One of the more exciting developments in the mass demonstrations in Cairo over the past two weeks has been the coming together of Muslims and Christians in opposition to the oppressive government of Hosni Mubarak. Coptic Christians make up roughly 10 percent of the Egyptian population, or about 8 million people, and are the largest Christian minority in the Middle East. Muslim youth have taken to guarding Coptic Christian churches, which have been attacked during previous disturnaces. And for their part, Christian youth stood guard to protect Muslims as they prayed at Tahrir Square in Cairo, knowing that people at prayer are vulnerable to the secret police. According to AP, one Coptic priest, Father Ihab al-Kharat, gave a sermon on Sunday in which he said, "In the name of Jesus and Muhammad we unify our ranks. . . . We will keep protesting until the fall of the tyranny."
Coptic Christianity is separate from both Catholics and Eastern Orthodox Christians, although they share many of the same roots. The Copts trace their branch of the faith to the foundational teaching of the apostle and evangelist Mark, who according to tradition came to Alexandria in the middle of the 1st century (c. 42 CE).
The Desert Fathers, a loosely connected group of ascetics, monks and nuns living hermit-like in the deserts of Egypt since about the 3rd century, are considered the first Christian monastics, and probably were influenced by small groups of Jewish ascetics, such as the Essenes of Israel and Therapeutae of Alexandria.
On Sunday, thousands of Muslim and Christian protesters again made their way into Tahrir Square to commemorate some 300 martyrs who have died at the hands of the secret police since the protests began on January 25. A Coptic Christian priest, carrying a cross, celebrated Sunday mass before the crowd, standing next to a Muslim imam, carrying a copy of the Qur'an, as the crowd chanted in unison, "We are one hand!"
The preacher then led them in the chant from the altar, "One hand! One hand!" referring to the unity of Christians and Muslims, who are expressing the same demands for a change of regime. The event was captured on video.
A Christian woman named Rana told Reuters Arabic, "All Egyptians, regardless of whether they are Christian or Muslim, want change, liberty, and justice for all people."
Does this remind you of anything?
In one of his last interviews before being murdered in December 1980, John Lennon says that he had the words "One World One People" inscribed on the master of Double Fantasy--the album with 7 songs each songs by him and Yoko Ono, which had just been released. (The words presumably appear on the vinyl matrix, although I don't have a copy of the LP on hand.) "If you look inside of the logo, which all the kids have done already all over the world, from Brazil, Australia, Poland--anywhere that gets the record--inside is written One World One People," Lennon told Rolling Stone's Jonathan Cott. "The kids have noticed that--no critic, no media, no anybody has said anything about it. . . . But the people that buy the record have written back from Australia, saying, 'P.S. One world, one people.' That is written on the actual master of the album."
Some years before, in 1965, Jamaican reggae legend Bob Marley (see photo above) had recorded a song entitled "One Love," whose original lyrics included the lines, "One love, one heart / Let's join together and I'll feel all right." (Later versions interpolate the song with "People Get Ready," by Curtis Mayfield of the Impressions, whose music played a significant role in the American civil rights movement.) Back then, the conception of one world uniting disparate groups was considered a hippie-socialist fantasy by many people, just as Lennon's song "Imagine" was criticized by some for being utopian. Now it and Marley's song are widely used as anthems for world unity.
This underlines the point I have made in previous blogs that popular music, including rock 'n' roll, hip-hop, jazz, and other idioms, are genuinely sacred music, not to be distinguished from religious or native chants, classical compositions, or so-called new age music. It has a history of bringing people together and expressin a universal desire for peace and unity.
That aspiration for unity is often tested by antagonistic and sometimes violent relations between different religious sects, including but not limited to Christians and Muslims. The chant of "One Hand" may signal a new stage in those relations, and one in which young people are playing a prominent role. Although the Coptic Pope Shenouda III has continued to defend the Mubarak regime, a group of Christian and Muslim intellectuals issued a joint statement affirming that "the revolution of Egyptian youth had instilled a new spirit in Egyptian souls, in which was apparent an excellent example of national unity... when believers guarded each others' prayers after the police disappeared." They said that this decision to stand guard came from the youth themselves, not from any religious leadership.
The Desert Fathers, a loosely connected group of ascetics, monks and nuns living hermit-like in the deserts of Egypt since about the 3rd century, are considered the first Christian monastics, and probably were influenced by small groups of Jewish ascetics, such as the Essenes of Israel and Therapeutae of Alexandria.
On Sunday, thousands of Muslim and Christian protesters again made their way into Tahrir Square to commemorate some 300 martyrs who have died at the hands of the secret police since the protests began on January 25. A Coptic Christian priest, carrying a cross, celebrated Sunday mass before the crowd, standing next to a Muslim imam, carrying a copy of the Qur'an, as the crowd chanted in unison, "We are one hand!"
The preacher then led them in the chant from the altar, "One hand! One hand!" referring to the unity of Christians and Muslims, who are expressing the same demands for a change of regime. The event was captured on video.
A Christian woman named Rana told Reuters Arabic, "All Egyptians, regardless of whether they are Christian or Muslim, want change, liberty, and justice for all people."
Does this remind you of anything?
In one of his last interviews before being murdered in December 1980, John Lennon says that he had the words "One World One People" inscribed on the master of Double Fantasy--the album with 7 songs each songs by him and Yoko Ono, which had just been released. (The words presumably appear on the vinyl matrix, although I don't have a copy of the LP on hand.) "If you look inside of the logo, which all the kids have done already all over the world, from Brazil, Australia, Poland--anywhere that gets the record--inside is written One World One People," Lennon told Rolling Stone's Jonathan Cott. "The kids have noticed that--no critic, no media, no anybody has said anything about it. . . . But the people that buy the record have written back from Australia, saying, 'P.S. One world, one people.' That is written on the actual master of the album."
Some years before, in 1965, Jamaican reggae legend Bob Marley (see photo above) had recorded a song entitled "One Love," whose original lyrics included the lines, "One love, one heart / Let's join together and I'll feel all right." (Later versions interpolate the song with "People Get Ready," by Curtis Mayfield of the Impressions, whose music played a significant role in the American civil rights movement.) Back then, the conception of one world uniting disparate groups was considered a hippie-socialist fantasy by many people, just as Lennon's song "Imagine" was criticized by some for being utopian. Now it and Marley's song are widely used as anthems for world unity.
This underlines the point I have made in previous blogs that popular music, including rock 'n' roll, hip-hop, jazz, and other idioms, are genuinely sacred music, not to be distinguished from religious or native chants, classical compositions, or so-called new age music. It has a history of bringing people together and expressin a universal desire for peace and unity.
That aspiration for unity is often tested by antagonistic and sometimes violent relations between different religious sects, including but not limited to Christians and Muslims. The chant of "One Hand" may signal a new stage in those relations, and one in which young people are playing a prominent role. Although the Coptic Pope Shenouda III has continued to defend the Mubarak regime, a group of Christian and Muslim intellectuals issued a joint statement affirming that "the revolution of Egyptian youth had instilled a new spirit in Egyptian souls, in which was apparent an excellent example of national unity... when believers guarded each others' prayers after the police disappeared." They said that this decision to stand guard came from the youth themselves, not from any religious leadership.
The young Egyptian computer engineer and Internet activist whose Internet postings helped spark the revolution against (now former) President Mubarak, Wael Ghonim, gave a remarkable TV interview after being relased from 11 days of secret arrest. It's a long, passionate interview, elicited by Mona El-Shazly, a popular Egyptian talk show host, on her show "Al Ashira Masa'an" for Dream TV , an independent Egyptian satellite channel. The emotional tone of the interview was in part a result of Wael having only just been released after having been blindfolded throughout his captivity. But this line jumped out at me midway through:
"The slogan that I myself loved. This country is OUR country, our country, not your country. This is our country. This country is all of ours."
Woody Guthrie couldn't have said it any better (although "This Land Is Our Land" had a melody to carry it along).