Monasteries
He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the
Lord: But he that is married careth for the things that are of the world, how he may please
his wife. 1. Cor 7:32,33
So then he that giveth her in marriage doeth well; but he that giveth her not in marriage doeth
better.1 Cor. 7:38.
Monasteries are a Coptic "invention". In a previous part it was described how
Diocletian
prosecuted the Christians, and how severe the prosecutions were in Egypt.
Some Christians fled into the desert, where they could freely live.
Others went into the desert because they disliked the decadent
late-Roman life. Life in the desert was not easy of course, as
an ascetic life was their purpose. To eat and drink moderately, and to abstain completely
from sex. One has to break with the world.
According to
Methodius
(third century) life in sexual abstinence is restoration of the human state
before the fall of Adam and Eve.
The Bible gives some motives for an ascetic life. The texts above this part
suggest at least sexual abstinence. And if one wants to follow the Sermon of the Mount
literally then one can better go to a monastery in the desert.
One Paul
should have been the first monk, but we know him only because
Antony,
the monk known for his temptations mentions him. Antony was born about 250,
and died in 356, 105 jaar old. He got many followers in the desert, but a monastery was
not founded.
The first one who did was
Pachomius,
who lived from 290-346. Hij laid down rules for communities of
monks or nuns, and founded 16 monasteries.
The next important monk was
Shenouda,
namesake of the present-day patriarch van Alexandria. He lived from
333-451, and so must have reached the age of 118 years.
The life in a monastery is obviously very healthy.
Shenouda was a really fanatical monk, who also made heavy demands on others.
He introduced the Coptic language (derived from the
old-Egyptic language of the Pharaos) as the official language of the Church in Egypt.
Many religious texts and literary works were written in the Coptic language.
The letters used were those of the Greek alphabet,
with some supplements for sounds the Greek alphabet did not have.
Well-known examples of Coptic writings are the finds of
Nag Hammadi, a
collection of Gnostic manuscripts of that time. The "Gospel of
Thomas" is a part of it.
Becoming a monk became popular, first in the East, later also in the West. It lead sometimes to peculiar behaviour. Simeon the Stylite lived for year on top of a pillar near Aleppo. The pillar is still there, but it has become low because many pilgrims took parts of it home as a relic.
The first Western hermit was
St. Martin
but he did not found monasteries. He died in 397.
The most famous founder of monasteries in the West was
Benedictus of Nurcia,
who founded one in 529 on the Monte Cassino. It became the
center of the Benedictine order, for which he laid down the rules.
The Copts still found monasteries. Not in Egypte, which has enough monasteries
for the number of novices, but in countries the Copts emigrated to,
like America and Australia.
The Egyptian monasteries are important attractions for tourists.
Four can be seen in Wadi an-Natrun (between Cairo en Alexandria).
The most well-known is Deir Abu Makar, with icons from the 5th
and the 6th century.
Along the Nile the White and the Red Monastery are found, near Achmin.
Near Aswan the ruins of the Simeon-monastery are found.
One can also visit the Antony-monastery, founded a few centuries after the death of the hermit,
near the cave where he used to live.
The famous Catharina-monastery in the Sinai desert is not a Coptic monastery.