Islamic scholarship records a large number of accounts featuring sayings by Christian monks (both monastics and ascetics) and their encounters with Muslim ascetics and mystics. On one level, these accounts attest to the fact that the perception of Christian monks as holy figures in the Near East survived into the early Islamic period and that they were still acknowledged for their spiritual authority and aura in Muslim circles well into the fifth/eleventh century. The continuity of this recognition indicates the degree of its diffusion among Muslim scholars. On another level, these accounts reinforce the conclusion that encounters between Christian monks and Muslim ascetics and early mystics must have played a role in the emergence of particular attitudes, views and practices within Islamic ascetical and mystical traditions.