Rabban Hormizd

Rabban Mar Hormizd (Syriac: ܕܪܒܢ ܗܘܪܡܙܕ ‎) was an Assyrian monk who lived in the seventh century in Assuristan (Assyria, modern northern Iraq). Rabban is the Syriac term for monk. He founded the Rabban Hormizd Monastery, named after him, which has been the main monastery of the Assyrian Church of the East and later of the Chaldean Catholic Church which originated among members of the Assyrian Church.

In the Chaldean Church, Rabban Hormizd is commemorated on the second Sunday after Easter.

Life

According to The histories of Rabban Hormizd the Persian and Rabban Bar-Idta, a text written by his disciple Simon before the 12th century, Hormizd was born at the end of the sixth or beginning the seventh century at Beth Lapat (in Sassanid ruled Assyria) from a rich Assyrian Christian family, and at the age of eighteen he started to travel towards Scetes to became a monk there. On the way he met three monks of the Assyrian Church monastery of Bar Idta who urged him to became an inmate of their monastery, and he did so. He lived a hard, stern life. Hormizd lived in and near the Monastery of Bar Idta for thirty-nine years and in the monastery of Abba Abraham of Risha for six or seven years.