Annaya Monastery: The History of Saint Charbel's Monastery
The Monastery of Saint Maron in Annaya is a working Maronite monastery on a forested hillside in the mountains above Byblos. It was founded by the Lebanese Maronite Order in 1828, and it is the house where Saint Charbel lived for forty-five years, died on Christmas Eve 1898, and lies entombed today.
This page tells the story of the place: how the monastery began, what the Lebanese Maronite Order is, the years Charbel spent inside these walls, and why a modest mountain community became the most visited Christian shrine in the Middle East. If you are planning a pilgrimage, our practical guide to visiting Annaya covers getting there, the tomb, Mass, and the 22nd of the month.
Annaya is not a grand cathedral or an ancient ruin. The buildings are simple, the landscape beautiful but not dramatic, and monks still rise before dawn to pray. What draws people here is harder to define: a sense that the silence Charbel cultivated during his lifetime still lingers in the stone, the chapel, and the mountain air.
History of the Monastery
The Lebanese Maronite Order (Ordre Libanais Maronite, or OLM) decided to establish a monastery at Annaya in 1820, and construction began in 1828, the same year Saint Charbel was born. The community was formally founded the following year under its first abbot, Father Sarkis Kartabawi, and building work continued in stages into the early 1840s.
The Order itself dates to 1695, when it was established as a monastic congregation within the Maronite Church, dedicated to prayer, manual labor, and community life in the tradition of the Desert Fathers.
The site chosen for the monastery was a wooded hillside in the village of Annaya, part of the Jbeil (Byblos) district of Mount Lebanon. The location was remote but not isolated. The ancient port city of Byblos lay below on the coast, and the mountain villages of the region were home to a deeply rooted Maronite population.
The monastery was named for Saint Maron, the 4th-century hermit monk whose followers formed the Maronite Church. In its early decades, the monastery was a modest establishment. The monks lived simply, cultivating the surrounding land, tending orchards and vineyards, and following a strict daily rhythm of prayer and work.
By the mid-19th century, the monastery had grown into a stable community with a church, living quarters, and agricultural buildings. It was during this period that a young novice from the village of Bekaa Kafra arrived at the gates. His name was Youssef Antoun Makhlouf. He would transform this quiet monastery into one of the most important pilgrimage destinations in the Christian world.
Saint Charbel at Annaya
Charbel entered the Monastery of Saint Maron in 1853, at the age of twenty-three. He had already spent two years as a novice at the Monastery of Our Lady of Mayfouq, another OLM community in the mountains. At Annaya, he took his monastic vows and was ordained a priest in 1859.
For the next sixteen years, Charbel lived the communal life of the monastery. He celebrated Mass daily, joined the community for the Liturgy of the Hours, and worked in the fields. He was known for his obedience, his long hours of prayer, and his indifference to comfort. He ate once a day. He slept on the ground. He owned nothing beyond his habit and his breviary.
In 1875, Charbel received permission to withdraw to the Hermitage of Saints Peter and Paul, a small stone building attached to the monastery but set apart from the community. There he would live as a hermit for the remaining twenty-three years of his life.
The hermit's life was austere even by monastic standards. Charbel followed a strict routine: prayer before dawn, Mass at the hermitage chapel, hours of contemplation, and manual labor in the garden. He rarely spoke. Visitors came to ask for his prayers, but he offered no sermons, no spiritual direction, no writings. His witness was his life itself.
On December 16, 1898, while celebrating Mass, Charbel suffered a stroke during the elevation of the Eucharist. He lingered for eight days, dying on Christmas Eve, December 24, 1898. He was seventy years old. The monks buried him in the monastery cemetery according to the custom of the Order, without a coffin, his body placed directly in the earth.
The Hermitage of Saints Peter and Paul
The hermitage stands a short walk from the main monastery, on a wooded slope overlooking the valley. It is a small, plain building: a chapel, a cell, and a small garden enclosed by a low stone wall. There is nothing ornate about it. The simplicity is the point.
The hermitage was built in the early 19th century as a place of deeper solitude for monks who, after years of community life, felt called to the eremitic vocation. In the Maronite monastic tradition, the hermit's life is considered the highest form of consecrated life. It is not a rejection of community but a progression beyond it, a stripping away of everything that is not prayer.
Charbel lived here from 1875 to 1898. His cell was tiny, with a wooden bed, a small table, and an oil lamp. The chapel where he celebrated Mass each morning is scarcely larger than a room in a house. The garden where he worked, growing vegetables and tending fruit trees, slopes gently toward the valley below.
The hermitage has been preserved much as it was during Charbel's lifetime, chapel and cell alike. Even on busy pilgrimage days it holds a stillness the main monastery does not. Our guide to the Hermitage of Saint Charbel covers it in full.
The Tomb and the Miracles: What Happened After 1898
What happened after Charbel's burial is what made Annaya famous. In the weeks following his death, monks and villagers reported seeing a bright light emanating from his grave in the monastery cemetery. The accounts were persistent enough that the monastery superiors ordered the grave opened.
When the body was exhumed, it was found intact. The limbs were flexible. A reddish, oil-like substance was seeping from the pores of the skin. The body showed no signs of the decomposition that would normally be far advanced after weeks of burial in damp mountain soil without a coffin.
The body was moved to a wooden coffin and placed in a chapel within the monastery. Over the following decades, it was examined multiple times by ecclesiastical authorities and medical professionals. Each examination confirmed that the body remained in an unusual state of preservation, and that the oil-like substance continued to seep from the skin.
Reports of miracles began almost immediately. Pilgrims who visited the tomb or applied the oil to their bodies reported healings. The cases were numerous and varied: paralysis, blindness, tumors, wounds that would not close. The Maronite Church and later the Vatican investigated many of these claims as part of the formal canonization process.
Two miracles were officially recognized by Rome. The first involved a woman named Mariam Awad, partially paralyzed since 1936, who reported a complete recovery after praying at Charbel's tomb in 1950. The second concerned Iskandar Obeid, who suffered from a severe throat condition and was healed after a novena to Saint Charbel. These two cases, after rigorous medical and theological examination, satisfied the requirements for beatification (1965) and canonization (1977) by Pope Paul VI.
The crowds changed the monastery itself. After Charbel's beatification in 1965, the Lebanese Maronite Order built a larger church at Annaya to hold the growing numbers arriving from Lebanon and abroad. Consecrated in 1974 and dedicated to Saint Charbel, it now houses his tomb and serves as the main pilgrimage church on the site.
You can read more about the incorruption of his body in our article on Saint Charbel's incorrupt body, about the reported healings in Saint Charbel's miracles, and about the substance from the tomb in our guide to Saint Charbel's oil.
The Monastery Today
Annaya remains an active house of the Lebanese Maronite Order. Monks live there under the same rhythm of prayer and work that has shaped the community since the 1820s, and the monastery also runs a retreat center alongside the shrine.
Over two million people visit each year, which makes it the most visited Christian pilgrimage site in the Middle East. The complex holds the pilgrimage church and Charbel's tomb, the Hermitage of Saints Peter and Paul on the slope above, and a small museum of his vestments and personal belongings.
For everything practical, from the drive up from Beirut to Mass, the holy oil, and the 22nd of the month, see our full pilgrim guide to visiting Annaya. The hermitage has its own detailed guide, and the feast is covered in Saint Charbel's feast day.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where is Annaya monastery located?
The Monastery of Saint Maron in Annaya is in the Jbeil (Byblos) district of Mount Lebanon, approximately 70 kilometers north of Beirut. It sits at about 1,200 meters altitude on a forested mountainside above the Mediterranean coast. The nearest major town is Jbeil (Byblos), the ancient Phoenician port city on the coast below.
When was Annaya monastery founded?
The Lebanese Maronite Order decided to establish a monastery at Annaya in 1820, and construction began in 1828, the year Saint Charbel was born. The community was formally founded the following year under its first abbot, Father Sarkis Kartabawi, and building work on the monastery continued into the early 1840s.
What happened to Saint Charbel's body after death?
After Charbel's burial on December 24, 1898, monks reported a bright light coming from his grave. When the body was exhumed weeks later, it was found intact and flexible, with a blood-like oil seeping from the skin. The body was examined multiple times over the following decades, each time found in an unusual state of preservation. This phenomenon was a key factor in his beatification by Pope Paul VI in 1965 and his canonization in 1977.
Why is Annaya monastery important to the Maronite Church?
Annaya is a monastery of the Lebanese Maronite Order, the congregation founded in 1695 that shaped Maronite monastic life around prayer, manual labor, and community. It became the most visited Maronite shrine in the world because Saint Charbel spent forty-five years there, died there in 1898, and is entombed there. For many Lebanese it stands as a living link between the Maronite monastic tradition and the modern Church.
Is Annaya monastery still active?
Yes. The Monastery of Saint Maron in Annaya is an active monastery of the Lebanese Maronite Order. Monks live there, following the daily rhythm of prayer and work that has defined the community since its founding in 1828. The monastery also operates a retreat center and welcomes pilgrims. Over two million people visit Annaya each year, making it one of the most visited Christian pilgrimage sites in the Middle East.
See also: Visiting Annaya, the practical pilgrim guide to the site. Saint Charbel Makhlouf, the hermit monk of Annaya. The Hermitage of Saint Charbel. Novena to Saint Charbel. Learn more about the Maronites in Lebanon.