LE SYMPOSIUM INTERNATIONAL LE LIVRE. LA ROUMANIE. L ...

480 cOnSTAnTIn PAncHEnKO
Adam (1.09.1591–31.08.1592) and 1000 year from hijra (19.10.1591–
7.10.1592).
uwakim was back just in time. 28 of September 1593 a russian
embassy headed by triphon Korobeynikov arrived to Jerusalem with large
alms to Middle eastern co-believers. At early october triphon started to
distribute the financial aid among palestinian monasteries. the tsar’s envoy
gave 50 golden coins for two priests of the Betlehem church and the same
sum of money personally to metropolitan uwakim, who was not forgotten
in Moscow. 28
It is the last information about Bethlehem metropolitan uwakim. his
further biography and date of death are unknown. how can we resume
his life? one can conclude that he was a failure. he defeated his struggle
for the patriarchal throne. he was totally forgotten by late scholars. his
historical heritage was only the single copy of the Tipikon translation, the
incomplete description of Constantinople and the cell, carved in rocks of
hamatura. however during this last – and practically unknown – period of
his life uwakim have achieved his really main goal. he managed to find a
man who could be a successor of his ambitious projects.
the world of the ottoman palestine was very small. there were about
two hundreds of orthodox monks there and they should know each other
personally. A number of monks of Arabic origin were much less and these
people should contact each other even more closely. Meletius Karma, the
prominent ecclesiastical leader of the Antiochean church in the 17 th century,
became a monk of Mar Saba in early 1590s. Being in the monastery he
adopted the Greek culture and realized a scale of the orthodox civilization.
Meletius understood that Christian Arabs occupied a marginal place in the
orthodox world. he devoted all his life to overcoming this marginality. As it
was said, Meletius embarked on the program of new revised translations of
Arabic liturgical literature, trying to unify it according to the Greek standards.
no doubts that Meletius in his young years was familiar with
metropolitan uwakim (and as well with ‘Isa, metropolitan of hama and
the author of kasida about the journey of uwakim Daw). So uwakim of
Bethlehem was one of those people who widened horizons of Meletius
and discovered for him the universe. uwakim belonged both to Greek
and Arabic cultures; he had close contacts with people from Serbia and
Georgia; he personally visited Sinai 29 , Istanbul, Bucharest, Kiev and
28 Hodjdenie Trifona Korobeynikova (A Pilgrimage of Triphon Korobeynikov), p.
VII, 101.
29 there is a colophon of uwakim in one of Sinai manuscripts (porphiriy uspenskiy.
Kniga bitiya moyego/A Book of my Biography). Т. 4. st.-Petersburg. 1898, p. 48).