Coptica 15, 2016

Letter by Anba Yūsāb, Bishop of Jirjā and Akhmīm 3 flood to its normal level and Egypt experienced famine. 4 Yūsāb witnessed the 1768 revolt of c Ali Bey al-Kabīr against the Ottomans’ central authority. The Georgian mamluks, led by c Ali Bey al-Kabīr, temporarily “took control of Egypt, the Hijaz, Palestine, and southern Syria” and c Ali Bey “openly courted Russian assistance in his military struggle against the Ottoman Empire.” The mamluks wanted to establish an autonomous Egypt and “sought an alliance with the Russian Empress against the Sultan’s government.” 5 The Ottoman counter assault was especially brutal on the Copts; the conquering soldiers pillaged Christian houses and “sold their property in public auctions.” 6 Five years later, in 1773, an outbreak of pestilence claimed the lives of 1,000 people per day in Cairo. 7 In 1798 Napoleon’s fleet arrived in Alexandria and the French occupied Egypt for three years. On the ecclesial level, Yūsāb witnessed the Russian attempt to offer “protection” to the Coptic Orthodox Church, most probably inspired by the unsuccessful military campaign during the Ottoman Rule and the Capitulation agreement between the Ottoman and European powers including Russia. Pope Peter VIII rejected the offer, famously answering that the Copts are protected by the Immortal power rather than an earthly one. Anba Yūsāb “struggled against the Catholic missionary propaganda campaign which was active in that period in his diocese” of Jirjā and Akhmīm 8 and against the various efforts of the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, established in 1622 by Pope Gregory XV, for which the present letter was produced. Thus, the writer of this letter experienced famine, civil war followed by severe persecution of the Copts, pestilence, French occupation, attempts from the Imperial Russian Court to control both Egypt and the Church, and aggressive Catholic missionary activity among Orthodox Egyptians. After all this Bartholomew, a Catholic monk, asked the Coptic Orthodox Church to submit ( yakhda c lahu ) to Rome unconditionally. The response to this Catholic proposal is the subject of this paper. IV. Content of the Letter We infer from Yūsāb’s letter that Bartholomew’s letter ordered the Coptic Pope to submit to the Pope of Rome by simply copying and signing a letter 4 A.S. Atiya, “John XVIII,” Coptic Encyclopedia , ed. A.S. Atiya, 4: p. 1350. 5 D. Crecelius and G. Djaparidze, “Relations of the Georgian Mamluks of Egypt with their Homeland in the Last Decades of the Eighteenth Century,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 45 (2002), 321-322. 6 A.S. Atiya, “John XVIII,” Coptic Encyclopedia , 4: p. 1350. 7 Ibid . 8 S. Khalil Samir, “Yusab,” Coptic Encyclopedia , 7: p. 2360.