Our Holy Family Pilgrimage to Upper Egypt with visits to Gabel el-Teir, Deir Abu Hinnis, Mallawi and al-Ashmonein, January 30th and 31st 2004,

February 3^rd., 2004

And when they were departed, behold, the angel of the Lord appeareth to Joseph in a dream, saying, Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and flee into Egypt, and be thou there until I bring thee word: for Herod will seek the young child to destroy him. And he arose and took the young child and his mother by night, and departed into Egypt; and was there until the death of Herod: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying, Out of Egypt did I call my son.

But when Herod was dead, behold, an angel of the Lord appeareth in a dream to Joseph in Egypt, Saying, Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and go into the land of Israel: for they are dead which sought the young child’s life. And he arose, and took the young child and his mother, and came into the land of Israel.

These well-known verses from Matthew 2 are all that is known to a typical Western Christian, like myself, of the flight to Egypt by the Holy Family; but not so to a Christian born and raised in Egypt. A Westerner can only speculate where they traveled, their route and final destination, but a Copt knows with a faith, almost a certainty, that goes much beyond what has been revealed in Holy Scripture. Recently we made a pilgrimage to some of the Holy Family sites in Upper Egypt, to places with such strange sounding names as Gabel el-Teir, Deir Abu Hinnis, Mallawi and al-Ashmonein. In these places we discovered Christian traditions vastly different from our own; a church that is today alive, active and well, as well as evidence of churches, once vibrant in the past centuries, but, sadly, not so today.

Since the church was first established in Egypt, very soon after the life of the Lord, every Christian here joyfully celebrates the coming of the Holy Family to Egypt. It was good just to be there with them to join in their celebration. The pilgrimage was led by Dr. Cornelis Hulsman, a Dutch sociologist and journalist, who is a world renowned authority on the flight of the Holy Family. ^[1] Before starting out from the interdenominational Maadi Community Church one of our fellow pilgrims, the Rev’d Randy Collins spoke briefly from Hebrews 11:6: “But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.” In other words what we derive from the pilgrimage would be proportional to our own faith and the diligence with which we seek the Lord.

Dr. Hulsman explained on the bus traveling south that the sites which the Holy Family were supposed to have visited were revealed in a dream or a vision of several important church leaders, that had since been recorded in manuscripts or documents, some in Medieval times, others more recently. This is not unknown in the Bible, as in the Old Testament Joseph and Daniel both had dreams themselves and were skilled in interpreting them. In the New Testament Joseph, the step-father of the Lord was directed by dreams and Mary had a vision of an angel. Peter preaching on the day of Pentecost quoted Joel 2:28: “And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith the Lord, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams.” (Act 2:17) Paul had a vision of a man from Macedonia begging him to come over to help them, which led to the faith being brought to Europe, and later to North America. John on the Isle of Patmos had certainly seen a vision of the Lord in all his glory. So what of later church leaders having dreams and visions telling them the itinerary of the Holy Family in Egypt? Dr. Hulsman said that in the Orthodox Church, as with some Pentecostals, if a dream or vision is not inconsistent with Holy Scripture and also builds up the faith of the believer, historical detail is not so important; whether an event did, or did not, happen. What is important is that the faithful believe that it did. As an Anglican observer I would have to admit that our own church is no less tradition bound. There are some who claim that they have no tradition but Scripture, but they do not realize that their very iconoclasm has itself become a tradition. However, since we are a part of the Western church, influenced by the so-called Enlightenment, there is another factor in the equation; Reason. We have tried to balance the three, Scripture, Tradition and Reason; not too successfully, as seen by the number of schisms in the Western church, and differing parties within Anglicanism. The Copts have no such impediment. If both Scripture and tradition say that it is true, it is true. Khelas!

To the Copt the story of the flight into Egypt does not begin with Matthew 2, but rather with Isaiah 19. This chapter begins:

The burden of Egypt. Behold, the LORD rideth upon a swift cloud, and shall come into Egypt: and the idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence, and the heart of Egypt shall melt in the midst of it.

This is the prophesy of the Lord visiting Egypt, born on a swift cloud, His holy mother, and the idols of Egypt, of the Pharaonic religion, falling in his presence.

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There are numerous traditions of the child Jesus entering an Egyptian temple and the gods falling on their faces, as did Dagon in the presence of the Arc of the Covenant, in the first book of Samuel, chapter 5. ‘The heart of Egypt shall melt’ meaning that there will be nothing remaining of the old religion in the light of the Gospel. Chapter 19 continues with a series of curses upon the old religion, but in verse 19 the mood changes.

In that day shall there be an altar to the LORD in the midst of the land of Egypt, and a pillar at the border thereof to the LORD.

The ‘altar of the Lord’ refers to the establishment of the church in Egypt, but the Orthodox Copts (as opposed to other Copts, Coptic Evangelicals or Coptic Catholics, reflecting the influence of western churches upon the Coptic Church) have also taken it to mean the altar in the monastery Muharraq, close to Assiut, geographically in the centre of Egypt. The chapter continues further in verses 24 and 25:

In that day shall Israel be the third with Egypt and with Assyria, even a blessing in the midst of the land: Whom the LORD of hosts shall bless, saying, Blessed be Egypt my people, and Assyria the work of my hands, and Israel mine inheritance.

‘Blessed be Egypt my people’ is the one promise that every Copt holds very dearly and cherishes it in his or her heart, as no other nation has been blessed by God in this way. The prophesy ‘Out of Egypt did I call my son’ is from the prophet Hosea (11:1). No doubt Hosea was referring to the nation of Israel, but Matthew takes this verse to refer to the Lord’s returning to Palestine from Egypt. These two verses ‘Blessed be Egypt my people’ and ‘Out of Egypt did I call my son’ are inscribed in stone in many Egyptian churches, not least All Saints’ Episcopal (Anglican) Cathedral in Cairo.

The first stop on the pilgrimage was at Gebel el-Teir, a village on the eastern bank of the Nile, about a four hour drive south of Cairo. This village is situated on the edge of a cliff overlooking a magnificent view of the Nile valley. The beautiful vibrant greens were a sharp contrast to ‘the dry and thirsty land, where no water is’[2] that we had just passed through. The village church, dedicated to the Virgin Mary, was a monastic foundation until the end of the 19th century. In the 5th or 6th century it was hewn from the chalky rock, which is still being quarried in the area, and is the principal industry, other than farming, of the village. There is a legend that as the Lord was passing by, the cliff prostrated itself before him, and he raised it up, leaving an imprint of his hand on the rock; hence another name for the village, Jabal al-Kaff, Mountain of the Palm. There is no such image of the Lord’s palm today, as the story goes that the Crusaders took the rock with the engraven palm on it back to Jerusalem in 1168. Another story we were told is that the British took it and placed it in the British Museum. These stories are immaterial, but there is today still a strong belief among the people here that the Lord did pass their village, and their faith in Him is all the stronger for it. In the church I felt I was standing in a holy place, sanctified by all the prayer that has been directed to God over the centuries. As in any other place of active worship in Egypt, Muslim or Christian, we were obliged to remove our shoes before entering the church, as Moses was before the burning bush, as a sign that he, and we, were standing on holy ground.

We descended the steps illustrated on the jacket cover of Be Thou There; The Holy Family’s Journey in Egypt, and boarded the bus at the bottom. We enjoyed a sandwich lunch with other snacks and drinks en route. Two kilometers further south we saw about a four foot length of a dead trunk of a tree lying on its side on the edge of the road. This was supposed to have been one of several worshiping trees that bowed their branches to the Lord. However, the church tradition here was less than twenty years old. The tree was no doubt considerably older, (it did not look to be 2000 years old) but did not attract anyone’s attention till about twenty years ago. During its time as a holy tree it received much veneration from pilgrims to it, both Christian and Muslim, and the local farmers benefited from the tips left behind. Then just three years ago it was cut down. Copts and Western media were quick to charge that Muslims wished to erase the Coptic identity from the area. However, Dr. Hulsman went there to determine for himself what had happened, and from interviewing all the parties, the priest of the village, government officials and the local farmers, he discovered that a squatter- he used the land but was not the owner - on the small plot of land the tree was growing, had heard that the government might put a fence around it, as one might around a heritage site, and he was afraid that he might lose what little land he had, as there would be no compensation. This illustrates how easily disputes can arise between the two groups of the local population over relatively minor matters.

From there we continued south, crossed the Nile to the west bank at Miniea, (population 2,000,000 with an important university) journeyed further south along the river, then crossed again by ferry to Deir Abu Hinnis. This village is exclusively Christian, and the inhabitants are determined to keep it that way. I did not feel that it was too much different from any other village we had seen, except for the presence of pigs foraging by the roadside and the crosses on every house. Perhaps the animals, donkeys everywhere, goats, sheep, a few dogs, one well fed cat in an upper storey window, many chickens and some geese, also looked more content, as none were tethered and perhaps they would be better cared for. However, the German photographer sitting next to me in the bus kept on remarking that the village was so much cleaner than any village he had seen in Egypt. One of the priests accompanying us the next day, who had taught English before his ordination, told us that they had learned that there would be some foreigners for the festival, and so everyone had deliberately made an effort to clean his own area. I had to admit, that the village certainly looked environmentally friendly, with a Garden of Eden quality, but I was more impressed by the silence than the cleanliness; there was no sound of traffic or people shouting in the street. I remarked to Dr. Hulsman that I regretted having to return to Cairo, and he replied that he had heard that sentiment expressed before.

We drove through the village to the mountain behind, which we climbed on foot, accompanied by a priest and young men from the village. From the foot it was void of any vegetation. The object was to get to the top and back before sunset to see some caves that hermits had lived in from the 4th century and a cave church where they had gathered for worship every Sunday. The younger members of the party reached the summit by the most direct path, but those of us who were older took a gentler climb, a good half hour’s walk to the top. The caves were just below the summit. We saw several of them, and it was hard to imagine anyone’s living there year round, year after year, in the blistering heat by day and through the chill of the cool desert night. The underground church was spectacular as it contained the earliest paintings ever known, from the 6th century, telling the story of the wise men visiting Herod, of their presenting their gifts to the infant Jesus, of the killing of the Holy Innocents and of the flight into Egypt. However, we could not go into the church as the gate was padlocked. The priest assured us that someone would come with a key, but the sun was slowly setting, and we would not have seen anything if we had been able to get in. However, we could see some of them through the gate in the dim light there was. Dr. Hulsman said that these paintings were in a poor state, and he had begged church and government officials to do more to preserve them, so it was kept locked; but people in previous years had climbed through a window. However, we discovered that the Antiquities authorities had closed that window without providing a key to unlock the door for visitors. Nevertheless, the climb itself was well worth the visit, as it helped me to imagine what the desert fathers had to endure.

We reached the bus with the last of the light and drove to one of the three village churches, the oldest, dating from the 5th century. It also began as a monastic church, dedicated to St. John Colobos, the dwarf, an early 5th century desert father who visited the area and later suffered martyrdom, though his true identity is disputed. Many alterations have been made since the church was originally built, including a double sanctuary, behind the iconostasis. In the second one, to the left of the “high altar” there was an ancient offering-table, placed on the altar, but was once used, as the inscription on it indicated, as a funerary stella. I stepped inside the sanctuary to look at it, and my wife and her sister followed me. Immediately, the shocked guide, a young English teacher in the village, asked them to leave. He apologetically explained that it was against their tradition for a woman to enter the sanctuary. Someone brought a bench for them to stand on to look in, but it was so wobbly that they declined. Dr. Hulsman arrived on the scene and explained that an illustration of the stella was in Be Thou There. (Page 98)

We went from the church to a convent in the village for supper, fasting food, lentil soup, rice and peas, pita bread, foul and tameya, since it was Friday, but it was by far more than sufficient. The muqaressat [3] served us with cheerful smiles. From there we left Deir Abu Hinnis, crossed the Nile by ferry to the west bank by dark, with a wonderful view of the stars, and drove the short distance to Mallawi, where we were the guests of Bishop Dimetrius. The guest house was spartan but clean. We slept well, but had to set the alarm for five in the morning, as breakfast was at six. We were served a simple but more than adequate breakfast, pita bread, cheese, both hard and soft, hard boiled eggs, coffee and tea. We were, after all, pilgrims and could not expect five star accommodations. We had probably had a much more substantial breakfast than most of the people we were to see on the festival.

Following breakfast we drove back to the Nile bank where thousands had already gathered, and were continually arriving either on foot or, like ourselves, by bus. Nearly all the men and boys wore galabeahs, and the ladies colourful dresses for the holiday. It was the same weekend as the start of the Muslim Eid, a four day public holiday, so everybody was in a joyful spirit. Twice a year at the end of January and in June the bishop crosses the Nile in a specially decorated felucca in commemoration of the Holy Family’s crossing, and then he leads a procession on foot into and through the village to a tent erected for the special celebration. He is accompanied by thousands of the faithful. Before the bishop arrived, ferries were coming and leaving with decks crowded with people, buses and trucks. Two feluccas were on the shore, both with icons of the Holy Family crossing the Nile painted on the sail. One was for the bishop and his party, a bishop Boutros, responsible for the convent of Patmos near Cairo, priests and some laymen, and the other for nuns and tassounis [4] Their leader happens to be Bishop Dimetrius’ sister, Tassouni Angela, who always comes from Alexandria for these occasions. She dresses in white and is well known throughout the Coptic Church for the counseling that she gives to women and young girls. Dr. Hulsman has nick named Bishop Dimetrius as the ‘Holy Family bishop,’ as he is so knowledgeable about the Holy Family. From what he was telling us about him and his sister we realized that we knew them already through their sister living in Ottawa, with whom we have been friends for over 30 years. Meeting them in person, as we did later, was just the icing on the cake.

While we were waiting for the bishop to arrive, I watched several farmers lead their water buffalo into the Nile to bathe, and I enjoyed observing their contentedly wallowing in the water. No sooner had they come out of the water, they went up to the bank to munch on the grass at the top, just as they had done in Pharaoh’s dream. These were the fattened cattle, not the skinny ones. I thought it such a privilege to see the Bible open before my eyes.

Around 10 am Bishop Dimetrius and his party arrived by car. He donned an elaborately decorated red cope, and bishop Boutros a white one, and they both boarded their felucca, followed by their party, and the ladies boarded the other one. He was holding an icon of the Holy Family surrounded by the Holy Innocents. We went across in a motorized boat, with the policemen who were there for our protection, and stayed as close to the bishop’s boat as was safe - at one point we gave them a tow - so that the photographers in our party could get their shots. However, by the time we reached the shore the bishop had already landed and was marching briskly up the bank followed by the crowd.

The march through the village to a tent on the edge of the desert was accompanied by the singing an account of the Holy Family’s visit, recounting each place by name and the miracle or event that occurred there. This was broadcast by a public address system mounted on a truck that followed us. If there was one negative point about the whole pilgrimage it was this; the noise. I wished that we had remembered Habakkuk 2:20; “...the Lord is in his holy temple: let all the earth keep silence before him.” We were expected to keep up, walking just behind the bishop, but I found the P.A. system so distracting and painful to my ears, that I would allow it to get ahead of me, only to be beckoned by the group to catch up. It reminded me too much of the Marches for Jesus that I had been on, only this one was for Jesus, Mary and Joseph. As with them, I felt the walk in silence would have been more appropriate, and conducive to prayer, which was impossible.

In the tent we were given special seats as guests of the bishop. We listened again to the account of the travels of the Holy Family, and then to speeches by the dignitaries, which included leaders of the Muslim community nearby, and the governorate and local parliament, congratulating the village on the Holy Family’s visit and wishing everybody a peaceful and happy holiday. Then Dr. Hulsman presented a new poster for the Holy Family pilgrimages to the bishop and introduced us. Cokes were passed around during this time, and at an interval, actually before the bishop began to speak, we left to return to the convent for lunch; as requested, we had to leave the tent before the bishop and his company would do so, because the muqaressat would otherwise not be able to handle the lunches for everybody.

Lunch more than made up for the lack of meat the previous evening. There was kofta, different types of sausage, and half a chicken breast, served with a variety of vegetables and rice, followed by fresh bananas and oranges - a feast. The bishop and his sister arrived while we were eating with a larger party, who ate after us. We were introduced to him, and I duly kissed the cross he held out, then the back of his hand. We told both him and his sister that we knew their sister back in Ottawa. He spoke excellent English and asked us to take his greetings to her.

Dr. Hulsman wished that we end our visit to Deir Abu Hinnis with a word of prayer, and he asked the bishop for permission to use the nuns’ prayer room, as normally men were not allowed in there. This was given, and those that wished went in, removing their shoes at the door. Prayer was brief, offered by the pastor of the German church in Cairo, and his American born wife sang and led us in a Taisé hymn in a minor key, that was most appropriate for the occasion. I found that brief time of worship in the stillness of the convent chapel the most awe inspiring event of the whole day.

We returned by bus to the Nile bank, where we had to await our turn for the ferry. During this time we had occasion to mix with the crowd. The young people naturally wanted to know where we were from, and on hearing that we were from Canada they expressed the desire to emigrate. Some had already applied to go to the United States, but had been refused. An older man approached us and listened to the conversations. Ellen, my wife, asked him for his thoughts, and he just said, “el hamdulellah” - “Thanks be to God!” I was saddened that anyone would wish to leave such an idyllic place as Deir Abu-Hinnis.

The final stop on the pilgrimage was at al-Ashmonein. Here we saw the remains of an ancient basilica, built in the early 5th century over a Ptolemaic temple, which in turn had been built over an ancient Egyptian temple. It was built adjacent to the agora, or market, and not too far away is a pair of Pharaonic baboons, one of which has lost its head. The Greeks had a garrison there named Hermopolis Magna. This was one of the sites in which the Egyptian and Greek deities fell before the Lord, and it was known to be an episcopal see from the early third century. The town had been an important port on the Nile, but the course of the river had shifted, leaving it high and dry. All that remain of a once thriving Christian community are the ruins. From the size of the granite columns, that have been re-erected, one can only imagine that it once had been a very impressive and magnificent building, visible from miles around.

Modern al-Ashmonein is a primarily Muslim village a short distance from the ruins. There is a small church there, both in the number of believers and the size of the building. Sadly, the church building there today is being disputed in court between the Coptic Orthodox Church and the Brethren; not a great example of Christian love to the unbelievers all around them. Dr. Hulsman has investigated the claims of both sides and written on them both extensively and objectively. [5] He concludes, “Regardless of who is right or wrong, it is sad to see two Christian churches fighting each other over a church building. The relations of Orthodox Christians and Muslims and Brethren and Muslims are obviously better than those between the two Christian denominations in al-Ashmonein.” This was a somber end to the pilgrimage and a warning to us that our Christian heritage may be lost for ever if we do not strive to preserve it, even though the decline of this particular church may have had something to do with the course of the river.

The return to Cairo by the western desert road in the dark was uneventful with one pit stop on the way. Returning to the roar of Cairo traffic just before ten in the evening at the end of a very long day brought us back into the real world with a jolt. But for two short days we had had a foretaste of heaven in the presence of the Holy Family, with two mountain top experiences at Gebel- el-Teir and especially in Deir Abu Hinnis, which will be long remembered. [6]

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[1] He has contributed to the text of a beautifully illustrated coffee table book, Be Thou There; The Holy Family’s Journey in Egypt, American University in Cairo Press, 2001. For further information and to view photographs of Holy Family sites see his website at www.holyfamilytravel.com, or sign up a free electronic newsletter at info@holyfamilyegypt.com.

He lives in Maadi, Egypt, and is both a sociologist and journalist by profession. He has established the Arab-West Report, whose mission is to “provide impartial, objective, independent reporting, interpretation, analysis and commentary of and on cultural, social and religious issues concerning the Arab world with the objective of fostering greater understanding and tolerance between Arab and Western cultures in the belief that only this will result in reduction of tensions which is needed to enhance the development of this region.”

[2] Psalm 63:1

[3] These are not actually nuns though both nuns and muqaressat are celibate women; but nuns are dedicated to a life of prayer and muqaressat are dedicated to service, often for social projects.

[4] These are women who have taken special vows and are consecrated in the Coptic Church, but do not live in a convent.

[5] From RNSAW, week 52A, art. 20 Special for the RNSAW, December 31, 2002 Title: Churches of al-Ashmonein; a conflict between the Coptic Orthodox and Brethren Churches Author: Cornelis Hulsman This was included in a handout of notes on each of the places we would visit, at the start of the pilgrimage.

[6] I am grateful to Dr. Hulsman for his reviewing the draft of this paper and for his correcting the errors and omissions.