But if Paul went to Arabia and preached the gospel, where and to whom did he go? A certain reply to these questions is unattainable since revelation is silent, but (1) The place was most probably the Sinaitic peninsula, or the region east of Sinai (Rawlinson). (2) There is more than one reason to hold with Jerome and later writers that he went to a tribe where his mission was unsuccessful as regards visible results. (3) The only people of the desert then, as now, were Arab Bedouin, and of the probability that Paul also knew their life and customs, Robertson Smith gives a curious illustration in an allusion to Galations vi. 17, when speaking of tattoo marks in religion.[117] Now was there an Arab tribe in the days of Paul, in the region southwest of Damascus, to whom a missionary came with a new and strange message which was not favorably received, and yet whom and whose message those Arabs could not forget? We find a curious legend taken up with other nomad débris into the maelstrom of Mohammed’s mutterings that may help to answer the question. It is about the Nebi Salih or “good prophet,” who came to the people of Thamud,[118] and whose person and mission is as much a mystery to Moslem commentators as Paul’s visit to Arabia is to us. European critics suggest his identity with Shelah of Genesis xi. 13! but etymology and chronology both afford the most meagre basis. Palmer offers a theory that Nebi Salih is none other than the “righteous prophet” Moses;[119] but the difficulty is that this puts the legend too far back in history. It is not probable that the people of Thamud “hewed out mountains into houses,” such as are found to-day as early as in the days of Moses. Nor does Old Testament indicate a time when Moses went to Arabs with a Divine message. Moreover, the legend is evidently a _local_ one that came to the knowledge of Mohammed, or it would have been better known to him who borrowed so largely from the former prophets; and if it is a _local_ legend, it is not a legend of Moses, for he is mentioned more than seventy-seven times in the Koran, and his story was well known in Arabia, at least as far as Yemen.