The Coptic Church

This article is courtesy of Revista Tierra Santa.

The name Copt comes from the Arabic corruption of the Greek term aigyptios, that is, Egyptian, transformed into gipt and later into qibt. The Copts are, in fact, by their ethnic characteristics and history, the legitimate descendants of the Egyptians of the time of the pharaohs. The present Coptic language has its roots in hieroglyphic writing, and its liturgy in that of the Patriarchate of Alexandria, the first intellectual center of Christendom.

The Beginnings of Christianity in Egypt

Christianity reached Egypt in apostolic times. Tradition attributes to Saint Mark the preaching of the Gospel in the Nile Valley, where he was martyred. The new religion was distinguished from its beginnings by intense intellectual activity and rapid spread among the urban population of Alexandria, the most cosmopolitan city of the Roman Empire after Rome. In this setting there arose in the second century the Alexandrian theological school, the Didascalia, with such illustrious representatives as Pantaenus, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Saint Athanasius of Alexandria, Didymus the Blind and Saint Cyril. Their writings belong to the heritage of all Christendom.

The persecution of Diocletian, from 303 to 305, was especially cruel to the Egyptian Christians. The historical sources speak of “countless faithful with their wives and children” who suffered martyrdom for the faith. The trauma caused by the “Great Persecution” remained so alive in the Christian conscience that it gave rise, in the liturgical calendar, to the Era of the Martyrs, which begins in the year 284, the date of Diocletian’s accession to the throne.

The Age of Splendor of the Coptic Church

In the year 325 the Council of Nicaea was held, granting the Alexandrian Church the primacy of honor after the Roman Church. Its jurisdiction at that time extended over the 100 dioceses of the Nile Valley, a sign of the vitality of this Church. In the year 381 the Council of Constantinople granted the primacy of honor, after the Church of Rome, to that of Constantinople, a decision that aroused the indignation of the Alexandrians and of their “ecclesiastical Pharaoh,” as Isidore of Pelusium called the Patriarch of Alexandria.

Years later the Nestorian controversy gave the Patriarch of Alexandria occasion to react against the Constantinopolitan patriarchal see, likewise the center of the Byzantine political power that dominated the whole eastern part of the Roman Empire, Egypt included.

The Break with the Catholic Church

Nevertheless, the occasion for the Alexandrian Church to manifest its particularism and its resistance to the imperial power embodied by Constantinople appeared at the Council of Chalcedon, in the year 451, where the Council Fathers proclaimed the Catholic doctrine of the two natures in Christ: the divine and the human. The Coptic Church, together with the Syriac Church and later the Armenian Church, adhered, on the contrary, to the doctrine of one single nature in Christ; hence they received the Greek name Monophysites. This rejection is regarded as the act of foundation of the independent Coptic Church, separated from the Catholic Church. From then on two rival patriarchates coexisted in Egypt: the Catholic or Chalcedonian one, followed by Byzantine officials, the merchants of the cities and those imbued with Greek culture, and the Coptic Orthodox one, followed by the mass of the people. The success of the Monophysites was based on their ability to mobilize national feeling through the influential body of monks and to brand their opponents as foreigners.

This shows that the theological element had secondary importance in the Christological controversies. In any case, the religious-political controversies of the fifth century absorbed the living forces of Egyptian monasticism, impoverished Christianity and disoriented the faithful, preparing the decline of the Church in Egypt.

The Muslim Conquest

The Arab conquest, in the years 639-642, guaranteed for some years the religious freedom of the Monophysites, favoring them openly to the detriment of the Chalcedonian Church. This period lasted half a century, that is, the time that allowed the conquerors to consolidate themselves in the Nile Valley. Once this period had passed, the Muslims established a regime of discrimination, involving humiliating measures for Christians, as well as heavy poll taxes, the famous jizya, without excluding endemic persecutions throughout the seventh to thirteenth centuries. A Coptic chronicler described the persecution of 850 in these terms: “The Church suffered so much that the images of the Virgin and the saints wept and shed blood throughout Egypt.” The revolts of the Christian peasants were cruelly crushed: the first in 725 and the last, the bloodiest, from 829 to 831.

The most devastating persecution, however, came under the Fatimid caliph al-Hakim (996-1020), called the “Egyptian Nero,” who attempted to eradicate Egyptian Christianity. According to Muslim writers, between the years 1014-1016 he is said to have destroyed some 30,000 churches in Egypt, Palestine and Syria, among them the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem.

Centuries of Decline

Such aggressions, joined to harsh fiscal pressure, caused the mass conversion of the Christian population to Islam. Indeed, an Egyptian governor wrote to Caliph Hisham (724-743): “I have been informed that it is not the heart that brings about conversions (to Islam), but fear of the jizya.” On the other hand, the religious authorities, lacking social prestige, appeared resigned to every compromise with the Muslim authorities. A sign of this decline and of the cultural integration of the Coptic Church into Islam is the transfer of the patriarchal see from Alexandria to Cairo, the center of political power, carried out under Patriarch Christodoulos (1046-1077), as well as the origin of the separation of men and women in the churches and the custom of removing one’s shoes at the entrance to places of worship. With the seminaries and theological schools likewise closed, the Coptic clergy sank into ignorance. In fact, the last flashes of Christian literature appear in the thirteenth century in the encyclopedic work “Collection of the Dogmas of Religion” by the three al-‘Asal brothers.

After this date until the nineteenth century not a single work of importance is found in Egypt. The Copts had lost their language and their culture.

Under Mamluk rule (1254-1517) and then Turco-Ottoman rule (1517-1811), Coptic Christianity took refuge in the rural areas of Upper and Middle Egypt and on the edge of the desert, far from the Muslim pressure that showed itself with greater virulence in the cities. It was there that the Christian “reserve” was maintained. Lacking economic means and social influence, the Copts were more or less forgotten by the Muslim power of those periods. Their marginalization was precisely what allowed them to survive. Toward the middle of the nineteenth century the Coptic Church had only 12 bishops, some 100 places of worship and seven monasteries with barely 50 monks.

The Renaissance of the Church

It was at the beginning of the last century that the Coptic Church began to emerge from its isolation and lethargy, taking advantage of the liberal laws of Muhammad Ali, who opened Egypt to the West and decreed measures for the emancipation of Christians.

It was the time when European missionaries, Catholic and Protestant, founded schools, opened hospitals and set up printing presses, giving an image of modernity and attraction. This dynamism moved the Coptic hierarchy to act, opening a network of primary schools in the villages where the missionaries had not arrived, creating “Sunday schools” for the teaching of catechism and publishing books of sacred literature.

In 1893 the first Coptic Orthodox seminary was opened. This was a highly meritorious work for a Church without government support or external structures. The spirit of renewal also reached the monasteries, nurseries of bishops, which had fallen to the lowest level during the Turco-Ottoman period. A new generation of monks was formed, emerging from the “Sunday schools” and university classrooms. The monk Matta el-Meskeen is the most representative of this generation of enterprising religious who renewed monastic life.

Monasticism, the Backbone of the Church

Indeed, Coptic monasticism today constitutes, as in the first centuries, the most vigorous branch of the Church. To give an idea of the importance ancient monasticism had, let us recall that the Egyptian Church counted at the end of the sixth century some 50,000 monks. Today there are about 700, distributed among 15 male monasteries and five female ones. They are beacons of spiritual, cultural and agricultural radiance, without forgetting that they are pilgrimage centers much frequented by Egyptian Christians. The best known are the four of Wadi en-Natrun, west of the Nile Delta: Deir Baramos, Deir es-Surian, Deir Anba Bishoi and Deir Makar (Saint Macarius); and the two on the western shore of the Red Sea: Saint Paul and Saint Anthony the Abbot. Three new monasteries have recently been rebuilt and repopulated: the famous one of Saint Menas, west of Alexandria, Saint Pachomius of Edfu, and Abu Sefein, near Luxor. All were founded between the fourth and sixth centuries. The prestigious monasteries of the Thebaid, among them Deir el-Abiad (the White Monastery) and Deir el-Ahmar (the Red Monastery), are abandoned, although they remain destinations of pilgrimage. The monastery of Deir el-Malak (Monastery of the Angel), south of Sohag, has begun to revive. The five female monasteries are found in urban centers of the Delta, in Cairo and in Upper Egypt.

A Church of Patriarchal Structure

The Coptic Church, like the other Eastern Churches, is patriarchal in structure. Its highest authority bears the title “His Holiness Pope of Alexandria and of all Egypt, of Nubia, of Ethiopia and of the Pentapolis, and Patriarch of all the land evangelized by Saint Mark.” The patriarchal see, originally established in Alexandria, was transferred in the eleventh century to Cairo, where it remains to this day. The Patriarch is elected by the bishops and lay delegates of the “nation.” In this regard each diocese designates its delegates.

From among them the diocesan electoral body is constituted, whose total number today rises to 800 delegates. These elect three candidates of Egyptian nationality, who have reached the age of 40 and belong to a monastic order. The originality of the election lies in the way one of the three candidates is chosen. A child, representing the hand of God, comes forward and draws at random from the box one of the three tablets bearing the candidate’s name. The chosen one is acclaimed Patriarch, and the election is followed immediately by the laying on of hands by the bishops present. The elected one must be recognized by the (Muslim) president of the Republic.

The present Patriarch, Shenouda III, 116th successor of the see of Saint Mark, elected in 1971, is a monk of Wadi en-Natrun. On November 10, 1996, he celebrated the twenty-fifth anniversary of his patriarchal ordination.

30 Diocesan Bishops

The Coptic Church has 27 dioceses in Egypt, two in Sudan and one in Jerusalem, to which must be added some eparchies in countries of Coptic emigration: 47 parishes in the U.S.A., 12 in Australia, 9 in Canada, 6 in England, etc.

The laity play an important role in the Church. They participate in ecclesiastical affairs through the majles milli, made up of 22 “pious educated” notables and two priests. This community council deals with matters related to the Church and the community of the faithful: administration of goods, canonical affairs, Coptic heritage, etc. Relations between the patriarchate and the majles milli have not always been as cordial as might have been desired.

The Coptic liturgy, marked in its origins by monasticism, is celebrated in Coptic and Arabic. Coptic, commonly spoken in Egypt until the twelfth century, is the language of the pharaohs in its last transformation, to which a good number of Greek ecclesiastical terms have been added.

The Coptic Catholic Branch

The Coptic Church, after the break in the fifth century with the Catholic Church, remained closed in upon itself and impervious to the idea of union with Rome. There was an attempt at reconciliation at the Council of Florence, in the year 1442, prepared by the Franciscan Alberto de Sarteano, sent to Egypt in 1939 as papal delegate. Later, from the sixteenth century onward, the attempts of the Popes to establish contacts with the Coptic patriarchate found no response. It was then that Rome chose the policy of individual conversions from Orthodoxy to Catholicism through Franciscan and Jesuit missionaries, given the impossibility of reconciliation between leaders. In this way small Coptic Catholic communities were formed in Egypt. In 1742 the Pope appointed the first Apostolic Vicar for the Coptic Catholics in the person of Anba Athanasius, Coptic bishop of Jerusalem, who two years earlier had passed to Catholicism.

Without abandoning his functions as Coptic Orthodox bishop of Jerusalem, Athanasius ordained several priests of the Coptic Catholic rite, thus creating an embryonic ecclesiastical structure. Three years later Rome appointed a prefect for the Copts converted to Catholicism of the Latin rite in the person of a Franciscan. In this way two parallel, and soon rival, structures were created for a small community. In 1758 the Pope recognized the primacy of the Coptic Catholic Prefect. This situation lasted only a short time, for 22 years later the Holy See chose the opposite orientation.

At the end of the last century Leo XIII encouraged a more active policy of conversions to Catholicism. The result was the opening of the first Coptic Catholic seminary directed by the Jesuits, in addition to the creation of a Coptic Catholic patriarchate and three dioceses in Egypt. But the Patriarch would be appointed four years later in the person of Cyril Macarios. The rivalry between the Franciscan Prefecture and the Apostolic Vicariate remained pending, and ended in 1893 when the Franciscans ceded to the Coptic Catholic clergy the 10 Coptic parishes of Latin rite established by them in Upper Egypt. At the moment of its creation the new patriarchate counted 6,000 faithful. Ten years later their number rose to 15,000. In 1908 the Patriarch submitted his resignation and the see remained vacant for 39 years, which hindered the natural development of the Church. Only in 1947 did Pius XII restore the patriarchal dignity in the person of Mark II. His successor, Stephanos I Sidarouss, elected in 1958, was raised in 1965 to the cardinalatial dignity with a view to promoting the young Church.

Like the Coptic Orthodox Church, the Catholic one is patriarchal in structure. At present this dignity is held by Stephanos II Ghattas, elected in 1986. He governs with the help of a Synod of six bishops. The Coptic Catholic Church has six dioceses: Beni Suef, Minya, Assiut, Sohag, Luxor and Ismailia-Port Said, in addition to the patriarchal diocese of Cairo-Alexandria. The bishops are elected by the Synod and confirmed by the Holy See.

Some 60 diocesan priests ensure parish life. The clergy enjoy a good level of formation, higher than that of their brothers of the Orthodox Church.

Since 1959 there has existed a religious congregation of the Coptic Catholic rite, the Brothers of the Preaching of Saint Mark, whose rule is inspired by the Dominican one. A women’s congregation, the Religious of the Sacred Heart, had been founded in 1912.

The Coptic Churches Today

Both the Coptic Orthodox Church and the Catholic and Protestant Churches today face the same problems: Islamic fundamentalism and emigration, the two strongly intertwined. The Copts insist on their Egyptian and Arab identity and on solidarity with Muslims. This is a difficult attitude to practice, especially from the seventies onward, with the rise of fundamentalism that tends to apply the Qur’anic sharia to all society, which would mean reducing Christians to second-class subjects, mere dhimmi or protected people. It is well known that Islamists provoke confessional incidents in order to mobilize the Muslim masses against the Christian minority. Since the death of Abdel Nasser, serious interconfessional tensions have occurred in Alexandria (1972), Minya (1978), Cairo, Alexandria and Assiut (1980), Alexandria and Cairo (1981), el-Fayum (1984), Abu Korkas and Upper Egypt (1990), Cairo (1991), Assiut (1992), and they continue in endemic form down to our own day. As a result of these tensions, the Christian community leaves the country.

In an interview granted by the Coptic Orthodox Patriarch to the media on October 27, 1996, in Alexandria, Shenouda III declared: “The fundamentalists practice two kinds of activities. The first is aggression, violence, discrimination and the burning of churches.” The second is “to create an atmosphere of tension among the population… We cannot change this situation with laments and conflicts. The solution lies in seeking the way to improve the position of the Copts through dialogue and love.” And he then specified: “One of my best friends is Muhammad Sabed Tantawi, sheikh of al-Azhar (the Islamic university of Cairo)… We cannot use violence against violence nor hatred against hatred.”

Author: Fr. Ignacio Peña