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St Barnabas Monastery

St Barnabas Monastery

Head west from Salamis and you’ll come to the Monastery of St Barnabas, once one of the most important Christian sites, now an archaeological and icon museum. Said to have been built as the result of a divinely inspired dream, it consists of the church of St Barnabas and monastery cloisters, which is a colonnade of pillars on three sides of a lush and well-tended garden. An extension. further colonnades and a campanile, though modern, fits in pretty well with the rest of the building. The white domes are the local landmarks.
The buildings
An archaeological museum housed in rooms that overlook the garden, contains Neolithic axe-heads, Bronze Age pottery, Iron Age antiquities and Ottoman artefacts. A stunning collection dating back to the 7th Century BC, they're kept in the monks' old cells and are mostly intact. It also has a small gift shop and restaurant.

An Icon Museum housed in the church of St Barnabas is a large collection of lit-up icons, depicting mostly well-known religious figures which are in great condition. Some of the Orthodox furnishings remain, including the pulpit, a chair and the iconostasis or screen. Four frescoes to the right of the entrance tell the story of the finding of St Barnabas’s body. What is said to be the tomb of the Barnabas himself is housed in a 1950s-built mausoleum about 100 yards from the monastery, built on the spot where his remains were discovered.
Brief History
St Barnabas is the patron saint of Cyprus. Over the years, Cyprus had rulers with different religious beliefs which have intermingled and the result is an island with mixed religions, churches and mosques. In Roman times most people practised Judaism, including St. Barnabas who came from Salamis. He travelled to the Holy Land to study law, met Paul the apostle and converted to Christianity. He was made the Archbishop of Salamis, returned, founded the Cypriot church and became a preacher. See The Bible Acts 4: 36-37, & Acts 13: 1-5 for reference. He convinced the Roman ruler Sergius Paulus to adopt Christianity, making Cyprus the first country in the world to have a Christian ruler. Together with his cousin Mark the Evangelist and the pivotal St Paul, he travelled extensively in both Cyprus and Asia Minor, spreading the gospel. Barnabas was so successful the Jewish elders in Salamis had him stoned to death around 75 AD. Mark retrieved his body and buried it secretly in a cave to the west of the city. Over time, the location of the cave was forgotten.

400 years later Cypriot Church under Archbishop Anthemios was faced with a takeover bid by Antioch, the patriarch of which claimed the right to rule over the island’s Christians, a claim supported by Byzantine Emperor Zeno. In 478 AD, when all seemed lost, Anthemios was visited in a dream by the spirit of St Barnabas, who told him where his body was buried – beneath a distinctive carob tree on the western edge of Salamis. Anthemios discovered a skeleton along with a copy of The Gospel of Matthew written in Hebrew by St Barnabas himself.

Anthemios shot off to Constantinople, donated the book to the Emperor and the Church of Cyprus was triumphantly granted autonomous status. Zeno also paid for a monastery to be built over the saint’s final resting place. In Cyprus, most churches feature an icon of Barnabas holding St Matthew’s gospel, placed in the backrest of the bishop’s chair. St Barnabas is said to be the patron saint of peace making and hailstorms, with St. Barnabas day taking place on June 11th. The monastery crumbled over the years and was replaced in the 18th Century. It was rebuilt with three domes, but lack of foundations and soft soil made one of the domes and an apse collapse. The third dome wasn’t replaced but the walls of the original apse can still be seen.

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