Rachaya Al Foukhar (also spelled Rashaya Al Foukhar, ar, راشيا الفخار) is a Lebanese village in the district of

Hasbaya Hasbeya or Hasbeiya ( ar, حاصبيا) is a town in Lebanon, situated at the foot of Mount Hermon, overlooking a deep amphitheatre from which a brook flows to the Hasbani. In 1911, the population was about 5000. Hasbaya is the capital of the Wadi ...

in the Nabatiye Governorate in southern

Lebanon Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in Western Asia. It is located between Syria to the north and east and Israel to the south, while Cyprus li ...

. It is located on the western slopes of

Mount Hermon Mount Hermon ( ar, جبل الشيخ or جبل حرمون / ALA-LC: ''Jabal al-Shaykh'' ("Mountain of the Sheikh") or ''Jabal Haramun''; he, הַר חֶרְמוֹן, ''Har Hermon'') is a mountain cluster constituting the southern end of the ...

at an altitude starting at 750 m with the highest summit being at 1,250 m. The population is

Greek Orthodox The term Greek Orthodox Church (Greek language, Greek: Ἑλληνορθόδοξη Ἐκκλησία, ''Ellinorthódoxi Ekklisía'', ) has two meanings. The broader meaning designates "the Eastern Orthodox Church, entire body of Orthodox (Chalced ...

History

In 1838, during the Ottoman era,

Eli Smith Eli Smith (born September 13, 1801, in Northford, Connecticut, to Eli and Polly (Whitney) Smith, and died January 11, 1857, in Beirut, Lebanon) was an American Protestant missionary and scholar. He graduated from Yale College in 1821 and from Andov ...

noted the population of Rachaya Al Foukhar as being "Greek" Christians. In 1852 Edward Robinson noted: "The village is celebrated for its pottery; for the manufacture of which it is one of the chief seats. There are many large dome-shaped furnaces for burning of ware; and many specimens were standing outside of the houses . tall jars, and the like. This pottery is sent around to all the fairs of the country, and far into the

Hauran The Hauran ( ar, حَوْرَان, ''Ḥawrān''; also spelled ''Hawran'' or ''Houran'') is a region that spans parts of southern Syria and northern Jordan. It is bound in the north by the Ghouta oasis, eastwards by the al-Safa (Syria), al-Safa ...

; as also to Hums and

Hamah , timezone = EET , utc_offset = +2 , timezone_DST = EEST , utc_offset_DST = +3 , postal_code_type = , postal_code = , ar ...

." In 1875,

Victor Guérin Victor Guérin (15 September 1821 – 21 Septembe 1890) was a French intellectual, explorer and amateur archaeologist. He published books describing the geography, archeology and history of the areas he explored, which included Greece, Asia Mino ...

found here a town with 700 inhabitants, mostly " Schismatic Greek". He also noted the pottery production, and that there was a small

Protestant Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

mission in the place. In 1990, U.S missionary William Robinson was killed here by masked gunmen.U.S. Missionary Shot to Death At Home in South Lebanon
Ihsan A. Hijazi, March 29, 1990,

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

References

Bibliography

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External links

Rachaiya El Foukhar
Localiban {{Hasbaya District Populated places in Hasbaya District Eastern Orthodox Christian communities in Lebanon