Saint Sabas

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For St. Sabas the Goth, see Sava the Goth.

Saint Sabas (439 - 531), a Palestinian monk, born near Caesarea of Cappadocia.

Becoming a monk in his childhood, he went to Jerusalem and lived as a hermit. After a time he established the Great Laura monastery in the neighborhood of the Dead Sea, and later on the New Laura, under St Basil's Rule. In the Lauras the young monks lived a cenobitical life, but the elders a semi-eremitical one, each in his own hut within the precincts of the Laura, attending only the solemn church services.

Sabas was made exarch or superior of all the monasteries in Palestine, and composed a Typicon or Rule for their guidance. He took a prominent part, on the orthodox side, in the Monophysite and Origenistic controversies. His Laura long continued to be the most influential monastery in those parts, and produced several distinguished monks, among them St John of Damascus. It is now known as the monastery of Mar Saba. The church of San Saba in Rome is dedicated to him. He is commemorated on December 5.

Sabas's Life was written by his disciple Cyril of Scythopolis. The chief modern authority is A. Ehrhard in Wetzer u. Welte's Kirchenlexikon (ed. 2) and Romische Quartalschaft, vii.; see also Pierre Helyot, Histoire des ordres religioux (1714), i. C. 16, and Max Heimbucher, Orden u. Kongregationen (1907), i, § 10.

This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.