Metropolitan Zaytun of Inhil
(d. 1855)
Metropolitan Zaytun was born at the village Inhil in Tur Abdin. He studied under teachers of his time, particularly the Metropolitan Abd al-Nur of Arbo. He also acquired a fair knowledge of literature, church rituals and calligraphy. He became a monk and was ordained a priest at the Qartamin Monastery. In 1848 he was ordained a metropolitan under the name Philoxenus and in 1851 he headed the diocese of Midyat. He died, a middle-aged man, in April 1855. He was a pious and venerable person. While still a monk, he composed an excellent ode comprising one hundred twenty-two lines in the dodecasyllabic meter praising the virtues of Saint Gabriel of Qartamin.660 While in Paris, I read an ode on Saint Philoxenus of Mabug. Although some of its lines are poor, I think it is the composition of our Metropolitan Zaytun.661