Discovering inner peace... no really!

• Tompsblogs's Profile
• About this blog
• Entry from Maaloula

Trip Start Feb 22, 2007 Previous
Entry Trip End Jul 19, 2008 Next
Entry

  Maaloula, Syria
Monday, March 26, 2007

Recently, some new university friends and I went on a very pleasant daytrip to Maaloula, an historical Aramaic village up in the mountains about an hour outside of Damascus, which is home to two historical churches. It is one of three such villages in Syria and they alone constitute the last populations in the entire world where Aramaic is used as a living language.
 
Arriving there, the first thing I noticed was the clean air. I find higher altitudes tend to give the atmosphere a delightful crispness anyway, but it was quite literally a breath of fresh air to lungs sated with weeks of dust and smog in Damascus. Upon arrival, we had the bus driver drop us in the village centre so that we could walk the rest of the way and take in the scenery more fully. The precipitous trail, atop of which stands the Mar Sarkis church, was lined on either side by houses built precariously into the mountainside

Maaloula 1

. The houses were not particularly elegant but one had to admire the tenacity with which they clung, some old and bowed, to the rock face. Indeed, at points it was difficult to distinguish between the houses and the hillside. At the top of the hill stood humbly the fourth century church, and beyond it lay a panorama portraying mile upon rolling mile of fairly sterile countryside. It was not a greatly inspiring scene in all truth, and we were left to puzzle over what industry (other than tourism) sustains this community in the seeming absence of farming. Yet, the underwhelming landscape belied a tranquillity that had each of us charmed into contemplative silence, broken only by our intrigue to discover the inside of this church where lay hidden a history dating back almost to the birth of Christianity itself.    
 
As we entered the church we were greeted by a friendly guide who offered to give us a tour. We graciously accepted and for the proceeding ten minutes were utterly captivated. The church was tiny really, but upon its bare rock walls hung an array of attractive Christian icons - among them some very valuable pieces - whose meanings she talked about at length with a pride and passion that belied her duty. Within the church too stood an ancient altar carved from marble which, according to the guide, was the first ever in Christianity. At the end of her tour she said for us the Lord's Prayer in Aramaic (the language of course of Jesus himself) which was quite a treat, and, with my growing exposure to Semitic languages, I would describe as sounding (unsurprisingly) like Hebrew

Maaloula 2

. Upon leaving the church we popped into the gift shop in order to sample the local wine. Actually, it was rather passable if not a touch too sweet and so we each purchased a bottle for later consumption.
 
I left the church feeling inspired. It was a strange feeling though: an inner inspiration, deeply personal, quietly spiritual and hard to fathom in my own mind. When I visited the Aya Sofya and Blue mosques of Istanbul, I too was inspired; but more by their sheer vastness and their unapologetic opulence. Yet, in the modest setting of this historical church, held together by 1700 year old wooden beams and grey stone from the village mountainside, I was inspired instead by the purest picture of serenity, of religion in its barest form, untainted by the politics of the modern world. Stripped of opulence and spared of vastness, this small place seemed almost to speak directly to my soul, filling me with peace. I could have stood for hours in the centre of the Aya Sofya Mosque and basked willingly in its brilliance, but never would it have spoken to my soul; its voice would merely have echoed around its own vastness and bounced off the tourist hordes and their flashing cameras. Indeed, for the first time since my reluctant Catholic childhood, I found myself humbled into dabbing my forehead with the Holy Water in a Benediction of sorts. High praise indeed I should say from someone who generally considers himself an atheist

Maaloula 3

.
 
Our route from the Catholic Mar Sarkis church to the more modern Roman Orthodox Mar Taqla church took us unexpectedly through a ravine deep within which we wandered, obeying the trickle of its small stream as it wound its way toward our destination. The high, steep walls of the ravine were tinged with a dusty yellow hue that beckoned the sun, bouncing playfully its willing rays from side to side and teasing our path into intermittent shadow. At points the cliff-faces flattened out and exposed ancient burial sites, the dusty graves of which were still visible amid the terraced effect. This whole scene made me think of, and yearn for, Petra; I'm not sure how much longer I can resist the urge to trace the wonders of Jordan in the knowledge that it's just a four hour, $10 taxi ride away.
 
The Mar Taqla church stood in the shadow of the mountain, as if hiding from the sun. In fact the focal point of this larger church, and a place of pilgrimage for both Christians and Muslims, was a section actually built into the mountainside. Its newer brickwork and angular construction gave it a slightly incongruous feel within the cave-like setting of the dusty rock precipice, but its attractive arches helped to maintain the spirit of the mountain. Inside it still felt to me more like a cave than a place of worship, the moss and vines vying with unattractively modern religious icons for pride of place on the jagged walls

Maaloula 4

. In the centre grew a peculiar tree, as if conjured from the Old Testament itself, which sprouted out at an impossible angle, its branches twisting like tentacles and reaching out through the arches and into the valley below.
 
As we made our descent back down to the village centre to catch the bus back to Damascus, I was left to reflect on an altogether surprising trip that had stirred within me a spirituality that, if not dead, had certainly lain dormant for some time. My only regret of the trip was that we were forbidden from taking pictures of the Mar Sarkis church that had so moved me, and so I will have but the memories of it upon which to reminisce. Yet, it was its simplicity that had seduced me and so it felt somehow fitting that cameras were forbidden from sullying that rare quality.   

Post your own travel photos for friends and family More Pictures

Maaloula 5	Maaloula 6	Maaloula 7	Maaloula 8
Mar Taqla 1	Mar Taqla 2	Mar Taqla 3	Mar Taqla 4

Slideshow Print this entry Share Maaloula hotels

Previous Entry Next Entry