The Temptation Monastery (Karanthal Monastery) is an Orthodox Greek male monastery located in the Judean desert, on the northwestern outskirts of Jericho. The monastery was built on the mountain of Temptation (in Arabic - Jabal al-Quarantal), on which, according to the Gospel, Satan tempted Jesus Christ during his 40-day fast in the Judean desert, where he retired after being baptized in the waters of the Jordan River. Monks and hermits began to settle in caves on the sacred mountain since the advent of Christianity, in 326 AD, Saint Helena, mother of Emperor Constantine, visited the Mount of Temptation, and in 340 on the Mount of Quarantal, Chariton the Confessor founded the Duca Lavra. The monastery was destroyed in 614 during the invasion of the Persians and was finally abandoned after the capture of the Holy Land by Caliph Umar ibn Khattab in 630. In 1099, these lands were conquered by the crusaders, who built two churches on the mountain - one in the cave where Jesus Christ lived during his 40-day fast, the second on the top of the mountain of Temptation. In 1874, the land on which the current Karanthal monastery is located was acquired by the Orthodox Greek Church, and the monastery itself was completely restored in 1895. From that moment, the pilgrimage to the mountain of Temptation resumed with renewed vigor, at its peak the sacred mountain was "the likeness of a large hive, in which lovers of silence did not cease to develop spiritual honey with the danger of their own lives, practicing sacred sobriety and unceasing prayer." And now, next to the monastery, you can see many caves-cells, in which there lived Coptic hermit monks. The monastery itself seems to be glued to the mountain - all its internal premises are carved into the rock, and in the cave of Jesus Christ a small church is built - the chapel of Temptation. It contains the main relic of the monastery - a stone, sitting on which, according to legend, Jesus Christ prayed. Above this stone is the throne of the chapel. The cave of the righteous Chariton the Confessor, the founder of the monastery, has also been preserved in the monastery, the cave is very small, and its arches are so low that you can enter the room only with your head bowed low. Most of the monastic cells are currently empty, today in the monastery there is always only one monk-inhabitant and his assistant. The traditional (pilgrimage) path to the monastery runs along a steep mountain serpentine; in 1998, a cableway was built from Jericho to the mountain of Temptation, which allows easy access to the monastery of Karantal.