St. Georg Monastery (Wadi Qelt)
The Monastery of St. George (also Monastery of Choziba , Deir Mar Jariys ) is a monastery in Wadi Qelt in the Judah Desert in the West Bank . Originally consecrated to the Theotokos , it now bears the name of its most famous monk, Georg von Choziba . It is located about 20 km east of Jerusalem and 5 km west of Jericho .
The monastery complex with chapel and gardens, now inhabited by Greek Orthodox monks, hangs on the vertically sloping northern rock face of Wadi Qelt and can only be reached via a pedestrian crossing that runs across the wadi. The monastery is open to pilgrims and visitors.
history
Originally, Syrian monks lived here in a hermitage in the first half of the 5th century . Later a lavra , a hermit colony , was built here , which consisted of a center and numerous hermit cells around it in the Wadi Qelt. In the late 5th century a monastery was built by John of Thebes . After the Persians destroyed the monastery in 614 and massacred its monks, it was abandoned. In 1179 the crusaders made some attempts to rebuild the monastery. After they were driven out, it fell into disrepair.
In 1878 the Greek monk Kalinikos settled here and rebuilt the monastery. The work was completed in 1901. The bones and skulls of the martyrs from AD 614 can still be seen in the monastery church today.
literature
- Alfons Maria Schneider : The monastery of the Theotokos at Choziba in the Wadi el Kelt . In: Römische Quartalsschrift 39, 1931, pp. 297–333.
- Yizhar Hirschfeld : The Judean desert monasteries in the Byzantine period , New Haven, Yale University Press 1992. ISBN 0-300-04977-3 , pp. 36-38.
Web links
Coordinates: 31 ° 50 ′ 35.9 ″ N , 35 ° 24 ′ 43.2 ″ E