Vatopedi

Vatopedi Monastery

In the courtyard of the monastery

The Vatopedi Monastery ( Greek Βατοπέδι or Βατοπαίδι, also called Vatopaidion ) is located on Mount Athos . Between 1999 and 2007, 50 to 80 monks lived in the monastery. In the hierarchical ranking of the Athos monasteries, Vatopedi now ranks second. It is considered the richest of the Athos monasteries.

history

The report of a foundation by Emperor Theodosius I is unbelievable ; the version that at the suggestion of Athanasios Athonites three archontes from Adrianople - Athanasios, Nikolaus and Antonios - restored a derelict monastery (around 972) is more accurate . The first documentary evidence comes from the year 985: the hegoumenos Nicholas signed the last place on a certificate of the protos for the monastery Iviron . In 996 the hegoumenos Nikephoros was able to put his signature in second place - Vatopedi and Iviron followed on an equal footing in the hierarchy behind the great Laura .

Thanks to gifts from Emperor Andronikos II. In 1292, Vatopedi became one of the great landowners, and later Bulgarian tsars and Serbian kings also sponsored the monastery, which was home to the arrival of Slavic monks towards the end of the 12th century.

At a young age Gregorios Palamas was a monk in Vatopedi, as well as Sava of Serbia before the Hilandar Monastery was founded.

Buildings and library holdings

Codex Vatopedinus 602

The monastery has the appearance of a fortress, the buildings date from different eras.

The library has around 600 manuscripts from the Byzantine period, including rare works by Claudius Ptolemy , Strabo and Pausanias , but also illuminated psalteries and the famous octateuch fragment Codex Vatopedinus 602 with 164 colored miniatures .

Real estate scandal

The monastery and its Archimandrite Efraim, who came from Cyprus, were at the center of a real estate scandal around 2008 that severely shook the government of Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis . The main point of contention in the scandal over controversial real estate transactions between the Greek state and the monastery was Lake Vistonida . The lake was said to have been bequeathed to the monastery by Byzantine emperors almost 1,000 years ago . Although the monastery's ownership claims were in dispute, they were recognized by the state. In exchange for the lake with its entire water surface and all shore properties, the monastery received 260 valuable properties in touristic developed areas, including in the Olympic Village in Athens, some of which it immediately resold at a profit. "They sold the lake - in other words," air "- to the state and got valuable offices, land and buildings in Athens for exchange," criticized the opposition.

The damage suffered by the state, which resulted from the fact that the lake properties claimed by the monastery were greatly overvalued and the state barter properties were greatly undervalued, is estimated at 100 million euros. The real estate scandal has already led to the resignation of Giorgos Voulgarakis , Minister of the Merchant Navy, who is involved in the real estate business . Two prosecutors resigned because the government interfered with their investigative work. The government spokesman for State Minister Theodoros Rousopoulos , a friend of Archimandrite Efraim and at the same time a close confidante of Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis , also came under heavy fire from the opposition ; Rousopoulos resigned on October 23, 2008.

On December 25, 2011, the archimandrite was arrested by the Greek police; a few days later he was taken to the maximum security prison Korydallos near Athens . On March 30, 2012, he was released on bail and returned to the monastery. Russian President Putin stood up for him after the most important relic of the monastery left the monastery for the first time during the elections in Russia to be shown in Russia. Putin's confidante Vladimir Yakunin had said, "We hope to promote the spiritual rebirth of Russia, as well as Christian values and above all the family."

swell

Jacques Bompaire : Actes de Vatopédi. Des origines a 1329 . Text and chalkboard. (= Archives de l'Athos. 21). Paris 2001, ISBN 2-283-60421-4 .
Jacques Lefort: Actes de Vatopédi. De 1330 to 1376 . Text and chalkboard. (= Archives de l'Athos. 22). Paris 2006, ISBN 2-283-60462-1 .
Georgios Salakides: Sultan documents of the Athos monastery Vatopedi from the time of Bayezid II and Selim I. Critical edition and scientific commentary. Thessaloniki 1995, ISBN 960-7387-08-2 .
Sōphronios Eustratiadēs: Arkadios, Catalog of the Greek manuscripts in the library of the monastery of Vatopedi on mt. Athos. (= Harvard theological studies. 11). Cambridge, Mass. 1924 (reprinted 1969)
Erich Lamberz , Euthymios K. Litsas: Katalogos cheirographon tēs batopedinēs Skētēs Hagiu Demetriu . Thessaloniki 1978 (PST: Catalog of the manuscripts of the Skete of St. Demetrius, Vatopedi)
Sōtērēs N. Kadas: Ta sēmeiōmata tōn cheirographōn tēs Ieras Megistēs Monēs Batopaidiu . Agion Oros 2000, ISBN 960-7735-17-X .

literature

Alexander Kazhdan and others: Vatopedi. In: Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium. III, 1991, pp. 2155-2156.
Archimandrite Efraim: The Great Vatopedi Monastery: A Guide for the Pilgrim . Edition Hagia Sophia, Straelen, 2010, ISBN 978-3-937129-66-2 .
Gunaridēs, Paris (ed.): Iera Monē Batopediu. Istoria kai technē (The monastery of Vatopedi) . Athens 1999, ISBN 960-371-009-1 . (Contribution partly in Greek, partly in Greek, partly in English, partly in French)
Stauros B. Mamalukos: To kathiko tēs monēs Batopediu. Istoria kai architektonikē. Athens 2001, ISBN 960-7666-32-1 (version in English udT: The kathikon of the Vatopedi monastery.)
P. Huber: Image and message. Byzantine miniatures from the Old and New Testament. Zurich / Freiburg i. B. 1973.