Location: Map
The Greek Orthodox Monastery of Saint Catherine on Mount Sinai
located in the South Sinai Governorate of Egypt. It famous for being
the oldest active Christian monastery. Monastery of Saint Catherine
was constructed here in 527 on a site that was inhabited by
Christian refuges who fled persecutions from the pagan emperors.
According to a legend this is a site where Moses spoke to God that
appeared to him in a form of a burning bush mentioned in the Book of
Exodus. Main building of the Monastery of Saint Catherine is the
Church of the Transfiguration there is an exhibition of icons and
old books in the vestibule. It is only a small part of the whole
collection that is owned by the monastery. Marble floors of the
basilica and caisson ceiling date to the 18th century and gilded
iconostasis to the 17th century. In the altar monks keep a silver
casket of Saint Catherine's remains.
Over the alter stands
the Chapel of the Burning Bush, the most sacred part of the
monastery. You will have to remove your shoes before entering the
chapel. The alter of the chapel, supported by the marble columns,
stands on top of the place where Biblical shrubs was said to grow. A
similar bush grows in the courtyard. The Monastery of Saint
Catherine is particularly famous for its huge collection of 3,000
manuscripts. The bell tower of the monastery was added in the 19th
century on donations from Russia. All of nine bells were also cast
by the Russian masters.
From the 3rd century, monks began to settle in small groups around
Mount Horeb - near the Burning Bush, in the oasis of Faran (Wadi Firan)
and other places in southern Sinai. The first monks in that area were
mainly hermits, living alone in caves. Only on holidays did hermits
gather near the Burning Bush to perform joint divine services. The
monastic life of this period was described in the 5th century by the
disciple of John Chrysostom, the former prefect of Constantinople -
Saint Nile, whose works are still studied by priests, monks and
believers: “Some ate food only on Sundays, others - twice a week, others
- after two days... Every Sunday they all gathered from different places
in one church, kissed each other, partook of the Holy Mysteries, and
with conversations about the salvation of the soul they edified,
consoled and encouraged each other to high deeds.”
During the
reign of Emperor Constantine, around 329, the monks of Sinai turned to
his mother Saint Helena with a request to build a small church dedicated
to Our Lady near the Burning Bush, as well as a tower for refuge for the
monks in case of raids by nomads. The monks' request was granted, and
pilgrims of the late 4th century reported that Sinai already had a
thriving community of monks, which attracted believers from various
places in the Byzantine Empire.
The story about the Holy Places
of the East, written at the end of the 4th century by the noble pilgrim
Silvia (or Etheria), also tells about the monastic community that formed
around the Burning Bush:
It was necessary for us to go to the
beginning of this valley because there were many cells of holy men
there, and a church in the place where the bush is located: this bush is
alive to this day and is giving birth. And so, having descended from the
mountain of God, we came to the bush at about ten o'clock. And this
bush, as I said above, is the one from which the Lord spoke to Moses in
the fire, and is located in an area where there are many cells and a
church, at the beginning of the valley. And in front of the church there
is a lovely garden, with an abundance of excellent water, and in this
garden there is a bush.
The monastery received a further impetus for development in the 6th
century, when Emperor Justinian I ordered the construction of powerful
fortress walls that surrounded the previous buildings of St. Helena, and
a church that has survived to this day, and also sent soldiers to Sinai
to protect the monks. His contemporary Procopius of Caesarea reports
about the construction of Justinian:
On this Mount Sinai live
monks whose life consists of continuous reflection on death; fearing
nothing, they enjoy the desert that is dear to them. Since they do not
desire anything, and above all human passions they do not care about any
acquisition and do not look after their bodies and in all other respects
do not want any benefit for themselves, then Emperor Justinian built a
church for these monks in the name of the Mother of God, so that they
could spend your life praying in this church and performing sacred
services. He built this church not at the very top of the mountain, but
much lower: it is impossible for a person to spend the night at the top
of this mountain, since constant noises and all sorts of other phenomena
causing religious fear are heard there during the night, striking the
mind and will of a person with horror. They say that from here Moses
once brought the laws he received from God. At the foot of this
mountain, the emperor built a very strong fortification and placed a
significant military garrison here so that the Saracen barbarians could
not break into the region of Palestine completely unnoticed from here,
since this country, as I said, was deserted.
- Procopius of Caesarea.
About buildings (Book 5:VIII)
Above the main monastery gate there
is an inscription: “From the foundation this sacred monastery of Mount
Sinai was erected, where God spoke to Moses, the humble king of the
Romans Justinian for the eternal remembrance of him and his wife
Theodora. Finished after the thirtieth year of his reign. And an abbot
named Dula was appointed in it in the year from Adam 6021, from Christ
527.” Based on this inscription, the Russian scientist Bishop Porfiry
(Uspensky) dated the completion of the construction of the monastery to
557.
According to the Chronicle of Eutyches of Alexandria, for
the protection and maintenance of the monastery, the emperor resettled
two hundred families from Pontus Anatolia and Alexandria to Sinai. The
descendants of these settlers formed the Sinai Bedouin tribe of
Jabaliya. Despite their conversion to Islam in the 7th century, they
continue to live in the vicinity of the monastery and maintain it.
The powerful monastery fortifications built by Justinian were
maintained in good condition by the monks and delighted pilgrims:
It's time to enter the monastery... Do you see how the fortress wall is
built - long, skillfully built, very revered? The king, nicknamed
Justinian, paid for the costs, and it was built very carefully. It has a
circumference of two hundred fathoms, and its height is nineteen and a
half...
- Paisios Agiapostolite. Description of the Holy Mount Sinai
and its surroundings
Among the abbots of the monastery was John
Climacus. Until the end of the 7th century, the monastery belonged to
the Faran diocese and was headed by an abbot in the rank of archbishop
(the antiquity of the Sinai Archdiocese is evidenced by the materials of
the Council of Chalcedon, where in the “Ordinary of Metropolises and
Archdioceses of the Apostolic See of the Holy City” the archdiocese of
“Mount Sinai” is mentioned in 24th place). In 681, when the bishop of
Faran was deprived of his see for being a monothelitist, the episcopal
see was transferred to the monastery, and its abbot became the bishop of
Faran. A little later, the diocese of Raito came under his control. At
the beginning of the 8th century, all Christians of the Sinai Peninsula
were under the jurisdiction of the Sinai archbishop.
The monastery, during the Arab conquest of Sinai in 625, sent a
delegation to Medina to secure the patronage of the Prophet Muhammad. A
copy of the safe conduct received by the monks - the firman of Muhammad
(the original has been kept in Istanbul since 1517, where it was
reclaimed from the monastery by Sultan Selim I), exhibited in the
monastery - proclaims that Muslims will protect the monastery, and also
exempt it from paying taxes. The firman was written on the skin of the
gazelle in Kufic handwriting and sealed with the handprint of Muhammad.
However, despite the privileges received, the number of monks began
to decline, and by the beginning of the 9th century there were only 30
of them left. With the spread of Islam in Egypt, a mosque appeared in
the monastery, which has survived to this day: “Behind the church, not
far away, is a stone hut, where Turks and Arabs worship Mohammed "
During the period of the Crusades from 1099 to 1270, there was a
period of revival in the monastic life of the monastery. The Sinai
Crusader Order took upon itself the task of guarding the increasing
number of pilgrims from Europe heading to the monastery. During this
period, a Catholic chapel appeared in the monastery.
After the
conquest of Egypt by the Ottoman Empire in 1517, the Turkish authorities
did not reduce the rights of the monks - Sultan Selim I confirmed the
key points of Muhammad's firman, they retained the special status of the
archbishop and did not interfere in the internal affairs of the
monastery. The monastery carried out extensive cultural and educational
activities; in the 18th century, it opened a theological school on the
island of Crete, where Greek theologians of that time were educated. The
monastery's farmsteads were opened in Egypt, Palestine, Turkey, Romania,
Russia and even India.
The monastery maintained long-standing ties with Russia. In 1375,
Metropolitan Macarius came to Moscow for alms for the monastery, and in
1390, an icon depicting the Burning Bush was brought from the St.
Catherine’s Monastery as a gift to the great princes, which was placed
in the Annunciation Cathedral of the Kremlin (first in the iconostasis,
and then in the altar with others valuable icons received from the
Eastern clergy).
In 1558, Tsar Ivan the Terrible sent an embassy
to the Eastern Patriarchs with a gold-woven cover on the relics of St.
Catherine as a gift for the Sinai Monastery. The Tsar wrote to the
Archbishop of Sinai: “Father, you yourself, in all your bishopric and in
Mount Sinai, would order to pray to God and His Most Pure Mother and all
the saints for our health and preservation, and for my queen Anastasia,
and for our children, the crown prince Ivan and Theodora and about all
Orthodox Christianity.”
In 1619, the Sinai archimandrite visited
Russia and participated, together with the Jerusalem Patriarch Theophan,
in a prayer service before the shrine of Sergius of Radonezh in the
Trinity-Sergius Lavra. After this, numerous donations from the Russian
tsars went to Sinai. In 1625, the Alexandrian Patriarch Gerasim turned
to Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich with a request for help for the monastery:
...if Your Majesty does not help, this monastery will be ruined, they
are wicked, and they want to destroy the elders. But we hope for the
mercy of God and your Majesty to help us in such a great difficulty.
The monastery received assistance, which the monks called “manna
from heaven” in their letter of gratitude, and in 1630 the king granted
the monastery a charter with the right to come for alms every four
years. The Sinai clergy not only received rich alms from Russia, but
also participated in the church life of the country. Thus, Archbishop
Ananiy of Sinai was a participant in the Great Moscow Council of
1666-1667, which deprived Nikon of his patriarchal dignity.
In
1687, the Sinai monks arrived in Moscow, where they lived until 1689.
The visit was connected with the campaign launched in 1682 by the Sinai
Archbishop Ananias to transfer the monastery under the protection of
Russia. On behalf of Tsars Peter and John and Princess Sophia, the monks
were given a letter: “in charity of their sovereign, they deigned to
accept the holy mountain and monastery of the Most Holy Theotokos of the
Burning Bush for the unity of our pious Christian faith.” The Sinai
monks left Russia with rich gifts, among which was a silver shrine for
the relics of St. Catherine, made, according to legend, with the money
of Princess Sophia.
In 1691, the Jerusalem Patriarch Dosifei
wrote to the Moscow Patriarch that the subjugation of Sinai to him was
“a thing of both lawlessness and ridicule.” However, researchers are not
inclined to see in these events a change in the ecclesiastical
jurisdiction of the monastery of St. Catherine, but see only an attempt
by the Sinai monks to find new ktitors capable of providing for the
monastery.
In Kyiv, in the middle of the 18th century, the
courtyard of the monastery of St. Catherine was opened. In 1860, the
monastery received from Emperor Alexander II a gift of a new shrine for
the relics of St. Catherine, and for the monastery bell tower built in
1871, the emperor sent 9 bells, which are still used on holidays and
before the liturgy.
Numerous Russian scientists have contributed
to the study of the Sinai Monastery. In 1837, the Russian hieromonk
Samuil was the first to clear and strengthen the 6th-century mosaic “The
Transfiguration of the Lord,” which adorns the monastery’s catholicon.
In 1887, researcher Alexey Dmitrievsky compiled a catalog of icons from
the monastery collection and examined questions about the Cretan school
of icon painting and the role of Sinai in preserving cultural traditions
in the 16th-18th centuries. The Orthodox Palestine Society played a
major role in the study of the monastery of St. Catherine, publishing
Russian and Greek materials about these places.
The Monastery of St. Catherine is the center of the autonomous Sinai
Orthodox Church, which, in addition to this monastery, owns only a
number of monastic farmsteads: 3 in Egypt and 14 outside Egypt - 9 in
Greece, 3 in Cyprus, 1 in Lebanon and 1 in Turkey (Istanbul).
The
abbot of the monastery is the Archbishop of Sinai. Since the 7th
century, his ordination has been performed by the Patriarch of
Jerusalem, under whose jurisdiction the monastery came under his
jurisdiction in 640 due to difficulties in communicating with the
Patriarchate of Constantinople that arose after the conquest of Egypt by
Muslims (officially, autonomy from the Patriarchate of Constantinople
was received only in 1575 and confirmed in 1782).
The affairs of
the monastery are currently managed by a general meeting of monks, which
decides economic, political and other issues. The decisions of the
Assembly are carried out by the Council of Fathers, which includes four
people: the deputy and assistant archbishop, the monastery sacristan,
the housekeeper and the librarian.
The monastery, as before, is a
traditional place of Christian pilgrimage. Every day after hours,
believers are given access to the relics of St. Catherine. In memory of
the veneration of the relics, the monks give a silver ring with the
image of a heart and the words ΑΓΙΑ ΑΙΚΑΤΕΡΙΝΑ (St. Catherine).
In 2005, the Supreme Council of Antiquities of Egypt announced the start
of a program for the development and study of the monastery complex,
including the systematization and study of documents related to the
history of Sinai and the Monastery of St. Catherine, the filming of a
documentary film and the publication of a detailed encyclopedia about
the monastery.
The main church of the monastery (catholikon), a three-nave basilica,
is dedicated to the Transfiguration of Jesus Christ. Its construction
dates back to the reign of Emperor Justinian.
The temple is oblong,
large and beautiful, it is supported by 12 large columns, 6 on each
side, in the form of an emblem of the 12 months of the year. Its floor
is covered entirely with beautiful marble slabs, the width of the temple
is 14 open steps, the length is 19 steps; it is in the name of Christ
the Savior.
The entrance to the narthex is decorated with carved
doors made of Lebanese cedar, made during the Crusades, and the doors to
the main nave of the basilica date back to the 6th century and are its
same age. Above the entrance door there is a Greek inscription: “This is
the gate of the Lord; the righteous will enter into them” (Ps. 118:20).
In each of the twelve columns, crowned with Corinthian capitals and
dividing the naves of the basilica, the relics of saints, covered with
bronze plates, are stored in special recesses, and on the columns
themselves are placed 12th-century mineain icons according to the number
of months of the year. Along the columns there are two rows of wooden
carved stasidia. The columns are connected by arches, above which there
are windows. In 1714, a new marble floor was laid in the basilica. The
ceiling of the basilica is made of Lebanese cedar and painted in the
18th century with stars on a blue background.
The main decoration
of the basilica is the mosaic of the Transfiguration of the Lord located
in the apse conch, which is in very good condition. The mosaic was made
in the first half of the 6th century by court craftsmen sent by
Justinian to decorate the monastery.
The mosaic of the
Transfiguration of the Lord is framed by medallions with sixteen
half-figures of the apostles and prophets. In the center of the
composition is the monumental figure of Jesus Christ, enclosed in an
azure mandorla, which is connected by rays of divine light with the
figures of the prophets and three disciples, made on a shimmering golden
background. On the sides of the mosaic on the apse arch there are two
images of the prophet Moses: standing in front of the Burning Bush
(left) and receiving the Tablets of the Covenant at Sinai (right). The
apse is also decorated with medallions with images of a lamb between two
flying angels, the Virgin Mary and John the Baptist.
According to
Academician V.N. Lazarev, in the 7th century, the design of the apse was
supplemented by two images on the marble facing of the altar pillars:
“The Sacrifice of Abraham” and “The Sacrifice of Jephthah.” Both images
are made using the encaustic technique, and their artistic style is
archaic.
The basilica's mosaics delighted pilgrims and are
mentioned in various descriptions of the monastery:
Look first of all
at the entire vastness of the conkha and at the host of prophets
standing around on high. There, in the dome, a host of prophets, shining
in gold, together with the apostles, is clearly depicted, through
mosaics and gold mixed with lapis lazuli, scarlet, red and purple. In
the middle is the venerable Transfiguration, painted with exquisite art,
along with a cloud.
- Paisios Agiapostolite. Description of the Holy
Mount Sinai and its surroundings
The mosaic of the
Transfiguration of the Lord was cleaned of dirt and soot by American
restorers in 1958-1965. For viewing from the central nave, the mosaic is
covered by a wooden carved iconostasis of the 17th century, but from the
side naves at the altar level the mosaic is accessible for viewing.
In the altar of the basilica, two silver reliquaries with the relics
of St. Catherine (head and right hand) are kept in a marble shrine.
Another part of the relics (finger) is located in the reliquary of the
icon of the Great Martyr Catherine in the left nave of the basilica and
is always open to believers for veneration.
Behind the altar of the Basilica of the Transfiguration is the Chapel
of the Burning Bush, built on the site where, according to the biblical
account, God spoke to Moses (Exodus 2:2-5). Following the biblical
instruction, all those entering must remove their shoes here. The chapel
is one of the oldest monastic buildings; it was mentioned at the end of
the 4th century by the pilgrim Silvia in his story about the Holy Places
of the East (see section Foundation of the monastery).
The chapel
is dedicated to the Annunciation and is decorated with icons dedicated
to this holiday. In the apse of the chapel, a mosaic image of a cross
from the 10th century has been preserved. There is also an icon of the
Mother of God with the baby Jesus in her arms, sitting in the center of
the Burning Bush.
The chapel has an altar located not, as usual,
over the relics of saints, but over the roots of the Kupina. For this
purpose, the bush was transplanted a few meters from the chapel, where
it continues to grow. There is no iconostasis in the chapel, which hides
the altar from the faithful, and pilgrims can see under the altar the
place where Kupina grew. It is marked by a hole in a marble slab,
covered by a silver shield with chased images of a burning bush, the
Transfiguration, the Crucifixion, the evangelists, St. Catherine and the
Sinai monastery itself. A Greek inscription from the 13th century has
been preserved on the slab: “Remember, O Lord, Thy servant, the humble
Gabriel Oripsai, Archbishop of the holy Mount Sinai in the Holy Bush.”
Liturgy in the chapel is celebrated every Saturday.
Well of Moses - located north of the Basilica of the Transfiguration
and is considered the well where, according to the Bible, Moses met the
seven daughters of the Midian priest Raguel (Ex. 2:15-17). The well
currently continues to supply the monastery with water.
The monastery
has numerous chapels: the Holy Spirit, the Dormition of the Blessed
Virgin Mary, John the Theologian, St. George the Victorious, St.
Anthony, St. Stephen, John the Baptist, the five Sebastian martyrs, ten
Cretan martyrs, Saints Sergius and Bacchus, the holy apostles and the
prophet Moses. These chapels are located inside the monastery walls, and
nine of them are connected to the architectural complex of the Basilica
of the Transfiguration. Two chapels are located in the chambers of the
Archbishop of Sinai: the upper one in honor of the Dormition of the
Virgin Mary and the lower one, dedicated to the Mother of God of the
Life-Giving Spring (located in an ancient tower built in 330 by Empress
Helena, the chapel is decorated with icons of the 12th-13th centuries,
among which stand out the royal doors, decorated with golden luminous
circles, and the revered image of the Mother of God “Life-Giving
Spring”, attributed to the brush of the Cretan master Angelos).
Refectory - built in the 11th century, after the premises of the ancient
refectory were converted into a mosque. In 2005, the refectory premises
were restored and continue to be used for their intended purpose. The
walls of the refectory are decorated with frescoes depicting scenes of
the sacrifice of Abraham (1577), Elijah in the desert fed by a raven,
and the Second Coming of Jesus Christ (1573). In the refectory there is
a large wooden table, sent as a gift to the monastery in the 14th
century from the island of Zakynthos. The table is decorated with
carvings of angels and flowers in the Rococo style.
The garden is
located in the northwest of the monastery walls and is connected to the
monastery by an ancient underground passage, which is still in use
today. On one of the terraces, apple trees, pears, pomegranates,
apricots, plums, quinces, mulberries, almonds, cherries, and grapes are
grown. Another terrace is dedicated to the olive garden, which supplies
the monastery with olive oil. Vegetables for the monastery table are
also grown in the garden. At the beginning of the 20th century, the
monastery garden was considered one of the best in Egypt.
Ossuary and
cemetery - located outside the monastery walls, next to the garden. The
cemetery has a chapel of St. Tryphon and seven graves that are used
repeatedly. After a certain time, the bones are removed from the grave
and placed in an ossuary located on the lower tier of the Church of the
Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The only complete skeleton in the
ossuary are the relics of the hermit Stephen, who lived in the 6th
century and is mentioned in the “Ladder” of St. John Climacus. The
relics of Stephen, dressed in monastic robes, rest in a glass case. The
remains of the other monks are divided into two parts: their skulls are
piled up against the northern wall, and their bones are collected in the
central part of the ossuary. The bones of the Sinai archbishops are kept
in separate niches.
Since the monastery has never been conquered or destroyed since its founding, it currently possesses a huge collection of icons and a library of manuscripts second only to the Vatican Apostolic Library in historical significance.
The library in the monastery was created only in 1734 under
Archbishop Nikifor; before that time, no work on the study of books and
manuscripts was carried out. Russian pilgrim A. Umanets, who visited the
monastery in 1843, writes about the state of the library:
“...is
located in a special small room with shelves around the walls. The books
on the shelves are located in complete disorder, in some places piled up
in heaps, and it is very noticeable that the people who sometimes sorted
them out were not the local owners, but were in a hurry to finish this
sorting as quickly as possible, and therefore threw them anywhere: the
work, no doubt, of travelers, of whom everyone, not at all concerned
about maintaining order here, and being the hundredth visitor to the
library, sorted through the books in turn with the desire and hope of
finding some hitherto unknown manuscript, and by hook or by crook,
taking it with them.”
This situation contributed to the looting
of the congregation; in particular, the Codex Sinaiticus, one of the
oldest texts of the Bible, was taken from the monastery.
The most
valuable manuscripts of the monastery library include:
twelve leaves
of one of the oldest texts of the Bible, Codex Sinaiticus (IV century),
which was taken from the monastery to Russia in 1859;
Codex Syriac,
5th century;
ten leaves of a 6th-century uncial manuscript in Greek
with the text of the Gospel of Matthew (Codex 074);
Greek Gospel of
717 (gift to the monastery of the Byzantine Emperor Theodosius III);
The Sinai Psalter (11th century) is the oldest psalter in the Slavic
language.
The monastery houses 3,304 manuscripts and about 1,700
scrolls. Two thirds are written in Greek, the rest in Arabic, Syriac,
Georgian, Armenian, Coptic, Ethiopic and Slavic languages. In addition
to valuable manuscripts, the library also contains 5,000 books, some of
which date back to the first decades of printing. In addition to
religious books, the monastery library contains historical documents,
letters with gold and lead seals of Byzantine emperors, patriarchs and
Turkish sultans.
In 2005, it was announced that a special
repository for this collection would be built in the monastery to
replace the book depository built in 1951 at the southern monastery
wall.
The monastery has a unique collection of icons that have exceptional
spiritual, artistic and historical value. Twelve of the rarest and
oldest icons were painted in the 6th century with wax paints - these are
the oldest icons in the world. Several encaustic icons of the
pre-iconoclastic era were exported to Russia by Archimandrite Porfiry
(Uspensky) in 1850 (since 1940, the icons have been kept in the
collection of the Kyiv Museum of Western and Eastern Arts named after
Bogdan and Varvara Khanenko, Kyiv).
Part of the monastery
collection dates back to the early Byzantine period up to the 10th
century (including Syro-Palestinian icons from the 8th-9th centuries).
These icons were made by Greek, Georgian, Syrian and Coptic masters. The
icons were preserved, since the monastery, being outside the Byzantine
Empire since the 7th century, did not suffer from iconoclasm. There are
few works of Western European writing in the collection, but there are
unique icons from the period of the Crusades, combining the features of
“Western Latinism” and “Greek Byzantinism” in a single style.
The
only icon revered as miraculous in the monastery is a 13th-century
triptych depicting the Virgin Mary Bematarissa with scenes from the
cycle of the Theotokos. The icon does not have a separate day of
celebration and a special service; it is located in the altar of the
catholicon to the left of the high place.
In 1695, the Wallachian boyar Mihai Cantacuzino from the ancient Byzantine family of Cantacuzinos, after a pilgrimage to the monastery of St. Catherine, founded the Sinaia monastery in his homeland, named after the monastery he visited.