From the Holy Mountain: A Journey Among the Christians of the Middle East

By William Dalrymple

In the spring of A.D. 587, John Moschos and his pupil Sophronius the Sophist embarked on a remarkable expedition across the entire Byzantine world, traveling from the shores of Bosphorus to the sand dunes of Egypt. Using Moschos’s writings as his guide and inspiration, the acclaimed travel writer William Dalrymple retraces the footsteps of these two monks, providing along the way a moving elegy to the slowly dying civilization of Eastern Christianity and to the people who are struggling to keep its flame alive. The result is Dalrymple’s unsurpassed masterpiece: a beautifully written travelogue, at once rich and scholarly, moving and courageous, overflowing with vivid characters and hugely topical insights into the history, spirituality and the fractured politics of the Middle East.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
• Release date: Oct 2, 2012
• ISBN: 9780307948922

William Dalrymple

William Dalrymple is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and of the Royal Asiatic Society, and in 2002 was awarded the Mungo Park Medal by the Royal Scottish Geographical Society for his ‘outstanding contribution to travel literature’. He wrote and presented the TV series ‘Stones of the Raj’ and ‘Indian Journeys’, which won BAFTA’s 2002 Grierson Award for Best Documentary Series. He and his wife, artist Olivia Fraser, have three children, and divide their time between London and Delhi.

Reviews for From the Holy Mountain

[jonfaith · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Very promising beginning which soon detoured into ruminations on geopolitics and along the way found it self stretched in the muddy fields of scripture and doctrine. The geopolitics appears dated, of course, which is no one's fault. The scripture and doctrine appear methodical, which I regard as alarming.

If it wasn't for the encounter with Robert Fisk I would've aborted the book while it was in Lebanon. It is a revealing view into the incestuous proximity between Islam and Christianity, even if the lengths explored lapse into Rorystewartism. That said, a neutral can appreciate the symbiosis of these desert faiths.

[pierthinker · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

William Dalrymple is a Scottish-born travel writer and historian, specialising in books about the Near and Far East. 'From the Holy Mountain' is a deceptively simple description of Dalrymple's travels as he follows in the footsteps of John Moschos's 'The Spiritual Meadow', a 6th century guide to the Christian monasteries of the Byzantine empire, beginning at Mt. Ethos in Greece through Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel (including the occupied West Bank) and Egypt, ending at the Al Kharga Oasis deep in the deserts of Upper Egypt. Along the way he focuses on meeting the remaining Christian (almost exclusively Orthodox) communities in these countries. The stories he hears are by turns surprising and expected (depressingly so).That the countries and governments of the Near East are growing more strongly Islamist and increasingly aggressive towards other religions is well known, although many will be unfamiliar with the specific stories revealed here of persecutions both old and ongoing. More surprising is the reminder that the Byzantine Empire was Christian and many communities have a longer history and stronger claim to the land than Muslims or Jews would like everyone to think. Further, given the antagonism between Islam and Christianity being offered today, it is ironic to learn that much of the religious practice of Islam was drawn from early Orthodox Christianity. As Dalrymple points out, Were John Moschos to return today he might find more familiar in the worship in a mosque than in a Western Christian church.Dalrymple writes well, with humour and compassion for all the people he meets. He draws you into his journey and helps you see what he has seen with his own eyes. As an armchair traveller too scared to leave his home town, Dalrymple stirred my wanderlust. What better recommendation for this book?

[stillatim · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

As good as advertised, and perhaps even more so twenty years after publication, given all that has happened in the meantime. If you're not inclined to sadness over lost traditions, you probably won't care, but I almost cried when the Taliban blew up the Bamiyan Buddha, and I have literally no social or cultural connection to Buddhism whatsoever, so I was basically free for the taking on this one.

[theonearmedcrab · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Wlliam Dalrymple’s “From the Holy Mountain” (1997) has a chapter on Lebanon, which he visited a few years after the civil war. His description paints a divided and destroyed country, yet with signs of remarkable resurrection. He is particularly interested in the Maronites, the ancient Christian society that survived in the Lebanese mountains, and more specifically in their role in the civil war – not a pretty picture, according to Dalrymple. As with all books I have read from Dalrymple, this one is equally brilliant, a balance between often funny travel experiences put in a broader framework of history, ancient to recent. Interestingly, he traveled west to east through Turkey via Syria to Lebanon (and then on to Israel and Egypt) in 1994, and he must have been in Diyarbakir, SE Turkey, when we were there, too.

[piano3646_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Quite fragmented because of its format (divided into various chapters) but a good read 

[karen_wells_58 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Dalrymple's speciality is going to dead places that the modern world has killed, and rooting around to discover those trace elements of its mysterious golden past that still exist below the surface.He comes across as a modest man of learning and good humour; certainly he has good eyes and ears. For me this book worked at every level; finely observed cameos of people and places, most definitely educational, and sometimes powerfully moving in its evocation of the tragedies and heroism of this region.

[cerievans1 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

150 pages in so far a few interesting stories but on the whole disappointing, I will reserve judgementUpdate. I didn't manage to finish this book; as I suspected, my final view is that it was disappointing. Having read a couple of William Dalrymple's other works of non-fiction I had high expectations of this book. Unfortunately, for me it focused too much on religion and not enough on observations and travel. I have up after 300 odd pages... having made it as far as Egypt.

[cathepsut · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Travel book, starting point is mount Athos in Greece. From there on to Turkey, then Syria, Lebanon, Israel and finally Egypt - following the history of Christians in the area from about 300 A.D. Very good, I enjoy it a lot. Very useful for my holidays in Greece, as all the Byzantine art in the various museums actually meant something to me.

[name99_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

More Dalrymple. Longer and a little more serious than In Xanadu, probably because the material us that much more depressing. A sad catalog of hatreds in the Middle East that continue to this day, happily sponsored by various states. Especially interesting were the claims that * Turkey is still doing whatever it can to suppress Christians (which basically means Greeks and Armenians). Question --- has this changed in the wake of all the recent changes in Turkey? The journey the book is based on was undertaken almost twenty years ago.* Israel does what it can to ensure that archeology and history concerned with anything outside the period of the original twelve tribes of Israel is suppressed, so as to maintain the myth that the place was pretty much an empty desert between when the Romans kicked them out and 1800 yrs later when they returned.* Of all the countries in the Middle East, Syria of all places is apparently the one that does the least to harass Christians.