The convent included a hostel for the aged and for pilgrims, built by a certain Isaurus (quodam Isauro). It attracted the attention of Pope Gregory the Great (592-604), who, hearing of it, forwarded to John Climacus, who was superior at the time, woollen coverings and bedding for fifteen beds, together with money wherewith to purchase feather-beds. At the same time he wrote to Father Palladius, to whom he forwarded a cowl or tunic. The Pope had previously written to John Climacus, complimenting him on having reached a harbour of safety while others were tossing on a sea of religious difficulties.[204] He seems to have made a permanent grant to the convent. A pilgrim of 1341 mentioned that the day of St. Gregory was kept at the convent, since he had bestowed on it alms out of the treasury of the Church, by which the number of convent inmates was raised to four hundred.
The interest which Pope Gregory took in the convent was probably connected with a pilgrimage made by the Roman patrician lady Rusticiana. In the year 592 she took her daughter, who was ill, to Sinai in the hope of effecting a cure. The husband of the daughter was also of the party. They started from Constantinople and returned sooner than was expected. This we learn from a letter which Rusticiana wrote to Pope Gregory.[205]
In Sinai the monk Anastasius recorded the visit of a patrician lady who came with her daughter and wished to consult Father Orontius, “who was so filled with divine fire that he could hold his hand in the flame, and burn incense on the palm of his hand.” On one occasion, however, he lost a finger by burning. But Orontius refused to see the ladies, he sent them some grapes instead. When the demon who was in the daughter, saw the grapes, he cried out: Father Orontius, why do you come here? And he departed out of her (no. 18). It was doubtless the same hermit, in this case called Orontos, who once came into church with his cowl all awry. When his attention was drawn to it, he said that all things being awry in the church, his cowl was in keeping with them. If they would set things straight there, he would see to his cowl.
A great feature of the convent of Sinai was its library, where the monks amassed books and manuscripts, and added to the world’s literature by copying and writing. The place was a polyglot centre. Antoninus Martyr found three Fathers there who spoke Latin, Greek, Syriac, Egyptian (Coptic), and Bessam (Persian), and many interpreters in each language (c. 37). The hermit Simeon, who came into Europe about the year 1025, spoke Egyptian, Syriac, Arabic, Greek and Roman (i.e. Latin).
The contents of the library, in spite of losses incurred at different times, are still considerable. Among its most notable treasures was the Codex Sinaiticus, dated to about the year 400, which helped to revise the text of most of the Greek Old Testament, of the New Testament, and of some important early Christian works, including the Shepherd of Hermas. Attention was attracted to this Codex by Tischendorf, who came to the convent in 1844 to inspect the MSS., and having identified some of its pages, returned in 1853, in 1854, and in 1859, when he finally acquired it for Petrograd, a facsimile copy being deposited at the convent. A few leaves are at Leipzig. Another notable treasure was a Syriac Codex of the Gospels of a very early date, which was discovered as a palimpsest and photographed by the sisters, Mrs. Smith-Lewis and Mrs. Gibson, in 1893. Again, there was the Evangeliarium Theodosianum, a collection of passages from the New Testament written in gold lettering on parchment, which was seen and described by Burckhardt in 1816, and is dated to about the year 1000.
The Greek MSS. that are in the library were recently examined and catalogued by Prof. Gardthausen of Oxford. The list contains 1230 entries of MSS. that are all of a religious character. Prof. Gardthausen noted the names of over two hundred scribes, and other details which show that some of the MSS. came from Crete, Cairo, and Cyprus.[206] The Syriac and Palestinian-Syriac MSS. were catalogued by the ladies Smith-Lewis and Gibson. They are over three hundred in number. The Christian Arabic MSS. catalogued by the same ladies, amounted to six hundred and eighty entries.[207]
The importance which was secured to the convent reacted on the standing of the bishopric of Pharan, the representative of which seems to have removed to the convent. When Peter, patriarch of Jerusalem, (524-544) summoned his bishops to a synod in 538, Photius, bishop of Pharan, who was close upon seventy years of age, was “unable to leave Mount Sinai,” which suggests that he lived there. Stephen of Cappadocia, mentioned above, Dulcetius and Zosimus were deputed to represent him. We again hear of Zosimus as one of three monks of Sinai, whom Apollinaris, the orthodox or Melkite patriarch of Alexandria (550-568), summoned to Alexandria. Of these he consecrated Theodor bishop of Leontopolis, an unnamed monk, bishop of Heliopolis, and Zosimus bishop of Babylon (Cairo). But Zosimus had no taste for the episcopate, and soon returned to his cell in Sinai.[208]
Likewise do we hear that Gregorius, who had presided over the monks in Sinai, was chosen to succeed Anastasius, bishop of the see of Antioch who was evicted in the year 569. According to information provided by Evagrius (593), he had there been besieged by the Kenite Arabs.[209] The country generally seems to have been at the mercy of the Arabs, which resulted in the abandonment of the hermitages, while it added to the prestige of the convent.
About this time the convent became the home of a young monk who was always silent. He was the only surviving son of the emperor Maurice, and was saved by his nurse when all the other sons were put to death by Phocas (602-608).[210] When he died his body disappeared. “Perhaps it was carried by God to the realms of the living,” was the verdict of the monk Anastasius (no. 29).
The last bishop of Pharan we hear of was Theodor, who proposed the so-called monothelite modification of the monophysite doctrine, hoping thereby to secure re-union with the Church. In its interest he went to Constantinople, where he was honourably entertained by the patriarch Sergius (610-638), who impressed Pope Honorius (625-638) in Theodor’s favour. Objection was, however, raised to the new doctrine by the monk Sophronius, who later became patriarch of Jerusalem (634-638), and disapproval of it was expressed by the Lateran Synod of 649,[211] and by the Sixth General Council of Constantinople in 681.