The Pillar of Life

Svetitskhoveli Cathedral, Mtskheta, Georgia – Aug 2018. If you look closely, you’d see a wedding procession under way. Far behind, on top of the hill on the left of the photo, is the Jvari Monastery

Summer is here, officially. Every year in the UAE, from 15-June to 15-September, no worker is allowed to work out in the open between noon and 3pm. It’s the mandatory midday break rule. Any company caught flouting this rule, would be subjected to hefty fines, the size of King Kong (or Godzilla depending on whose side you’re on). Previously, workers used to die from heat stroke every friggin year.

Summer also marks the end of the school term and the start of the 2-month long summer vacation, that’ll drive the residents here to make a beeline for the airport, immediately on the day that school ends. Don’t believe me, just camp out in the airport on the last day of school, and you’ll see what I mean.

But this year? Hmmmm… I have no idea. Countries are starting to open up. All the ads on radio, YouTube, Google and what-have-you are about airlines and holiday destinations. Everyone’s surfing the web hunting for places to go, holiday packages… (including yours truly, ahem). But will it materialize? There’re still SO many restrictions in place, procedures to follow, COVID-19 tests to take, visas to obtain, etc, etc, etc, might have to give this summer break another break! That’s 2 years in a friggin row. WTF.

Anyway, here’s something from 2 years, no, 3 years back! A continuation of our summer vacation in the Caucasus. Continuing from where I left off – Tbilisi. After a couple of days in Tbilisi, we started our customary road trip (what’s a holiday without a road trip?!) A road trip on a Chinese 4WD car – a Great Wall 4WD automatic transmission SUV (don’t ask me the model, OK?) Let’s hope it doesn’t conk out… Fingers crossed – Don’t want another broken car adventure like the one we had in Armenia earlier in the trip!

First stop, Mtskheta, the former capital of Georgia in the olden days. Mtskheta has been around for centuries, err.. actually longer than that. It was there at the time of Alexander the Great, 4 centuries before Christ!


This bird’s eye view of Mtskheta is taken from the Jvari Monastery. Svetitskhoveli Cathedral can be seen clearly in the middle of town

Anyway, the story goes that a Jewish native from Mtskheta, who was in Jerusalem at the time of Jesus’s crucifixion, bought Jesus Christ’s robe from the roman soldier who had it. He brought it back to his hometown Mtskheta and was met by his sister. When his sister touched the robe, she was so overwhelmed with emotions that she died clutching the robe. They could not remove the robe from her clutches, and buried her together with the sacred robe. Years went by and a cedar tree grew from the place where she was buried.

About 300 years later (4th century), St Nino (a nun who converted Georgia to Christianity) chose this sacred place for the building of a church. The enormous cedar tree was cut down and made into pillars for the church. When the builders started erecting the pillars, the last (seventh) pillar rose into the air by itself. It only came down after St Nino prayed for a whole night. The pillar also exuded a liquid that cured people of all diseases. Now, it only I knew which pillar this is… Hmmmm…


Svetitskhoveli means life-giving (tskhoveli) pillar (sveti) in the impossible to pronounce Georgian language


An artwork portraying the living pillar legend, from the hilltop Jvari Monastery, photo compliments of camera-trigger-happy wife (I love you honey, you capture the most amazing things on camera, mmmuahhhh!) A similar artwork is supposed to be in Svetitskhoveli, but I just didn’t pay attention, there were so many religious artworks around, duh. I only ‘discovered’ this photo while picking out the photos for the post!


This is the ciborium marking the place where the robe of Jesus Christ was supposedly buried… (if only I’d knew about it during the visit… I only found out while reading about it for this post!)


The original church built by St Nino had been damaged many times in the course of history by earthquakes, wars and lastly by religious subjugation during the Soviet era. The present church dates back from the 11th century. Behind Anu, you can see a grapevine cross with drooping arms. That’s the cross of St Nino which has since become a symbol of the Georgian Orthodox Church


“Wow, this place is like a castle!” “Hey kids, this is not a playground, OK?” (As if they'd care...)


A fresco of Jesus Christ can be seen behind the chandelier, Svetitskhoveli Cathedral




More scenes from the Svetitskhoveli Cathedral, Mtskheta


The monastery on top of the hill, Jvari Monastery, Mtskheta


Jvari Monastery, Mtskheta, Georgia


The Jvari Monastery also has its story. St Nino erected a large wooden cross (or was it a grapevine cross…) on the site of a pagan temple. This cross could work miracles and this attracted pilgrims from all over the land. Eventually, someone erected a church at the spot and it grew to become the Jvari Monastery of today. Is this the miraculous cross? I don't know. I don’t think it’ll survive that many hundred years… What, with the wars and invasions throughout history!

By the way, St Nino also featured in the story of neighbouring Armenia’s conversion to Christianity, which made Armenia the first Christian nation in history. St Nino was the only survivor of a group of virgin nuns from Rome who sought the protection of the king of Armenia, only to be slaughtered by the king when one of the nuns, Rhipsime refused to marry him. St Nino eventually came to Georgia and converted the king of Georgia (then known as the Kingdom of Iberia) to Christianity. Georgia therefore became the second nation in history to adopt Christianity as its state religion. The end.