WHEN ADDRESSING THE characteristics of Betä Ǝsraʾelmonastic centres, it is important to bear in mind that the information athand is mainly indicative of the years in which BetäƎsraʾel monasticism suffered a dramatic decline. A morecomplete picture requires taking the years that preceded this decline intoaccount. Fortunately, a few clues regarding the characteristics of suchcentres and the size of the religious communities residing in them prior tothe decline appear in the sources.

Betä Ǝsraʾel Monastic Centres before theDecline

The dramatic decrease in the size of Betä Ǝsraʾelreligious communities in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries ismirrored in accounts relating to the monastic centre ofHoḫwärwa, which, due to its prestige, ismentioned in a relatively large number of sources.

Qes Mənase Zeməru and AbbaWände Iyasu related that Hoḫwärwa andQwara were each home to two hundred and fifty monks duringthe Gondär Period (1630s to 1769, Quirin 1992, 118). While thisaccount is based on oral tradition and cannot be taken at face value, itdoes indicate that both localities are remembered as having been home to avery large number of monks.

The earliest written mention of Hoḫwärwa'smonastic population is the list of Betä Ǝsraʾelvillages with prayer houses provided in 1848 byHoḫwärwa's headmälokse(monk), AbbaYəsḥaq, and his disciple Ṣägga Amlak(d’Abbadie 1851–52, 260–62). In it,Hoḫwärwa is mentioned as a locality inhabitedonly by twenty Betä Ǝsraʾel priests. Writ-ing in the1860s, Flad (1869, 29) relates that “the cave Hoharewa is to this daya place of pilgrimage among the Falashas. About 200 monks live there in onevillage.” Halévy (1877a, 229), in the same decade, recalledthat twelve to fifteen monks lived in this locality. Both YonaBoggalä and Wəbe Akale related, in the early 1980s, thatduring their lifetime, Hoḫwärwa was no longer amonastic centre, but still served as a holy site and a place of pilgrimage,and the Səgd holiday was celebrated there (Ben-Dor1985a, 44–45).

Abba Yəsḥaq's testimony is reliablesince he was the head of the religious community in question. In light ofthis, Flad's testimony may reflect a BetäƎsraʾel tradition of numerous monks inhabitingHoḫwärwa, rather than the physical number ofmonks there during his lifetime.