At the foot of a mountain peak in the Kidron Valley desert, the Mar Saba Monastery sits 1,500 meters (roughly a mile) away from the town of al-Ubeidiya, east of Bethlehem. The monastery dates back to the fifth century. Saint Saba, among other monks, founded it in 484 based on a unique engineering plan to become one of the oldest inhabited monasteries in the world.

The monastery is one of the most prominent Palestinian archaeological monuments. It is surrounded by magnificent natural sceneries showing the twists and turns of the valley. An 18-meter (59 feet) high tower called the Justinian Tower was erected next to the monastery in the sixth century and was used for observation.

Mayor of al-Ubeidiya Naji Radaida told Al-Monitor, “The monastery is an architectural masterpiece and is home to the relics of Saint Saba, whose slightly decomposed body lies in a glass box. There is also a church at the monastery, a water spring and a crypt leading to the monastery’s underground cemetery, where the remains of hundreds of monks who were killed by the Persians in 614 can be found. The monastery also houses the rocky hermitage of Saint John of Damascus, who lived there in the eighth century. The monastery consists of more than 100 rooms and is decorated with a number of paintings about Judgment Day and a painting of the burial ceremony of Saint John of Damascus.”

“The monastery still maintains its old traditions of preventing women from entering. Based on Christian beliefs, the monastery would collapse and be completely destroyed by an earthquake should a woman enter it. There are still some strange myths imposed by the monastery. Eating apples is forbidden since Saba once felt like eating an unripe apple; but deeming this as gluttony, he thought that the pleasure of eating the apple would affect his and the monks’ [journey] at the monastery,” Radaida said.