Christians Versus Muslims in Modern Egypt: the Century-Long Struggle for Coptic Equality.
Chandler, Paul-Gordon
Christians Versus Muslims in Modern Egypt: The Century-Long
Struggle for Coptic Equality.
By S. S. Hasan. New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 2003. Pp. xiv, 320.
$45.
Through the lens of S. S. Hasan, a nominal Muslim Egyptian woman,
the illuminating story of modern-day Christians in the context of a
Middle Eastern culture unfolds. Writing as one no longer welcome in her
country because of a "controversial" book she wrote on Israel,
she provides us a comprehensive study of the recent revitalization of
the Coptic Orthodox Church. Having been openly received by Coptic
priests, monks, bishops, and the Coptic pope himself, she writes
candidly in relating their stories. Her research focuses on Upper Egypt,
where the majority of Copts come from middle- or lower-class
backgrounds. Addressing the leadership of Pope Shenouda, she offers an
insightful glimpse into the Coptic patriarchate. According to Hasan, the
renewal of the Coptic Church was a creative process of modernization in
which the Sunday School Movement empowered the Copts, reminding them of
their ethnicity, church traditions, saints, and martyrs.
The first section of the book is a helpful historical overview of
Christian and Muslim Egypt. The second, the most important, focuses on
understanding the channel through which the recent reformation came, the
Sunday School Movement. Her fascinating description of the "warring
founding fathers" of this movement lays the groundwork for
understanding why and how the revitalized Coptic Church emerged as a
political spokesperson, socioeconomic entrepreneur, and cultural agent
for the politics of their identity both as a people and as a church
within a Muslim majority context. The final questions addressed concern
democracy and empowerment of women in the church, issues still in their
early development.
Hasan concentrates on the process of modernization in the Coptic
Church. The spiritual motives and inspiration behind such a dramatic
renewal are therefore not explored; instead, a systematic approach to
transformation is suggested. The question of spiritual substance behind
this Coptic reformation has yet to be studied. Hasan's candid and
well-researched work is an important contribution to understanding the
church in today's Egypt, which continues under the threat of
discrimination. In its scholarship and empathy, this book could
represent a helpful step toward changing the title's words
"Christians versus Muslims" to "Christians and
Muslims" in modern Egypt.
Paul-Gordon Chandler, Rector of St. John's Anglican Church in
Maadi/Cairo, Egypt, is the author of God's Global Mosaic
(InterVarsity Press, 2000).
