St George Monastery in Saidnaya

At the southern entrance to Saidnaya, 1200 metres up on a hill facing the Our Lady of Saidnaya Monastery below, stands a monastery of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch. The lower walls of its church are Byzantine, built of large white stone blocks. Underground there is a cave chapel found in 1912, and its icons include some dated 1707. A community of monks lives here today.

How old is the monastery?

Nobody knows when it was founded. Local tradition links it to the first Christian ascetics, but no archaeological evidence supports that. The first written record dates from 1727, when the Russian traveller Barsky found a single monk keeping watch over it. Until 1924 it was the seat of the Metropolis of Seleucia. It was repaired in 1905 under Metropolitan Germanos Shehadeh.

What to see

The lower walls of the church are Byzantine; the upper parts and the dome were rebuilt in 1905 and again in recent years. The wooden iconostasis, the screen of icons in front of the altar, is dated 1905, and most of its icons were painted in 1961. The older icons that stand out are a Transfiguration and a Baptism dated 1707, an 1882 work by the Palestinian painter Mikhail al-Qudsi, and an icon of Saint George dated 1828.

The underground chapel

In 1912 an underground chapel was found in a natural cave. Today it is fitted out as a place of worship, with a dome and an iconostasis.

The community today

The monastery came back to life in 1985, when it was attached to the Our Lady of Saidnaya Monastery. In 1995 it was placed under Archimandrite Youhanna al-Talli, and in 1999 a monastic community of seven monks was formally established. According to a 2026 Euronews report, 10 monks and 10 novices now live here. The monastery runs retreats and summer gatherings for young people from Damascus and the surrounding area.

What not to miss

The underground chapel. It is a church set inside a natural cave, with its own dome and iconostasis, and a separate layer for anyone who knows the monastery only from the building above.

Before you go

The monastery is active and its visiting hours could not be verified, so confirm at the gate. The Our Lady of Saidnaya Monastery stands on the facing hill below, and the two fit into one visit.