The history of the Mahaira Monasterytranslated

The history of the Mahaira Monastery is related to the miraculous icon of Panagia Mahairiotissa, the holy icon of the Monastery. This icon, according to tradition, was painted by the Apostle Luke and is one of the seventy icons he painted after the Dormition of the Virgin. During the years of the Roman Empire, we find this miraculous icon in Constantinople, specifically in the church of Panagia of Blacherna, where the holy Soros, i.e. the holy dress and the holy Belt, the only relics left to us by the Virgin, were treasured. That is why she was named Agiosoritissa.

Tradition preserves that during the period of iconoclasm, an ascetic took it to Cyprus to save it from destruction, specifically to a cave in the mountains of Machiras, where he himself remained until the end of his life. After his death it remained there forgotten for many centuries.

In the 12th century, when the history of the Monastery begins, an ascetic named Neophytos came to Cyprus from Palestine, due to the raids of the Saracens. In Cyprus he settled, together with his student Ignatius, in the Monastery of Saint John...