The landscape before the birth of the Order

Although the Order of Saint John of Jerusalem, later known as Knights of Malta, had its actual inception in the year of Our Lord, 1090, it had also a sort of a preamble in the sense that an attempt of a similar nature had started in 600 A.D. when Pope St. Gregory the Great ordered the Abbott Probus to proceed to Jerusalem, provided with the necessary funds, to build a Christian hospital in the Holy City, which Abbott Probus did.

Destroyed by the Persians in A.D. 614 the Christian Hospital was restored by St. John the Almoner who was then the Patriarch of Alexandria. The Christian Hospital passed through many vicissitudes and again during the Caliphate of Harun al-Raxid, it became restored by Charlemagne. As a matter of fact, Charlemagne assured the continued operation of the Hospital by passing it into the hands of the Benedictine Fathers. He, therefore, added a house for habitation and a church (Sancta Maria ad Latinos) to the main building of the Hospital. The year 1010 witnessed once again the destruction of the Christian Hospital by the hands of another Kalif this time Kalif el-Hakem Bin Amr Allah.

The Amalfitans restored the Christian Hospital in 1023 when a new page started to be written later in 1048 Amalfitans, this time a certain Maro of Amalfi made further additions to the Christian Hospital complex. Those Amalfitan merchants being both rich and zealous were in a good position to effect such restorations. They dedicated the Christian Hospital complex to St. John the Almoner. .The history proper of the Order of Saint John of Jerusalem as such had its creative spark in 1090 at the time when the Blessed Gerard was Rector and Administrator of the Christian Hospital.