Understanding Christian faith and freedom in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA): Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates and Yemen.
Christianity was born in the Middle East: in Bethlehem (where Jesus was born), in Nazareth (Jesus’ hometown, where he grew up), throughout the towns and villages of Judea and Samaria (where Jesus ministered for three years), and in the Jewish capital, Jerusalem, where Jesus was executed by Roman crucifixion and buried in a borrowed tomb, before God vindicated him as the sinless Saviour by raising him from the dead.
Jerusalem. Image: Unsplash.
It was in Jerusalem that followers of Jesus first testified about him (Acts 2) and from where the Gospel (or Good News) spread to “all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8). It was amongst the Greeks in Antioch, Syria, that the followers of Jesus were first called Christians (Acts 11:19-26). https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=acts+11%3A19-26&version=ESV
Tradition has it, that in the early decades of the 7th Century there arose in the Arabian Peninsula a religious reformer and self-proclaimed prophet named Muhammad. Inspired by the monotheism of Jews and Christians, Muhammad exhorted the pagan Arabs to reform their polytheistic idolatrous ways and turn to monotheism.
While the Jews and Christians rejected Muhammad as a false prophet, the pagan Arabs rejected Muhammad because of the serious threat he posed to their way of life. Arab idolatry was about more than mere belief; entire commercial industries revolved around it. It was the pre-Islamic, Arab tradition of undertaking an annual pilgrimage to the Kaaba, which housed 360 idols, that kept Mecca economically unviable. [Note: The Apostle Paul hit the same obstacle in Ephesus. There, a silversmith named Demetrius incited craftsmen to riot, warning that if Christianity was to spread, then they – those who make and sell idols – would be out of businesses (Acts 19:23-41).]
Mecca. Image: Unsplash.
Rejected and persecuted, Muhammad fled Mecca with a small band of disciples (Muslims). It was in Medina that Muhammad was established as prophet, ruler, judge and warlord. By Islamising pagan Arab traditions (including Ramadan, the kaaba and the pilgrimage to Mecca) and giving the people two choices – Islam (submission) or death – Muhammad united the Arab tribes of the Arabian Peninsula under the banner of Islam.
After Muhammad’s death in 632 C.E. a series of Arab Caliphs (rulers) led an era of Arab imperial expansion: north through the Levant, east through Mesopotamia and into Persia, and west through Egypt, across North Africa and into Spain. [The Arab Muslim advance into western Europe was halted in October 732 by Charles Martel in the Battle of Tours.]
As with the Arabs of the Arabian Peninsula, the indigenous non-Arab peoples were given a choice. While pagans, polytheists and idolators could choose between Islam and death, monotheistic Jews and Christians – also known as the “People of the Book” – were offered a third choice. They could keep their faith so long as they submitted to Muslim rule as mandated by the Quran, in Sura 9:29. https://corpus.quran.com/translation.jsp?chapter=9&verse=29
The dhimma pact set out the terms upon which the dhimma (subjugated peoples) would be “protected” (i.e. permitted to live). To secure their right to life, dhimmis had to agree to pay the jizya (tribute/protection money) and remain disarmed and subdued, without legal rights. Should any dhimmi (individual) rebel, or the dhimma (community) resist, then “protection” (right to life) was withdrawn, and jihad (Islamic holy war) would resume.
Recommended:
The Decline of Eastern Christianity Under Islam, by Bat Ye’or, 1996
Islam and Dhimmitude, by Bat Ye’or, 2001
The Third Choice, by Mark Durie, 2010
After the conquest, the Arabs installed proxy rulers to collect taxes and jizya, and to enforce Islamic Sharia Law. Arab colonisation proceeded apace until eventually Arab Muslims became the majority.
In the 11 Century, Seljuk Turks – converts to Islam from the steeps of Central Asia – advanced west through the Caucasus and into Anatolia. There they exploited a local Byzantine (Greek) civil war to seize control of much of modern-day Turkey.
With the Holy Land in Muslim hands and Ottoman armies advancing ever deeper into Byzantium, the Pope in Rome responded to calls from Constantinople (the Byzantine capital) for military aid to save Christendom. The Crusades were simply a failed counter-offence against imperialistic Islam.
Refugee Camp. Syria/Lebanon Border. Image: Unsplash.
Recommended:
The Concise History of the Crusades, by Thomas F. Madden PhD, 1999
“The Crusades Then and Now,” a lecture by Thomas F. Madden PhD, Dec 2011, Augustine Institute. https://vimeo.com/33043624
The goals of Islam are first and foremost political: establish Muslim rule and enact Allah’s law (Islamic Sharia Law). Consequently, apostasy (leaving Islam) is treated as an act of treason against the Islamic community/Ummah or State.
Religious liberty is anathema to Islam which Muslims insist is “the religion of unspoiled nature” [Article 10, Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam (OIC, 5 Aug 1990)]. https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b3822c.html
In Islam, religious identity is inherited from the father at birth. Because apostasy is a capital offence, most Muslim converts to Christianity will flee to seek refuge in a country that respects religious freedom. Converts who cannot flee, or who choose to remain in their homeland, are compelled to live as secret Christians. Driven by desperation, some will take the risky path of changing their name and securing false identity papers which enable them to live as Christians. Female converts might do this so they can marry a Christian man (forbidden to Muslim women). Male converts might do this so their children can be Christian. It is an illegal act born of sheer desperation. If discovered, the consequences can be catastrophic. Consequently, converts with means tend to flee.
Apart from expatriate workers, most Christians in the Middle East are indigenous peoples, the remnants of once-great nations: e.g. Copts, Armenians, and Assyrians (also known as Syriacs, Chaldeans and Maronites; terms that reflect religious denomination more than ethnicity). For 1400 years these Christians – the remnants of once-great nations – have mostly lived as subjugated, impoverished, persecuted dhimmis – their security and liberty perpetually tenuous.
The mid 20thC provided some respite as secular Arab and Turkish nationalism rose in the wake of Muslim defeats in World War One (in which the Ottomans sided with the German Empire) and World War Two (in which the Arabs sided with the Nazis).
However, the days of respite are over! Traditional, fundamentalist, Quranic Islam is back – meaning jihad is back, Sharia is back, dhimmitude is back . . .
Recommended:
After Saturday Comes Sunday: Understanding the Christian Crisis in the Middle East, by Elizabeth Kendal, 2016 http://www.elizabethkendal.com/books/after-saturday-comes-sunday/
However, traditional Quranic Islam is proving to be incredibly divisive! While many Muslims are being drawn into intolerant and supremacist, fundamentalist Islam, just as many are being driven away from Islam all together. Profoundly disillusioned by what Islam is producing, they are rejecting its violence, rejecting its politics, and rejecting its “prophet”.
Recommended:
Leaving Islam: Apostates Speak Out, edited by Ibn Warraq, 2003.
As Christian missionary and researcher David Garrison PhD has pointed out, “We are in the midst of the greatest turning of Muslims to Christ in 14 centuries of Muslim-Christian interaction. More than 80 percent of all the Muslim movements to Christ in history have occurred in the past two to three decades.”
Note: Garrison defines a “movement” as a turning to Christ that results in at least 1000 baptism, or the establishment of at least 100 worshipping communities over a two-decade period. He notes that the first 1200 years of Muslim-Christian interaction, there were none! However, in the late 19thC there were two: one in Indonesia and one in Ethiopia. Then, during the 20thC there were eleven, one in Albania, Algeria, Bulgaria and West Africa; two in Iran, two in Bangladesh, and three in Central Asia… making a grand total of 13 movements in 1,368 years.
Garrison writes: “It is this long history of frustration, a history that has seen tens of millions of Christians absorbed into the Muslim world that makes the current events all the more striking.”
For, in the first 12 years of 21stC Garrison recorded a further 69 movement of Muslims to Christ. What’s more, these movements are not concentrated in some remote corner, “but taking place throughout the House of Islam: in sub-Saharan Africa, in the Persian world, in the Arab world, in Turkistan, in South Asia and in Southeast Asia.”
“Something is happening,” writes Garrison, “something unprecedented. A Wind is blowing through the House of Islam!”
Quote from: A Wind in the House of Islam, by David Garrison, 2012 (p18).
Recommended news sources reporting Christian persecution in the MENA (general):
Middle East Concern, https://www.meconcern.org/
Morning Star News, https://morningstarnews.org
Christian Solidarity Worldwide https://www.csw.org.uk
Religious Liberty Prayer Bulletin http://rlprayerbulletin.blogspot.com/