From The Holy Mountain: A Journey In The Shadow Of Byzantium (2004) - Plot & Excerpts
This is a depressing book. I read it expecting tales of deep traditional faith in remote places. I found stories of lone decrepit survivors waiting to die and then end the two-thousand-year history of Christianity in their region. Dalrymple seems to view them as historical relics, a strange tribe to be studied before their inevitable extinction. He admires the gentleness of the monks in some surviving monasteries, but he finds them superstitious and credulous as well as pious. Maybe he's right.Each country has a different story. The Syrian Orthodox Christians in Turkey are (or were in 1994, when Dalrymple's journey took place) trapped between warring Turks and Kurds, distrusted by both. The Lebanese Maronites are no better than Sicilian gangsters. Arab Christians in the Holy Land are margininalized by Israeli indifference to Christian archaeological remains, to vandalism of Christian sites, and to claims of Arabs evicted from their homes in 1948 and never allowed to return. Copts in Egypt daren't complain when am imam fires up his flock and they pour out of the mosque looking for Christians to kill. The best off in 1994 were the Christians of Syria, who had an accepted place in Syrian society and got some protection from the minority Alawite government. Presciently, they worried how they could survive the backlash if that government should fall.All these Christian populations are ancient peoples, going back to Roman times and the preaching of the Apostles. They are not colonial impositions, either from the Crusades or from modern times. In many places they are (or were) a substantial minority, 10-15% of the population. Under Ottoman rule they suffered some disabilities, but overall they got along relatively well and sometimes even prospered. Their determined persecution and gradual expulsion from the region started only with the rise of nationalism and then of fundamentalist Islam, starting 100 years ago. The Armenian expulsion from Turkey was the first act. A journey undertaking in 1994 tracing the footsteps of two 6th century monks. Well written and captures the history -both past and present very well. The book could do with a map showing the places this journey takes the author on. And lots more photographs since most readers have little chance to either visit these places or find them in the same condition the author found them in. I created my own map on google and its a fascinating routes. Unfortunately I have no idea how to upload it onto goodreads.
What do You think about From The Holy Mountain: A Journey In The Shadow Of Byzantium (2004)?
a story of one man's journey travelling an ancient route through modern day Byzantium.
—paula
A fascinating trip to places you'll never read about elsewhere.
—veroniro
