Issue No. 613
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21 - 27 November 2002 Issue No. 613 Books |
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Christianity in Egypt
Christianity in the Land of the Pharaohs: The Coptic Orthodox Church, Jill Kamil, Cairo, The American University in Cairo Press, 2002. pp271
The many readers who have benefited over the years from Jill Kamil's excellent guide to the monuments of Coptic Egypt will now welcome her new book, Christianity in the Land of the Pharaohs (which might be considered as nothing less than a guide to the origins and development of the Coptic Orthodox Church). In it, Kamil seeks to explain the uniqueness of the Coptic Church, how much it has in common with universal Christianity, and how Coptic monasticism contributed to the development of a nationalistic consciousness in Egypt.
The astonishing speed with which Christianity spread in Egypt can be partially explained by the resonance of many of its elements with the ancient religion that had dominated the imaginations of the inhabitants of the Valley of the Nile for thousands of years. The most fundamental ancient Egyptian myth of all, that of Osiris, Isis, and Horus, could be taken as an allegory of the Holy family. Isis easily equated to Mary, and the similarities between Isis caring for the infant Horus and the Christian motif of mother and child were obvious. Likewise, Christian visions of the Last Judgement and entry into Paradise were not new concepts in Egypt. As Kamil explains, "Thousands of years before Christianity, the Egyptians believed in judgement of the dead based on ethical values that included a person's right conduct towards others, towards the gods and towards society" (p270). Even acceptance of the doctrine of the Trinity, a concept utterly alien to many non-Christian cultures, was made more acceptable to Egyptians by the ancient practice of grouping deities into triads. Many other examples could be adduced. Yet, even as the ancient religion provided a receptive background for Christianity, it subtly imparted distinctly Egyptian qualities to it.
Christianity came early to Egypt. The sojourn of the Holy Family there and the many places that are associated with their stay are some of the most cherished traditions of the Coptic Church. Another basic tradition holds that Christianity was introduced into Egypt by St Mark the Evangelist, who came to Alexandria during the reign of the emperor Nero, began the process of conversion, and suffered martyrdom. The number of converts grew rapidly amid changing times that encouraged the growth and development of Christianity. Roman rule in Egypt brought with it a ruthless exploitation that undermined many of the age-old certainties of Egyptian society as temples were deprived of their endowments and traditional relationships were broken. Christianity offered comfort and support in an age of increasing confusion. When the Roman Empire entered a prolonged period of crisis in the third century AD, the demands of taxation, civic duties, and conscription became so oppressive that many fled their homes and villages to seek refuge in the deserts or in the countless tombs and caves that honeycombed the cliffs above the Nile. There, in fleeing the vicissitudes of this world, it was only a step for new Christians to move toward contemplation of the next world. This was the genesis of monasticism, one of Egypt's most important contributions to Christianity.
The way was shown by St Antony (AD 251-356) and his solitary withdrawal into a remote grotto near the Red Sea. His friend and biographer, St Athanasius, wrote, "After this when many were eager and wishful to imitate his discipline, and his acquaintances came and began to cast down and wrench off the door by force, Antony, as from a shrine, came forth initiated in the mysteries and filled with the Spirit of God . . . He spoke to them in the Egyptian tongue: 'Always have the fear of God before your eyes. Remember Him who grants death and life. Hate the world and all that is in it . . . Renounce this life, that you may be alive to God . . . Suffer hunger, thirst, nakedness . . . test yourselves, to see if you are worthy of God; despise the flesh, so that you may preserve your souls'" (pp78-80).
Antony's ideal was one of hermits withdrawing into individual cells near a central place of worship.
Monasticism as we know it was introduced by St Pachomius (AD 290-346) whose cenobotic, or communal, monasticism became the norm. Instead of seeking solitude, Pachomian monks withdrew into organised "houses" with shared facilities. According to Kamil, "Pious, enlightened communities were established, and soon enough they became self-sufficient and set an example to others. Pachomian monasteries provided services to surrounding settlements, sometimes entire villages. They offered alms to the poor, cared for widows and orphans, ministered to the ailing, gave brotherly love, and aided the bereaved by praying and blessing their dear departed. Leading disciplined lives, Pachomian monks brought productivity to the soil and revived crafts. They gathered their own materials for baskets and buildings, constructed their own boats for travel on the Nile or to nearby islands suitable for agriculture, and built churches which were open to the public for worship -- except on certain religious occasions" (p125).
These monasteries, which rapidly multiplied, were vital centres for continuing the spread of Christianity. They helped the Church survive crises such as the persecution of the Emperor Diocletian (AD 284-305) which, far from eradicating Christianity in Egypt, cauterised it into the body of Egyptian life.
Kamil is especially concerned to show that the Coptic Church, instead of the heretical, schismatic, and altogether peculiar institution that many outsiders perceive it to have been, was actually in the mainstream of the development of early Christian orthodoxy, and indeed contributed strongly to that mainstream. Much of the orthodoxy of Christianity was hammered out in Egypt -- in the first catechetical schools, which were established in Alexandria, and in the bitter theological disputes such as that between Saints Athanasius and Arius over the nature of Christ or between Cyril I and Nestorius over the nature of Mary. The Nicene Creed ("I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of all things both visible and invisible, and in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Word of God . . .") was formulated by Egyptian churchmen. Far from being an exotic, isolated offshoot, Egypt was a pillar of the early Christian Church.
Interestingly enough, when Kamil turns to the schism between what became the Coptic Orthodox and the Greek Orthodox Churches, she interprets it as resulting not primarily from religious issues, and even less from expressions of cultural and national identity, but from political considerations. The movements toward unity in organisation and dogma within Christianity were rarely smooth processes. The great councils of the early church only partially succeeded in imposing unanimity; occasionally they underscored and reinforced increasingly irreconcilable differences that were magnified by the political changes occurring in the Mediterranean world. The foundation of Constantinople created a new centre of power, power that was increased by the eclipse of Rome and the West and the divergence of the Latin and Greek worlds. Meanwhile, Antioch and Alexandria, of profound importance in the development of Christianity, regarded Constantinople as an upstart; they bitterly resented the latter's assertion of supremacy. When the See of Constantinople was formally granted precedence over those of Alexandria and Antioch at the Second Council of Ephesus in AD 449, the bishop of Alexandria was so enraged that he threw the bishop of Constantinople to the ground and stalked out of the meeting. Two years later, Egyptian representatives at the pivotal Council of Chalcedon refused to accept proposed doctrinal adjustments, an act that Kamil describes as "a nationalistic statement of cultural independence from foreign occupation" (p190). Violent years ensued as the imperial government attempted unsuccessfully through military force and compromise to impose its authority on the See of Alexandria. Egyptian Christians began to perceive this as foreign oppression.
In the Egyptian hinterland, Pachomian monasteries provided emotional and material support. An increasingly Egyptian Christianity developed. When frustrated officials in Constantinople intensified their efforts to force religious conformity on Egypt, monastic resistance grew proportionately. "What is clear," Kamil writes, "is that a national body, of which Egyptian Christians were an important part, was extremely hostile to Byzantine rule. This was not because of an aversion to the Hellenistic culture as a whole, nor because of the subtle differences in doctrine. It was a strong desire to assert independence" (p194).
In AD 570, Egyptian Christians took the decisive step of appointing their own patriarch. Kamil's description of an essentially political process is plausible, and the doctrinal differences appear minor, at least in retrospect, but readers might nevertheless conclude that the decisive factor in the break was the emerging cultural distinctiveness of the Coptic Church that she describes so well in other portions of her book.
There are areas that might have been explored more fully, for the book is not overly long. For example, little is said about the determined, often violent, and destructive struggle that the Christians, once they had attained numbers, organisation, and imperial encouragement, waged against paganism. Even such a major event as the destruction of the Serapeum in Alexandria receives just a few lines, while the gruesome murder and dismemberment of the learned pagan lady Hypatia by a Christian mob in AD 415 is dismissed as the byproduct of a power struggle. One sentence describes the overall process: "Mindless destruction continued throughout the country" (p166).
But wishing for more is a response to a good book. Christianity in the Land of the Pharaohs is concise, well-written, and tastefully and effectively illustrated. It has an engaging personal quality: "The complex issues that have been raised in this book are coloured to a large extent by my long exposure to Egyptian society" (p271). Kamil's contemporary observations, interspersed throughout the book, bring the past to life by firmly connecting it to the present. Any interested reader who turns to Christianity in the Land of the Pharaohs as a guide to the origins and early development of the Coptic Church will be amply rewarded.
Reviewed by Jason Thompson
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