An authoritative account of the Coptic Papacy in Egypt from the coming of Islam to the onset of the Ottoman era, by a leading religious studies scholar, new in paperback

In Volume 1 of this series, Stephen Davis contended that the themes of “apostolicity, martyrdom, monastic patronage, and theological resistance” were determinative for the cultural construction of Egyptian church leadership in late antiquity. This second volume shows that the medieval Coptic popes (641–1517 CE) were regularly portrayed as standing in continuity with their saintly predecessors; however, at the same time, they were active in creating something new, the Coptic Orthodox Church, a community that struggled to preserve a distinctive life and witness within the new Islamic world order. Building on recent advances in the study of sources for Coptic church history, the present volume aims to show how portrayals of the medieval popes provide a window into the religious and social life of their community.

Editors’ Introduction
Author’s Preface
Technical Notes
Acknowledgments
Abbreviations

1. Continuity and Reinvention
Succession and Innovation
Earning the “Crown of Exile”
The Church in a “New World Order”
Relationships with Rulers
A Sacred Geography

2. Patient Sufferers
Coming to the End-Time?
Bearing Trials Patiently
The Account of John the Deacon
Patriarchs and Martyrdom
Patriarchs and Sainthood

3. Crisis of Cohesion
Satan Hinders, but God Prevails
Patriarchs and Political Authority in ‘Abbasid Egypt
Trials from Without
Trials from Within
A Crisis of Cohesion?
Hanging On
Embattled Saints

4. Saints and Sinners
Bishop Michael’s Account: Warts and All
Before the Fatimids
Simony: “The Word of God Became as a Merchandise”
Contrapuntal Saintliness
Unexpected Saintliness
Saints and Sinners

5. Transitions
Language Shift, Lay Concerns, and Ecclesiastical History
Gabriel II ibn Turayk: An Attempt at Reform
After the Reform Attempt

6. Chaos and Glory
A Strange Period
Chroniclers
The Person at the Center of the Story
1216–1217: Attempts at Making a Pope
The Monk Da’ud Becomes Pope Cyril, Successor of Saint Mark Cyril’s Patriarchate
A Failed “Great Man”? Or a Scholar among Scholars?

7. Marginalized Patriarchs
Internal Rivalry, External Interference
Scattered Portrayals, Incidental Mentions
The Patriarch at the Center of the Story

8. A Burst of Holiness
The Patriarch as Saint and Holy Man
An Orchestra of Holiness? The Principals
A Quartet and a Chorus?

9. Humility in Action
After the Fireworks
“Listless” and “Lacking in Blessing”?
Diplomacy and Faithfulness
Quiet Leadership in Difficult Times

Epilogue: Survival

Appendix: The Forty-Nine Martyrs during the Patriarchate
of Matthew I (#87, 1378 –1408)

Works Cited: Primary Sources
Works Cited: Secondary Sources
Notes
Index