest town and the seat of a bishop. Churches and monastic cells grew around the oasis, where water and gardens supported a community amid the dry valleys. Christian tradition associated the place with biblical Rephidim. Its ruins preserve traces of the religious life that flourished here before the rise of Saint Catherine's monastery farther east.