Coptic Christians - History
The Coptic Church claims to hold an unbroken line of patriarchal succession to the See of Alexandria founded by Saint Mark, a disciple of Christ. Egyptian Christianity developed distinct dogmas and practices during the more than two centuries that the religion was illegal. By the fourth century, when Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire, Coptic traditions were sufficiently different from those in Rome and Constantinople (formerly Byzantium; present-day Istanbul) to cause major religious conflicts. Dissension persisted for 150 years until most Copts seceded from the main body of Christianity because they rejected the decision of the Council of Chalcedon that Christ had a dual nature, both human and divine, believing instead in Christ's single, divine nature.
The Coptic Church developed separately from other Eastern churches. The Coptic Church's clerical hierarchy had evolved by the sixth century. A patriarch, referred to as the pope, heads the church. A synod or council of senior priests (people who have attained the status of bishops) is responsible for electing or removing popes. Members of the Coptic Church worldwide (about 1 million Copts lived outside of Egypt as of 1990) recognize the pope as their spiritual leader. The pope, traditionally based in Alexandria, also serves as the chief administrator of the church. The administrator's functionaries includes hundreds of priests serving urban and rural parishes, friars in monasteries, and nuns in convents.
In Egypt the conservative aborigines had a deep-rooted dislike of the Greek influence spreading from Alexandria, and of the rule of Byzantium ; and this opened a gulf between the orthodox Patriarchate of Alexandria and the National Church of Middle and Upper Egypt, which seceded to Monophysitism. The same jealousy blinded the eyes of the ecclesiastical and political leaders of Egypt to such an extent that they welcomed the Arabs, who flooded their country under the leadership of Amr, as their deliverers from the Byzantine yoke. Following Islam's spread through Egypt, Muslims alternately tolerated and persecuted the Copts. Heavy taxation of Christians encouraged mass conversions to Islam, and within two centuries, Copts had become a distinct minority. By the tenth century, Arabic had replaced Coptic as the primary spoken language, and Coptic was relegated to a liturgical language.
The Copts remained a significant minority throughout the medieval and modern periods. After the Turks incorporated Egypt into the Ottoman Empire in the sixteenth century, they organized the government around a system of millets, or religious communities. The Copts were one of the communities. Each organized religious minority lived according to its own canon law under the leadership of recognized religious authorities who represented the millet to the outside world and supervised the millet's internal communal life. This form of organization preserved and nourished the religious differences among these peoples. Most historians believe that the millet system prevented the full integration of non-Muslims into Muslim life. The system, which the Ottomans applied throughout their empire, had an enduring influence on the social structure of all countries in the Middle East.
Beginning the 1850s, in an effort to reach Eastern Churches such as the Coptic Orthodox Church, Pope Pius IX (r. 1846-78) allowed new Catholic converts to maintain their traditional liturgies and languages as long as they recognized the authority of the Roman Papacy. In doing so, Copts could become Uniate or Catholic Copts without losing their indigenous liturgical traditions or the sacred language of their old church rites.
The Ottoman millet system of drawing administrative divisions along religious lines reinforced Coptic solidarity. The dismantling of the millet system during the nineteenth century helped open new career opportunities for the Copts. Egypt's Muslim rulers had traditionally used minorities as administrators, and the Copts were initially the main beneficiaries of the burgeoning civil service. During the early twentieth century, however, the British purged many Copts from the bureaucracy. The Copts resented this policy, but it accelerated their entry into professional careers.
By far the greater part of the Egyptian people - 8,971,761 out of a total of 9,734,405 by 1900 - had become Muhammadan ; but all the more obstinately does the faithful remnant cleave to the venerable, ancient Church. These latter are called Copts, and, as they have in this name retained the ancient name of their country - Egypt - so also their appearance, particularly that of the children, shows at once that they are the pure descendants of the aboriginal Egyptians, whose kings and queens look down from their granite statues with similar faces upon the poverty-stricken fellaheen living in their mud huts.
In Lower Egypt they were to be found by 1900 in considerable numbers only in Cairo (26,440), and Alexandria (5,059); in Middle Egypt, thousands of them live in all six provinces ; but they are most numerous in Upper Egypt-in Minyah, 92,223; in Assiut, 161,686; in Girgeh, 109,777; and in Kenneh, 52,802. In these four districts are crowded together 426,488 out of the 592,374 Kopts of the ancient creed. In the Assiut district they formed more than one-fifth of the population.
The Sunday School movement invigorated the Coptic Church beginning in the early twentieth century. In an effort to counteract Protestant missionary activity in Egypt, the Coptic Orthodox community began their own Sunday school classes, youth meetings, Bible studies, and prayer meetings.
During the rising sectarian tensions between Coptic Christians and Muslims, His Holiness, the Pope, treads a very fine line as both a religious and political figure in Egypt. Balancing staunch patriotism with a need to speak out against the discrimination that Christians are presently experiencing in Egypt, he has always been an activist for Coptic civil rights while promoting Christian-Muslim unity. Yet, he has not been without challenges in this arena. During the presidency of Anwar Sadat (1970-1981), these tensions came to a head with the growth of Islamic fundamentalist groups in student universities. Pope Shenouda decried the repeated attacks against Christian homes, churches, and businesses by refusing to celebrate the Easter liturgy publicly and to welcome government delegates to the service as is customary every year.
Accused of aggravating sectarian dissent, he was placed under house arrest in Anba Bishoy, or Saint Bishoy Monastery, in the western desert of Egypt, beginning September 5, 1981. After Muslim extremists assassinated President Anwar Sadat on October 6, 1981, the next reigning president, Hosni Mubarak, finally released Pope Shenouda from his exile on January 6, 1985. This period was a time of spiritual retreat for the Pope and he managed to publish 16 books during these 4 years.
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