Anchorite

An anchorite ( from ancient Greek ἀναχωρέω, anachōreō " retire " ) was a man who for personal reasons from the community, the Chora, retired in ancient Greek language. Already in the Hellenistic- Roman Egypt time anchorites have already been mentioned in pre-Christian, who, in order to avoid, for example, taxation or conscription, fled into the desert or into inaccessible wetlands in the Nile Delta. Later the term was transferred to the representative of one of the earliest forms of Christian monasticism. The assignment of a monk to Anachoretentum therefore means once nothing more than its withdrawal from human society, which then in monastic communities living either as Koinobit with other anchorites or alone, as a hermit, can live totally isolated and withdrawn.

As the founder of the Christian Anachorese applies Anthony the Great ( The Hermit ) ( 251? -356 ). In his environment, were also first Anachoretengemeinschaften, loose associations of more or less estranged hermits as a transition to Koinobitentum. In England can be found in medieval churches grown cells whose front door was bricked up, and of those heard from the respective Anchorite by a small open in the stained glass windows the fair and could receive Holy Communion, and opening by another, on the road window could be supplied with necessities of life.

An extreme form of anchorites were from the 5th century, the demigod, whose most famous, the Holy Symeon Syria in a large number of imitators prompted to, spend their lives on a tall column. The spatial separation did not mean to give up the communication with others. Dendrites attracted instead on a tree back. The full withdrawal from the environment practiced anchorites who were immured in cells and were passed only through a small opening food. Such archaeological site is occupied Sayala in Nubia; for the few cases in Egypt are no archaeological features, but contemporary sources.

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