[6] St Sabbas was born the son of John, a military commander, and Sophia, at Moutalaske near Caesarea of Cappadocia.

[citation needed] Journeying to Alexandria on military matters, his parents left their five-year-old son in the care of an uncle.

[citation needed] Euthymius attentively directed the life of the young monk, and seeing his spiritual maturity, he began to take him to the wilderness with him.

Because some of his monks opposed his rule and demanded a priest as their abbot, the opposition continued and he withdrew to the New Lavra, which he had built near Thekoa.

It is claimed that many miracles took place through the prayers of Sabbas: at the lavra a spring of water welled up, during a time of drought they received abundant rain, and there were also healings of the sick and the possessed.

Sabbas composed the first monastic rule of church services, the so-called Jerusalem Typikon, for guidance of all the Byzantine monasteries.

2) and Römische Quartalschaft, vii; see also Pierre Helyot, Histoire des ordres religieux (1714), i.C.16, and Max Heimbucher [de], Orden u. Kongregationen (1907), i, §10.

His Great Lavra long continued to be the most influential monastery in those parts, and produced several distinguished monks, among them St John of Damascus.