desert fathers

American  

plural noun

1. monks, as Saint Anthony or Saint Pachomius, who lived as hermits in the deserts of Egypt and founded the first Christian monasteries.

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Example Sentences

Gagné has been reading the works of the early Christian monks known as the “Desert Fathers.”

From Salon

Although some version of the solitary exists in nearly every religious tradition, eremitism is most commonly associated with the early Christian Desert Fathers and Mothers of the third and fourth centuries.

From New York Times

For the Desert Fathers of third-century Egypt, Christianity’s founding monastics, the desert was not merely a place for undistracted prayer or a sanctuary from persecution; as the realm of the Devil, it was a spiritual battleground.

From New York Times

Look out on any desert landscape, from the Egyptian boulder-plains of the Desert Fathers to Ehrenreich’s relatively verdant Joshua Tree National Park.

From New York Times

I discovered acedia spread from the Desert Fathers into the monasteries of medieval Europe, where it was seen as a sin that monks needed to overcome.

From The Guardian