The Orthodox Gorno Nunnery is located in the Ein Karem neighbourhood in the south-west of Jerusalem. The monastery, run by the Russian Spiritual Mission, is a small corner of Russia in the Holy Land.
Since ancient times there has been a village surrounded by gardens: Ein Karem means "spring in the vineyard" in Arabic. Christian tradition holds that it was here that the young Virgin Mary came from Nazareth to her relative Elizabeth. The evangelist Luke described the striking scene of this meeting. Elizabeth, pregnant with the future John the Baptist, seeing Mary already carrying Christ under her heart, joyfully exclaimed: "And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord has come to me?" (Luke 1:43).
In 1869, Archimandrite Antonin, head of the Russian Spiritual Mission, accompanied Peter Melnikov, a member of the Russian State Council, to the outskirts of Jerusalem. The ascetic told the guest of his plan to buy for Russia a plot of holy land in Ein Karem, on which the Virgin Mary had walked two thousand years ago. Melnikov caught fire with the idea and organised a fundraising committee. Large donations made industrialist Nikolai Putilov, traders brothers Eliseev, his contribution was made by ordinary Russian pilgrims. After much haggling with the dragoman (interpreter) of the French embassy, Hana Jellad, who owned the plot, the olive plantation on the mountainside was purchased. Father Antoninus, in accordance with the text of Scripture, named it "The Mountain Town of Jude," or Gornje.
A female monastic community was established here. On a beautiful slope grew a small stone church of the Kazan icon of the Mother of God. In the monastery established a strict order of appearance of new residents: each of them, receiving a plot of land, undertook to build a house with outbuildings at their own expense, to break up around the garden, plant cypresses and almonds. Very soon the monastery turned into a blooming oasis.
In 1911 the construction of a large cathedral began here, but the First World War destroyed all plans. Palestine was then part of the Ottoman Porte, and its authorities even expelled the nuns from the Mountain - they were forced to leave for a while in Egypt, in Alexandria. In 1948, after the formation of Israel, the monastery was handed over to the Moscow Patriarchate. Construction of the church resumed in 2003, four years later it was completed. In 2012, the Cathedral of All Saints in the Land of the Russian Shining, solemnly consecrated by Patriarch Kirill of Moscow.
In the centre of Ein Karem preserved spring, from which, as it is believed, took the water of the Blessed Virgin Mary. From here the road leads to Gornyema. The abode looks unusual, but extremely picturesque: there are no buildings with cells, on the slope scattered drowning in greenery small houses of the nuns.
At the entrance to the church of the Kazan icon of the Mother of God you can see a magnificent flower carpet, arranged by the sisters. To the right of the entrance is the stone near which, according to tradition, John the Baptist preached. On the border with the neighbouring Catholic Church of the Visitation is a cave church in honour of Saint John the Baptist, consecrated in 1987.
