after a considerable sum of money was left to them. Gerasimos became Metropolitan of Aleppo. Other monasteries joined them. In 1727 Nicholas Ṣā'īgh was elected Superior; they then determined that there should be a new election every third year. Ṣā'īgh († 1756) was a poet of some reputation.[1] They wanted to be joined to the Italian Basilian Congregation; but Propaganda did not encourage this idea. However, in 1734 Pope Clement XIII (1758-1769) gave them the church of St Mary in Dominica at Rome, commonly called "Santa Maria della Navicella."[2] This still belongs to the Congregation; they use it as their agency at Rome. Ṣā'īgh composed their Constitutions, which were approved by Benedict XIV in 1756. The Shuwairites are rather more strictly organized than the Salvatorians. But they, too, serve the parish churches. They have had a number of famous men, including bishops and Patriarchs.
Neophytos Naṣrī, Metropolitan of Ṣaidnaia, is one of the chief Catholic bishops of the first period, under Cyril VI. He was one of Cyril's ordainers (p. 198). He died at Rome in 1731, leaving the reputation of a saint. There has been a great dispute as to whether he was a Shuwairite monk. On the whole, the evidence seems that he was.[3] 'Abdullah Zakher (1680-1748), who entered Shuwair in 1722, was famous for his learning. At four years old he could read Arabic easily. As a Shuwairite monk he founded a printing press which produced many liturgical and other useful books; this was one of the first presses for printing Arabic.[4] The Congregation also had nuns, whose rule was approved at Rome in 1763. In 1735 Cyril VI made an attempt to unite the Congregations of St Saviour and Shuwair; but it came to nothing. He was himself a partizan of St Saviour, being nephew of its founder; the Shuwairites represent his plan as an attempt to merge
- ↑ His Life (with portrait) is in Ech. d'Or., xi, 71-76; 154-161. His Dīwān (collection of poems: "Dīwān alkūrī") is published by the Imprimerie Catholique of Beirut, 1883.
- ↑ Alexis Kateb, "Église diaconale cardinalice de N.-D. de la Barque," Rome. Ech. d'Or., ix, 155-159.
- ↑ In the Echos d'Or., vii, 213-214, Haissa Boustani says he was a monk of Shuwair; viii, 87-88, C. Bacha (Salvatorian) denies that he was a monk at all (a Byzantine bishop in the eighteenth century not a monk?); viii, 361-363, P. Bacel (Shuwairite) agrees with Boustani and is angry with Bacha; ix, 160-161, Bacha returns to the charge and S. Vailhé sums up against him.
- ↑ Life of Zakher, with his portrait and list of works he wrote or printed, Ech. d'Or., xi, 218-226; 281-287; 363-372 (by P. Bacel).
