Copts
"If you come to a Coptic person and tell him that he’s an Arab, that’s offensive. We are not Arabs, we are Egyptians... When we hear the word "Copt", that doesn’t only mean "Christian", it means "Egyptian"."
–Bishop Thomas of Cusae and Meir, a Copt.
HISTORY
You may or may not know much about Egyptian history after the pharaohs. I will bring us up to speed.
For most of their ancient history, the people in Egypt were ethnic Egyptians and they did the Egyptian thing–pyramids, embalming, and senet. In 434 B.C., the Persians took it over for a wee-bit. A hundred years later along came Alexander, who the Egyptians viewed as a liberator, and following his early death, the Hellenistic (Greek civilization outside of Greece) Ptolemaic Kingdom reigned along the Nile. The capital moved from Memphis to newly established Alexandria. Hellenization thrived in Egypt. The Greeks and the Egyptians lived in relative harmony for a while, with the Greek "Pharaohs" taking on Egyptian customs and continued to tolerate the Egyptian religion. Egyptians could still to their thang. But the Greek Pharaohs started marrying their sisters or something and the subsequent rulers became more and more feeble.
Julius Caesar showed up and "Veni, vidi, vici.*" He set up a puppet state in Egypt in 47 B.C. and it was finally absorbed into the Roman Empire by Octavian in 30 B.C. The Romans were pretty tolerant folk, which is probably why they had such long-standing success, and they allowed the Egyptians to do whatever they wanted and worship whomever they wished as long as they paid their taxes and didn't start a fight. If they started a fight, well, then there would be hell to pay–something everybody understood except the Jews. Even though the world was run by the Romans, the East anyway was still Greek. Egypt was comfortable with the Greco-Egyptian culture, and in the first century A.D. the Egyptians moved from hieroglyphics to a modified version of the Greek alphabet.
With the advent of Christianity, Egyptian life was about to drastically change. The Church in Alexandria is thought to have been founded in 42 B.C. by Mark the Evangelist. By the beginning of the 3rd Century, Christianity was the majority religion along the Nile. For the first three centuries after Christ, Christianity was a minority religion throughout the Roman Empire with no political ties and, on occasion, subject to Roman and local persecution. Egyptians were willingly converting to Christianity and was therefore not an overthrow of Egyptian culture but an evolution of it.
Egyptian culture stayed Christian until the Muslim conquests in the 7th Century by the Arabs. The Arabs referred to Egyptians as "quft," or, in today's usage, Copts. After centuries of Islamic rule in Egypt, most Egyptians converted to Islam. The term Copt evolved to exclusively define Christian Egyptians. The Church in Egypt became known as the Coptic Church. Christians were tolerated mostly, as dhimmis, or in a way, second-class citizens, but after the Crusades, the Mamluk Sultanate imposed heavy persecutions on the Christians, burned Coptic monastaries and forced many to convert to Islam. Things eventually got better. In the 19th Century, the ruler Muhammad Ali liberalized much of Egyptian law and the Copts were treated more as equals and rose to high positions in the Egyptian government. Yet in the 1950s after the Coup d'état, Gamal Nasser came to power and established a Pan-Arabic (unity with the Greater-Arabic world and culture) and Arabic Nationalism within Egypt that resulted in many human rights violations against the Copts including terrorism such as the recent bombing of a Coptic Church in Alexandria. This has led to a greater Coptic diaspora.
CULTURE
Today when one refers to Copts, he refers to Egyptian Christians and predominately those that adhere to the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria. The church still uses the modified Greek alphabet known as the Coptic alphabet, during Church Liturgy speaks the Coptic language, which is the last remnant of the Ancient Egyptian language, and follows the Coptic calendar which starts on August 29th.
As a result of the Ecumenical Council of Chalcedon of 451, the Church in Alexandria along with others, split with the majority of the Roman Christian Church. The schism resulted in the Oriental Orthodox Church (which included the Church in Alexandria), or Non-Chalcedonians, falling out of communion with what is now the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church (which were unified at the time) also known as the Chalcedonians. They differed on the definition nature of Christ. The Chalcedonians stated that Christ had two natures in one person. He was both fully human and fully divine. The Non-Chalcedonians (Oriental Orthodox) states that Jesus Christ's Divinity and Humanity are intertwined in one single nature (known as "physis") and are not separated in any way. This teaching of the Oriental Orthodox Church (of which the Coptics are a part) is known as Miaphysitism. To most of us now, if we even understand it, is not perceived as an issue worth splitting over. To the Christian in the 5th Century, it carried a lot more wait. The Oriental Orthodox Church, over fifteen centuries later, is still out of communion with the Eastern Orthodox Church. A Protestant, Catholic, or Greek Orthodox adherent cannot partake in a Coptic Communion.
Although the only account for about 10-15% of the Egyptian population, the Copts think of themselves as the true Egyptians. They say are linked to the Ancient Egyptians not only by their language alphabet and ethnicity, but also by direct Apostolic Succession dating back to the 1st Century with St. Mark. They view Muslims as non-Egyptians or Arabs. They site Nasser's Pan-Arabism, which focuses on the Islamic Arab world and not Egypt, as a distinguishing factor between the Copts or "Egyptians" and the Muslims–"Arabs." Copts focus on an indigenous Egyptian culture and not an Arabic culture which has separate roots.
To quote Coptic Bishop Thomas of Cusae and Meir in more detail:
"What makes a person change the identity of his own nation and shift the focus of his identity from Egypt to become "the Arabs", even though ethnically he/she is the same person? The Copts have been always focused on Egypt; it’s our identity, it’s our nation, it’s our land, it’s our language, it’s our culture. But when some of the Egyptians converted to Islam, their focus changed away from looking to their own [language and culture]. They started to look to the Arabians, and Arabia became their main focus. So the focus here has changed and they would no longer be called "Copts". If you come to a Coptic person and tell him that he’s an Arab, that’s offensive. We are not Arabs, we are Egyptians. I am very happy to be an Egyptian and I would not accept being "Arab" because ethnically I am not. I speak Arabic. Politically now, I am part of a country that was Arabized and politically I belong to an Arabic country but that doesn’t make a person Arab. If a person believes he is an Arab, his main focus is the pan-Arab area, and he no longer belongs to the Egyptian nation. You are either in or out; either you belong or you don’t. And this is a big dilemma that is happening for the Copts who kept their Christianity, or rather their identity as Egyptians with their own culture, and who are trying to keep the language, the music, and the calendar of the Copts. That means that the culture of Ancient Egypt is still carried on. A process of Arabization has been ongoing in this country for many centuries, since the 7th century. At the same time Islamization as well is a dilemma that started and is still carrying a lot of the problems. [...] So when we hear the word "Copt", that doesn’t only mean "Christian", it means "Egyptian"."
Since the 1970s Copts have suffered about 120 major attacks which have resulted in about 4,000 deaths alone and millions in personal property. Mubarak's government has done little to nothing to quell the violence against Copts in Egypt. Most of the attacks are not committed by terrorist groups, but by the local population. But don't take my word for it. If you have an hour, watch Bishop Thomas address the Hudson Institute about the tension between Copts and Muslims in Egypt. An interesting perspective that we would could not see, being Westerners.
BUT...
The Christmas Eve attack on the Copts was the final straw. Copts have been dealing with attacks from militant Muslims with no support from the government and took to the streets in protest. Soon afterwords, Muslims joined in the protest to and stood united with the Christians as Egyptians attacking the government for not supporting and protecting its own. Some even stood as humans shields for the Christians during Mass. This is maybe one possible contributing factor to the national protests in Egypt. If there is a smooth transition in the government, this could be good news for the Copts.
It's amazing to see a group of people hold on to what they believe for centuries on end, in times of persecution, radical cultural change, from regime to regime and empire to empire. I think it's safe to say that they'll still be around centuries later.
Notes
*According to Julius Caesar's "Civil War", "Veni, vidi, vici" actually refers to Caesar's brief encounter and shellacking of Pharnaces II of Pontus in the city of Zela.
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