According to tradition, at the moment the Holy Family entered the town, a funeral procession of a widow’s son was just leaving and Jesus felt compassion for her and raised him from death, a story that resembles the resurrection of the son of a widow in Naim [Luke 7:11-17]. On the other hand, the Armenian Infancy Gospel accounts that the Holy Family stayed here for six months until the Christ Child reached the age of 2.

Bilbays was an important bishopric in the 4th century, therefore it witnessed a flourish of the Coptic Christianity in the area and the place itself was mentioned by several historians and pilgrims. The Church of St. George dates to the 1960’s and was built on a location older churches have stood.

Photo: Norbert Schiller, the interior of the church Mar Girgis at Bilbays. In the corner stands a small model of the old church, which was built in the nineteenth century and replaced in the 1960s.

Photo: Norbert Schiller, a young boy chases geese on a roof alongside the Church of Mar Girgis, built in the 1960’s, in the center of Bilbays.