posted
The Egyptian Copts and the Jews: No Illusions
Op-Ed: The Egyptian Copts and the Jews: No Illusions
Published: Saturday, November 05, 2011 7:24 PM Egypt's Copts: Uncle Boutros and Uncle Tom. When you are feeling sorry for them, remember that they hate us too.
Gerald A. Honigman The author is an educator who has done extensive doctoral studies in Mid-East Affairs and has conducted counter-Arab propaganda programs for college youth. He gives lectures and participates in debates around the U.S. Read his new book to be found at http://q4j-middle-east.com. ► More from this writer
Not everyone was celebrating the "Arab Spring"…
Don't get me wrong, I too wished for all peoples--Arabs and non-Arabs alike (yes, there are scores of millions of the latter) to finally gain modern-day freedoms in a region ruled for millennia by various imperial powers succeeded, in the modern era, by assorted Arab autocrats, tyrants, and despots.
Still, for those schooled in this area, many had fears and doubts--even if kept to themselves. For such folks, what and who was likely to replace such leadership--despite wishful thinking--was going to be as bad or worse than what was being overthrown.
I wrote about this not long after the Egyptian Arab Spring had sprung. And in that same analysis, I expressed major concerns about what would likely unfold for Egypt's native, pre-Arab/non-Arab people, the Copts.
Well, I truly hate to have to say that I told you so, but--since that earlier article was written--Coptic Churches have indeed been burned down, and Copts have been murdered, maimed, and intimidated at an accelerated pace. The situation has deteriorated, and it always has been tenuous and iffy for all native, non-Arab (and especially non-Muslim) populations living in Arab-conquered lands, the dhimmis.
While dhimmitude primarily refers to the plight of conquered, native Christian and Jewish populations (the People of the Book), Arab subjugating racist attitudes often also extended to those non-Arab peoples who--in order to jump on the winning bandwagon, escape special taxation, and so forth--became Muslims.
And those who were not ahl al-Kitab most often either converted or were massacred. Think Hindus, Sikhs, and Buddhists, in particular, as jihad was waged in the name of the Dar ul-Islam to points east.
Since dozens of Copts were recently murdered and deliberately mowed down in the streets, the plight of these folks in Egypt deserves further attention…
While there are Berbers in the west, black Nubians in the south, and once upon a time Egypt had a substantial population of native Jews, the Copts are by far the largest pre-Arab, non-Arab population in the land. They are the native people, descendants of the Pharaohs, who, after being subjected to the rule of the hated Byzantines, were conquered in the 7th century C. E. as Arabs burst out of the Arabian Peninsula and spread in all directions.
Today, there are probably somewhere between ten and thirteen million Copts in Egypt--depending upon whose numbers you use. As Christians, they, with the Jews, were tolerated, to a degree, as "People of the Book"--as long as certain rules of the conquering Arab Muslim road were adhered to. The latter have been referred to as dhimmitude.
The best approach for the Copts over the centuries has been to keep a low profile, pay the obligatory special taxes, prove usefulness, quietly accept a perpetual, subservient status, and find ways to ingratiate and prove loyalty to the Arab Muslim majority and its rulers.
Boutros-Ghali, a Copt, felt that there might be a solution. How?…Well, Israel could become an Arab country. Most Israelis were (Jewish) immigrants from Arab countries anyway ... The new urgency of this topic brought back memories of some famous quotes I had come across during my own doctoral study days.
In Amos Elon’s Flight Into Egypt (New York, 1980), he reviewed encounters with the late President Sadat’s Foreign Minister, Dr. Boutros Boutros-Ghali. The latter would later become Secretary General of the United Nations.
A Copt, it was largely believed that Boutros-Ghali was selected by Sadat for this post precisely because of his unquestioned, assured loyalty. Centuries of dhimmitude could be expected to have done its thing…and it did.
Follow carefully some excerpts regarding this famous Copt’s advice to Elon, a prominent Israeli journalist:
In his office, there is a map of the Middle East on which Israel is still blacked out…Israel must integrate by accepting the nature of the area…that nature that is Arab…In a tape of a long discourse delivered in 1975 to Professor Brecher he proclaimed that…in the vast area between the Persian Gulf and the Atlantic Ocean everyone had to be Arab or risk continuing strife…Still, Boutros-Ghali felt that there might be a solution. How?…Well, Israel could become an Arab country. Most Israelis were (Jewish) immigrants from Arab countries anyway (pp.84-91).
To learn more about all of this, other scholars, besides the essential Egyptian Jewish scholar, Bat Ye’or, have also made important contributions. One, in particular, Professor Albert Memmi, a Tunisian Jew, wrote a short but powerful work also exposing firsthand, like Bat Ye’or, dhimmitude--and what needs to be done about it. Memmi supported Tunisia’s struggle for independence from France, and the mere four lines on the opening page to his book, Jews And Arabs, say it all…
To my Jewish brothers To my Arab brothers so that we can all be free men at last…
Compare this Jewish call for mutual respect to Boutros-Ghali’s, the Copt's, pathetic advice.
In contrast to Copts who daily fear for their very lives in Egypt, a reading of what they have to say about these things when they flee abroad is telling as well.
In 1852, Harriet Beecher Stowe authored a famous antislavery novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, in which she wrote of the blacks’ expected servile behavior towards their white masters.
Unfortunately, as we've seen in the words of Sadat's Foreign Minister, this is also the Arabs’ predominant idea of “tolerance”…creating scores of millions of Uncle Boutroses--be they Copts, Kurds, black Africans, "Berbers," native kilab yahud (Jew dogs), pre-Arab Lebanese, etc. and so forth.
Given their own tragic plight in a land where their ancestors lived and ruled for millennia before Arabs ever invaded and conquered both, the Copts' attitude to Jews too often gets whisked under the rug--for a number of reasons. Since my wish is for a better future for all of the region's diverse peoples, I won't remain silent.
You see, if there are problems with the Arab Spring regarding freedom, democracy, and such due to Muslim intolerance and the rise of Islamist groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood, then the following nasty reality must also be addressed…
Simply put, non-Arab, Christian Copts don't need Arab Muslims to teach them how to hate Jews...Their own faith has taught them to hate the G-d-killers for centuries before Islam's Muhammad ever entered into the picture.
As just one example of the problem, Saint John Chrysostom of Antioch--one of the early Church Fathers, is beloved among the Copts. Here's a taste of Chrysostom's teaching in Homily 1, some sixteen centuries ago.
The Jewish people were driven by their drunkenness and plumpness to the ultimate evil; they kicked about, they failed to accept the yoke of Christ, nor did they pull the plow of his teaching. Another prophet hinted at this when he said: "Israel is as obstinate as a stubborn heifer " ...Although such beasts are unfit for work, they are fit for killing. And this is what happened to the Jews: while they were making themselves unfit for work, they grew fit for slaughter. This is why Christ said: "But as for these my enemies, who did not want me to be king over them, bring them here and slay them."
Here's an excerpt from Homily 6...
You {Jews} did slay Christ, you did lift violent hands against the Master, you did spill his precious blood. This is why you have no chance for atonement, excuse, or defense.
And, moving into modern times, listening to the Copts' Pope Shenouda III is like hearing a speech from the best anti-Semites of any stripe have to offer.
So,Copts have been taught by their religious leaders to join their own often murderous, abusive Arab neighbors in their mutual antagonism of the Jew:
Besides joining their fellow Muslim Arab Egyptian neighbors in targeting a common, demonized enemy (to help divert attention away from their own vulnerable positions), an even earlier animus towards the alleged G-d-killers has been ever present as well.
At a time when the lives of Egypt's truly native people are becoming increasingly endangered due to Muslim intolerance, is it not long overdue for the Copts to realize that they and the Jews are two of the region's most ancient peoples and that they should finally overcome their Jew hatred?
Posts: 1061 | From: Laos | Registered: Jun 2012
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quote: At a time when the lives of Egypt's truly native people are becoming increasingly endangered due to Muslim intolerance, is it not long overdue for the Copts to realize that they and the Jews are two of the region's most ancient peoples and that they should finally overcome their Jew hatred?
All Egyptian Copts Are Not Natives, Many of them are Left Over Products of the Foreign Invaders who mixed with the Natives. Many Copts Are Former Jews who converted for better status in society. Have No Illusions Copts & Jews Are Both Greedy People, Who Will Do Anything For A Little Extra Piece of Gold, a.k.a Gold_Diggers!!Posts: 1061 | From: Laos | Registered: Jun 2012
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Absolute nonsense. Egyptian Copts and Muslims are both mixed with foreign invaders. Who cares about Boutros Ghali! He is a puppet of the west and is naturally favors anything the west approves. Then again you are a right-wing fanatical like most Ameri-copts. I can guarantee you one thing you have more bedouin, Turkish and Albanian ancestry than I. You may even have southern Sudanese ancestry since most of your Albanian brothers liked importing southern Sudanese women to serve as domestics.
Posts: 8675 | From: Tukuler al~Takruri as Ardo since OCT2014 | Registered: Feb 2003
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Egyptian Christianity under Islamic Rule - A Brief Coptic Muslim History
Islam rose in Saudia Arabia early in the seventh century, then swept across the Middle East and North Africa. Egypt fell to the Arabs by the middle of the seventh century, in large part because the rulers of both church and state were the hated imperial Chalcedonian Christians. The Coptic-speaking monophysite majority rejoiced to be free of Byzantine rule, gained a measure of religious toleration they had not known since the Council of Chalcedon, and found themselves taxed at just over half the rate they had been under the Empire.
For the first four centuries of their rule, the Arabs treated the Copts with forebearance, in part because Mohammed, whose Egyptian wife was the only one to bear him a son, had said "When you conquer Egypt, be kind to the Copts for they are your proteges and kith and kin." The Copts were therefore allowed to practice their religion freely, and were protected as "People of the Book" as long as they paid a special tax, called the "Geyza." The Coptic population became an important source of revenue for the Islamic governors, and at one point they discouraged conversion to Islam for financial reasons. The tax advantages of becoming Muslim led to a slow decline in the Coptic population until it stabilized at just under 10% of the population.
The Copts replaced Greek speakers as the civil servants and administrators of Egypt, in large measure because they, unlike Arabic speaking Muslim rulers, spoke the language of the general population. For generations, Copts who had learned Arabic were the only scribes, magistrates, or tax collectors. From the turn of the eighth century, when Arabic became the official language of Egypt until the late middle ages, when Coptic ceased being a spoken language, the Coptic community was a bilingual community. As the Copts subsided further and further into minority status without surrendering their tradition of serving in the civil service, they became hated and vilified by the Muslim population, who occasionally rioted and burned Coptic churches and neighbourhoods.
At the turn of the millennium the Caliph al Hakim, who was probably insane, turned against Christian and Jews, and later also against Muslims, torturing and killing thousands of people. He forced all Christians to wear distinctive dress, including a five pound cross which every Christian had to wear around his or her neck. He forced Jews to wear a heavy bell around their necks, and dismissed all non-Muslims from administrative offices. Al Hakim turned loose the Egyptian mob to demolish Coptic Churches and Jewish synagogues, walled off a Jewish street, leaving all inside to die of starvation, and also walled and sealed the doors of a public bath for women, entombing alive all those who were inside. He banned all women from appearing on the streets of Egypt for any reason. At Caliph al Hakim’s death, toleration returned, the center of Coptic Christianity shifted from Alexandria to the new capital, Cairo and churches were rebuilt.
The Crusades brought another dark time to the history of the Coptic Church. Coptic Christians were caught between two equally hostile forces during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Muslims came to hate all Christians in Muslim world, while Latin Christians despised the Copts as heretics. During the Crusades, Latin Christians came to control the Holy Land, but prevented the Copts from fulfilling their binding religious obligation to go on pilgrimage to the Holy Land by preventing Copts from entering the holy sites.
In 1168 the Islamic capital of al-Fustat was burned to the ground by its Muslim governor, in order to prevent it from falling into the hands of the Crusaders, who could use it as a fortress from which to invade all Egypt. He used 20,000 barrels of naphtha lit by 10,000 torches to raze the city, which burned for 54 days. The predominantly Coptic population fled, and was made destitute overnight. Shortly afterwards the Fatimid dynasty collapsed to be replaced by Saladin and the Ayyubids. Life did not change much for the Copts through all the dynastic changes, which included the Mamaluk takeover about 1250 and the later conquest by the Ottoman Turks in 1500. The major change was the death of Coptic as a spoken language under the Mamaluks. The church, however, held on to Coptic as the church’s liturgical language up to the present. The mob still hated the Copts, and unless restrained by rulers who found their administrative acumen useful, burned churches and Coptic neighbourhoods. In 1320 after a particular severe season of rioting, the Christian desert monks swept into the cities in retaliation and burned down mosques and Muslim neighbourhoods, then returned to the desert.
Patriarch Cyril IV (1854-61) took advantage of a period of toleration to initiate serious reform and rebuilding, including the construction of a Coptic Orthodox College. He endowed the college with enough funds to enable it to teach students without charging them tuition, and appointed professors in Coptic, Arabic, Turkish, French, English and Italian, as well as the usual theological and academic curriculum. In addition he opened the first women’s college in Egyptian history, and established a flourishing printing press. When the physical press arrived Cyril ordered that it be met by an official religious processional, which accompanied the press, chanting hymns all the way from Cairo station to the patriarchate. Cyril IV also arranged for nation-wide clerical education, summoning all the priests within reach of the capital to regular Sunday classes and theological discussions, and directing clergy to re-learn the proper liturgies and chants to use in services.
In the last half of the twentieth century, the Coptic Church has engaged in extensive ecumenical dialog with other Coptic Churches, as well as Orthodox, Roman Catholic and Protestant churches. In 1987 the Copic Church and the Orthodox Churches agreed to a common statement on the nature of Christ, and lifted the mutual anathemas they had held on each other since the fifth century, and in the early 1990s the Coptic Church and the Roman Catholic Church came to agreement on their understanding of the nature of Christ and declared one another Sister Churches.
Posts: 42940 | From: , | Registered: Jan 2010
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quote: Coptic Christians were caught between two equally hostile forces during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Muslims came to hate all Christians in Muslim world, while Latin Christians despised the Copts as heretics.
posted
Egyptians do not identify along color lines. Both light and dark Egyptians straddle the lower, middle, and upper classes. Calling any Egyptian "black" is an insult, as far a I know, but you can ask ausar about this.
Chester "ausar", seems to know more about Egyptians who claim to be marginalized, angry, and pissed off than anyone else on the face of the planet.
Posts: 1061 | From: Laos | Registered: Jun 2012
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quote:Originally posted by the lioness,: Egyptian Christianity under Islamic Rule - A Brief Coptic Muslim History
Islam rose in Saudia Arabia early in the seventh century, then swept across the Middle East and North Africa. Egypt fell to the Arabs by the middle of the seventh century, in large part because the rulers of both church and state were the hated imperial Chalcedonian Christians. The Coptic-speaking monophysite majority rejoiced to be free of Byzantine rule, gained a measure of religious toleration they had not known since the Council of Chalcedon, and found themselves taxed at just over half the rate they had been under the Empire.
For the first four centuries of their rule, the Arabs treated the Copts with forebearance, in part because Mohammed, whose Egyptian wife was the only one to bear him a son, had said "When you conquer Egypt, be kind to the Copts for they are your proteges and kith and kin." The Copts were therefore allowed to practice their religion freely, and were protected as "People of the Book" as long as they paid a special tax, called the "Geyza." The Coptic population became an important source of revenue for the Islamic governors, and at one point they discouraged conversion to Islam for financial reasons. The tax advantages of becoming Muslim led to a slow decline in the Coptic population until it stabilized at just under 10% of the population.
The Copts replaced Greek speakers as the civil servants and administrators of Egypt, in large measure because they, unlike Arabic speaking Muslim rulers, spoke the language of the general population. For generations, Copts who had learned Arabic were the only scribes, magistrates, or tax collectors. From the turn of the eighth century, when Arabic became the official language of Egypt until the late middle ages, when Coptic ceased being a spoken language, the Coptic community was a bilingual community. As the Copts subsided further and further into minority status without surrendering their tradition of serving in the civil service, they became hated and vilified by the Muslim population, who occasionally rioted and burned Coptic churches and neighbourhoods.
At the turn of the millennium the Caliph al Hakim, who was probably insane, turned against Christian and Jews, and later also against Muslims, torturing and killing thousands of people. He forced all Christians to wear distinctive dress, including a five pound cross which every Christian had to wear around his or her neck. He forced Jews to wear a heavy bell around their necks, and dismissed all non-Muslims from administrative offices. Al Hakim turned loose the Egyptian mob to demolish Coptic Churches and Jewish synagogues, walled off a Jewish street, leaving all inside to die of starvation, and also walled and sealed the doors of a public bath for women, entombing alive all those who were inside. He banned all women from appearing on the streets of Egypt for any reason. At Caliph al Hakim’s death, toleration returned, the center of Coptic Christianity shifted from Alexandria to the new capital, Cairo and churches were rebuilt.
The Crusades brought another dark time to the history of the Coptic Church. Coptic Christians were caught between two equally hostile forces during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Muslims came to hate all Christians in Muslim world, while Latin Christians despised the Copts as heretics. During the Crusades, Latin Christians came to control the Holy Land, but prevented the Copts from fulfilling their binding religious obligation to go on pilgrimage to the Holy Land by preventing Copts from entering the holy sites.
In 1168 the Islamic capital of al-Fustat was burned to the ground by its Muslim governor, in order to prevent it from falling into the hands of the Crusaders, who could use it as a fortress from which to invade all Egypt. He used 20,000 barrels of naphtha lit by 10,000 torches to raze the city, which burned for 54 days. The predominantly Coptic population fled, and was made destitute overnight. Shortly afterwards the Fatimid dynasty collapsed to be replaced by Saladin and the Ayyubids. Life did not change much for the Copts through all the dynastic changes, which included the Mamaluk takeover about 1250 and the later conquest by the Ottoman Turks in 1500. The major change was the death of Coptic as a spoken language under the Mamaluks. The church, however, held on to Coptic as the church’s liturgical language up to the present. The mob still hated the Copts, and unless restrained by rulers who found their administrative acumen useful, burned churches and Coptic neighbourhoods. In 1320 after a particular severe season of rioting, the Christian desert monks swept into the cities in retaliation and burned down mosques and Muslim neighbourhoods, then returned to the desert.
Patriarch Cyril IV (1854-61) took advantage of a period of toleration to initiate serious reform and rebuilding, including the construction of a Coptic Orthodox College. He endowed the college with enough funds to enable it to teach students without charging them tuition, and appointed professors in Coptic, Arabic, Turkish, French, English and Italian, as well as the usual theological and academic curriculum. In addition he opened the first women’s college in Egyptian history, and established a flourishing printing press. When the physical press arrived Cyril ordered that it be met by an official religious processional, which accompanied the press, chanting hymns all the way from Cairo station to the patriarchate. Cyril IV also arranged for nation-wide clerical education, summoning all the priests within reach of the capital to regular Sunday classes and theological discussions, and directing clergy to re-learn the proper liturgies and chants to use in services.
In the last half of the twentieth century, the Coptic Church has engaged in extensive ecumenical dialog with other Coptic Churches, as well as Orthodox, Roman Catholic and Protestant churches. In 1987 the Copic Church and the Orthodox Churches agreed to a common statement on the nature of Christ, and lifted the mutual anathemas they had held on each other since the fifth century, and in the early 1990s the Coptic Church and the Roman Catholic Church came to agreement on their understanding of the nature of Christ and declared one another Sister Churches.
Source??? You definitely did not research nor synthesize this work above. Source pleaseeeee!
Posts: 7419 | From: North America | Registered: Mar 2009
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posted
Deadhead "Djehuti" is Nothing More Than A Cheerleader anxious to show us her panties, so that we can all admire her curves.
Sad Day, when the only people around cheering for ausar are the Afronuts, Trannys, & Hookers.
White Nubian Justice Is All Around Us & Will Always Trump The Fake Characters of Egyptsearch.
Posts: 1061 | From: Laos | Registered: Jun 2012
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quote:Originally posted by IronLion: [QUOTE]Originally posted by the lioness,: [qb] Egyptian Christianity under Islamic Rule - A Brief Coptic Muslim History
Source??? You definitely did not research nor synthesize this work above. Source pleaseeeee!
^^ ldon't click, copy and paste in google search field not in the address field, numerous citations
It seems to go back to at least 2002
"Bethel University (Minnesota) has been a leader and model in Christian higher education since 1871. For generations, our fusion of evangelical faith with top-ranked academics has transformed women and men, preparing them for unique callings in the kingdom of God."
A professor there Neil Lettinga had a website (no longer) called African Christianity
Contributions Of Yoruba People In The Economic & Political Developments Of Nigeria by Jacob Oluwatayo Adeuyan (Oct 11, 2011)
Note this sentence from the essay I posted:
Islam rose in Saudia Arabia early in the seventh century, then swept across the Middle East and North Africa.
________________
Jacob Oluwatayo Adeuyan version>
The religon of Islam began in Saudia Arabia early in the seventh century, then swept across the Middle East and North Africa region and neighborhood
_______________________________________
essay I posted:
"As the Copts subsided further and further into minority status without surrendering their tradition of serving in the civil service, they became hated and vilified by the Muslim population, who occasionally rioted and burned Coptic churches and neighbourhoods."
___________
Jacob Oluwatayo Adeuyan version>
As the Copts subsided further and further into minority status without surrendering their tradition of serving in the civil service, they became hated and vilified by the Muslim population, who occasionally rioted and burn Coptic churches and neighbourhoods.
Posts: 42940 | From: , | Registered: Jan 2010
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quote:Originally posted by white nubian: Egyptians do not identify along color lines. Both light and dark Egyptians straddle the lower, middle, and upper classes. Calling any Egyptian "black" is an insult, as far a I know, but you can ask ausar about this.
Chester "ausar", seems to know more about Egyptians who claim to be marginalized, angry, and pissed off than anyone else on the face of the planet.
posted
Indeed. Whether modern Egyptians like being called "black" or green or whatever doesn't make the slightest difference in the scientific data showing the core African character of ancient Egypt. That data is not dependent on the "feelings" of anyone, and doesn't rely on "approval" or "clearance" from today's Egyptians, Europeans or anyone else for that matter.
-------------------- Note: I am not an "Egyptologist" as claimed by some still bitter, defeated, trolls creating fake profiles and posts elsewhere. Hapless losers, you still fail. My output of hard data debunking racist nonsense has actually INCREASED since you began.. Posts: 5905 | From: The Hammer | Registered: Aug 2008
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