The Mar Saba Monastery is a Byzantine architectural marvel, nestled precariously into the cliff face as if it had sprouted organically out of the sheer rock.
Although female visitors are not permitted to enter the monastery, the view of the metal domes glinting in the sun between the rock face is reason enough to visit.
The Serbian monastic community of Palestine, based in the fourteenth-century monastery of St. Michael the Archangel, purchased Mar Saba in 1504, which had been abandoned due to Bedouin raids at the time. The Serbs controlled the monastery until the late 1630s, and the monastery’s significant financial support from Tsar of Russia allowed them to run the monastery semi-independently from the Patriarch of Jerusalem, the monastery’s nominal overseer (much to the vexation of the patriarchate). The Serbs’ control of Mar Saba enabled them to play a significant role in the Orthodox Church of Jerusalem’s politics, frequently siding with the Arabic laity and priests against the Greeks who dominated the episcopate.
One of the Holy Land’s great historic sites, Mar Saba Monastery is an easy day trip from Bethlehem or Jerusalem.
After all, this is where some of the most important events in the Jewish, Muslim, and Christian faiths are said to have occurred.