[ilds] Religions in Egypt

[Lee Sternthal]

exactly.  thanks, bruce.

On Sun, Aug 15, 2010 at 8:42 AM, Bruce Redwine
<bredwine1968 at earthlink.net>wrote:

> Haag's *Timeline* is a calendar of historical facts with brief
> explanations, not a thorough discussion of events.  He mentions the legend
> of Mark proselytizing in Alexandria in 45, Hadrian dealing with Egyptian
> Christians in 130-31, and the founding of the Catechetical School in
> Alexandria in 180.  By 240, Roman citizens are prohibited from "embracing
> Christianity," and the "Delta is studded with Christianity communities."
>
> How does this related to Lawrence Durrell?  Not directly.  As David Green
> mentions, what is interesting about Durrell is his "mindscape" (Richard
> Pine's term).  Durrell also had a strong religious impulse which caused him
> to dabble in a host of spiritual approaches.  The long religious history of
> Alexandria surely appealed to him, because it was basically "syncretic."  It
> was fertile ground for competing ideas.  It absorbed and reinterpreted and
> recombined many religions and philosophies — which also seems to have been
> the way Durrell's own fertile mind worked.  He read widely, took what he
> needed from sundry sources, and made up his own hodgepodge of religious
> folklore.  This process becomes transferred to his fiction.  That's why I
> find Scobie's character fascinating — in particular, Durrell's deification
> of *El Scob.  *Scobie is Durrell's mind at its best and most outrageous.
>
>
> Bruce
>
>
>
> On Aug 14, 2010, at 5:51 PM, Lee Sternthal wrote:
>
> sorry to be lazy, but does Haag cover where Dionysus would have picked up
> Pre-Nicaea Chrisitianity, let alone adopted it as belief system enough to
> convert populace? Before Constantine Christianity was just another competing
> ethos, wasn't it?
>
> L
>
>
> On Sat, Aug 14, 2010 at 9:59 AM, Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net
> > wrote:
>
>> Interesting questions.  Michael Haag's *The Timeline History of Egypt*(New York 2005) is useful in providing facts.  "247-64 Dionysus is the first
>> patriarch of Alexandria actively to convert the native Egyptians" (p. 156).
>>  The pharaonic religion persisted until supplanted by Christianity, but even
>> now aspects of the "old religion" still exist.  If I'm not mistaken, the
>> ancient "Opet festival" in pharaonic Thebes has a modern reflex in today's
>> Luxor, under a new guise.  Durrell is very good at picking up the syncretic
>> features of folk religion in Egypt.  In *Clea,* Scobie dies and becomes a
>> Coptic saint, *El Yacoub*, and an Arabic one, *El Scob* (p. 82).  Also,
>> Durrell's evocations of superstitions such as "the Evil Eye" are quite
>> memorable.
>>
>>
>> Bruce
>>
>>
>>
>> On Aug 14, 2010, at 2:31 AM, Lee Sternthal wrote:
>>
>> At what point were the Copts converted to Christianity, and by whom?  What
>> was their belief system before?  It couldn't have been before the 3rd
>> Century.
>>
>> On Fri, Aug 13, 2010 at 3:55 PM, Bruce Redwine <
>> bredwine1968 at earthlink.net> wrote:
>>
>>> No offense intended, but Lawrence Durrell makes a distinction between the
>>> Copts and the general Egyptian population.  He fully develops his Coptic
>>> theme in *Mountolive* (Penguin 1991).  Here is what Durrell has Mr.
>>> Hosnani, Sr., say about his Coptic roots:  "'Do you know what they call us —
>>> the Moslems? . . . I will tell you.  *Gins Pharoony.*  Yes, we are *genus
>>> Pharaonicus* — the true descendants of the ancients, the true marrow of
>>> Egypt.  We call ourselves *Gypt* — ancient Egyptians.  Yet we are
>>> Christians like you, only of the oldest and purest strain'" (p. 41).
>>>
>>> As I said before, I believe most Egyptians are in fact descendants of the
>>> ancient Egyptians.  That population, however, speaks Arabic, as a
>>> consequence of Amr's invasion in 641 CE.  A version of the original Egyptian
>>> language is preserved in the liturgy of the Coptic Church, and the Copts,
>>> who are Christians, think of themselves as a distinct minority within Egypt
>>> — and as Tarek Heggy, an Egyptian Muslim, has pointed out, Copts are treated
>>> differently.  This distinctiveness is what Durrell picks up on and
>>> elaborates in the *Quartet.*  So, I would not call Durrell's usage of
>>> "Copt" and all its connotations a "new trend."
>>>
>>>
>>> Bruce
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Aug 13, 2010, at 2:12 PM, nabila marzouk wrote:
>>>
>>> Dear group,
>>> It hurts very much, I mean the new trend of saying that copts are the
>>> true descendents of ancient Egyptians. I donot know based on what  this
>>> rumour is so widely spread. As an Egyptian muslim I am the descendent of
>>> king Thut and queen Hatshpsut. When we celebrate anything national here we
>>> dress like ancient egyptians and talk about their glorious history. We never
>>> speak of ourselves as arabs or think that we have any arabic ancestors. Read
>>> history and you will know that most of the Egyptian muslims were descendents
>>> of a certain creed of Egyptian Christians who differed immensely from
>>> Orthodox church and also of christians who embraced Islam. Read history and
>>> you will know that when Amr left Egypt only no more than ten thousand arabic
>>> people stayed behind. Read history and you will know that it took Egypt more
>>> than 300 years to have the Islamic majority she has now which negates the
>>> idea that muslims are descendents of arabs while christians are descendents
>>> of ancient egyptians, otherwise I can say that christians are descendents of
>>> the Romans. The word copt should be used to refer to both muslims and
>>> christians because it means egyptian in ancient egyptian language. Please do
>>> not speak about me as if I were less Egyptian than I really am.
>>> nabila
>>>
>>> --- On *Wed, 7/28/10, Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net>* wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>
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