Authors: Youssef Ziedan
When Yoannes had finished reading the letter of recommendation which had been in my bag, he lifted his face and asked me quietly and concisely after the health and circumstances of his friend
who recommended me. I reassured him and did not tell him I knew that they both rejected the ideas and the violent acts of the previous bishop, Theophilus, and that they had written each other
letters about that, although in their youth they were his disciples and believed he was fighting against the paganism which had long struggled against Christianity. When they found him prolonging
his war indefinitely, they shunned and avoided him. I also did not tell him that his friend had sent me to Alexandria after the bishop’s death in the hope that the situation would calm down.
I did not hint at any of this, even remotely. I just mentioned some of the stories he had told about them when they were monks at St Antony’s monastery and when they were neighbours to St
Shenouda the Archimandrite, the head of the solitaries in Akhmim. His face showed signs of relief and when I finished he invited me to rest from my long journey, and he called on his servant to
show me the way.
The servant first took me to the vast refectory and ate some hot food with me. Then he took me to a guest wing with many very small rooms, and told me that in a few days I would move from these
temporary quarters to a monk’s room. Two days passed as I swam in the seas of the church, which have no shores. The church had dozens of priests and monks, and hundreds of visitors and people
came all day long to pray, seek blessings or confess. The church never slept; it was a beehive always glorifying the kingdom of God. Even in the depths of night, when they lit the prodigious and
extraordinary lantern which hung in the church, it seemed to me that this place was the world where I truly belonged, and I told myself often in those days that I was not part of this ephemeral
world. The Lord had chosen me for some mysterious purpose known to him, so let the Lord’s will be done.
I ended up staying in a small room inside the church, surrounded by other rooms occupied by many like me, servants of the Lord. Most of them were monks from the Western Pentapolis and Upper
Egypt, and some were priests who had come on short missions from faraway places, such as Abyssinia, where they speak that strange language. In the early days no one paid me any attention, except a
visiting monk originally from a small village near the Muharraq Monastery, which I had passed by on my way to Alexandria. The remote monastery was built years ago by the late Bishop Theophilus in
the Qusqam Mountain overlooking Lycopolis (Assiut). The monk was staying in the next room, waiting to leave with the Abyssinians, to live in their land and never come back. I no longer remember his
name, perhaps Bishoy, but I am not certain now. ‘Bishoy’ in the Egyptian language means ‘elevated’ but this monk was short. I was drawn by his dignity, goodness and the fact
that he was a stranger. At the time he was about thirty years old and spoke the Sa’idi dialect of Egyptian like me. We used to chat between the prayers and the masses, and on our way to the
refectory. After a few days we became brothers in the fold of the Lord. When I told him on Saturday that I planned to go out the next day to go to Hypatia’s lecture, he shouted at me,:
‘That’s quite wrong.’ He told me in alarm that if this act was committed, it could never be forgiven, and he advised me never to mention her name again. ‘It would be a
mortal sin. Would you miss the Sunday sermon by Pope Cyril, the great bishop, to go and see a harpy! That sin would never be pardoned if you committed it. As for me, you have nothing to fear.
I’ll consider it a bad joke, and will never mention it to anyone.’
I had a sleepless night, torn by every conflicting thought. Should I forget that I had seen Hypatia and devote myself to my purpose in coming, then go back to my native country safe and sound?
Or should I leave the church forever? Should I go out tomorrow morning and never come back? At least I am not a prisoner between these walls. What’s the point in staying? Jesus the Messiah
began his great mission among the people, not between walls amidst monks and priests. There was real life around him, yet why should we die before death comes? But I am safe in the church, after I
was homeless, and the men of the faith are my real family, since I have no earthly family except my uncle who is weakened by the Aa disease and who I doubt will still be alive when I return. Who
would I go back to if I returned to my home country? And which is my home country? Is it the village of my uncle who’s waiting to die? Is it my father’s village, where no one will know
me? Or the village where my mother settled? My mother who slept every night in the arms of a man with sin on his hands. I hate him and I hate her, and the hatred will kill me. But I should love my
enemies and do good to those who have done me ill, to be truly Christian, and truly loving. I have seen real love only in a pagan woman, who met me by chance on the beach and took me into her
paradise for three nights together and four unforgettable days. If I went back to Octavia, would she accept me or would she again call me vile and despicable? That was the first time anyone had
insulted me and I will try to make sure it’s the last. No one will dare insult me as long as I am a monk in the great church, and perhaps I will rise in the clerical hierarchy until I become
bishop of one of the big cities. But what do I want with a bishopric? Will it compensate me for my dream of excelling in medicine, and my hope of curing Aa? Will I follow my earthly ambitions,
after promising my ailing uncle that I was giving my life to Jesus the Saviour? That would not be right of me, and that way I would lose my reason for living. What if tomorrow I offered to live in
Hypatia’s house to serve her and learn from her? She would agree and she would help me study medicine in the Museion or scientific academy and I would be a distinguished doctor within only
two years, because I had studied medicine extensively in Akhmim. Of all its many branches the only one I lacked was anatomy, and the doctors of the Museion had been dissecting for hundreds of years
and knew all the secrets of medicine. That’s what I told myself that night, though I had not yet discovered that the Museion had closed down years earlier.
That night my brain kept churning with conflicting ideas. My heart ached and my spirit was broken. I thought, ‘If I leave the church, and leave it when they know who I am, they will see me
as an apostate and they will persecute me as they persecuted those who renounced Christianity in the days of Emperor Julian.’ Christianity was now the official religion of the whole empire
and I would not survive denunciation by the fearsome group called the Lovers of the Passion. Because of them I would meet the same fate as my father, and they would rejoice as my mother rejoiced.
But I was burning with desire to see Hypatia the next day. I would discuss philosophical matters with her and I would rise in her estimation, though she in any case esteems everyone. She is true to
the meaning of her Greek name Hypatia: sublime. She was only ten or fifteen years older than me, and that’s not a big difference. Let her adopt me as a son or a younger brother, or maybe the
day will come when she will fall in love with me, and we would be like the couples Octavia spoke of when she said that women who love younger men make them the happiest of the happy. But there is
no happiness or joy in this world.
I awoke from my reverie to the sound of the bells for Bishop Cyril’s sermon, and I went out with all the others as they left their rooms. I was squeezed between hundreds of people going
into the church. The nave was full and there was no longer any way to leave or to move from the spot where I was stuck among the monks, priests, deacons, gospel readers, initiates great and small,
former wrestlers who had become believers, members of the Lovers of the Passion group, sons of penitents who had rejoined the church, bewildered followers of the Tall Brothers, and groups of monks
from the Wadi Natroun monasteries. I was surrounded on all sides by the army of the Lord. Their chant, which made the nave quake and the walls tremble, foretold that great news and momentous events
were nigh. When the chant reached its climax and their voices were close to cracking, Bishop Cyril appeared above us in his pulpit.
The bishop’s awesome aspect stunned and amazed me. It was the first time I had seen him, and after that for the next two years I would see him every Sunday morning without exception. I
also saw him the day of the private meeting, which I will relate if the occasion arises to speak of it. When I saw the bishop for the first time I was astonished, because he looked down on us from
a pulpit with walls covered in gilt. That was just one level, and above it there was an enormous wooden cross holding a statue of Jesus made of coloured plaster. From the forehead, hands and feet
of the crucified Christ flowed blood coloured bright red.
I looked at the ragged piece of cloth on the statue of Jesus, then at the bishop’s embroidered robe. Jesus’s clothes were old rags, torn at the chest and most of the limbs, while the
bishop’s clothes were embellished with gold thread all over, so that his face was hardly visible. Jesus’s hands were free of the baubles of our world, while the bishop held what I think
was a sceptre made of pure gold, judging from how brightly it shone. On his head Jesus had his crown of thorns, while the bishop had on his head the bright gold crown of a bishop. Jesus seemed
resigned as he assented to sacrifice himself on the cross of redemption. Cyril seemed intent on imposing his will on the heavens and the earth.
The bishop looked at his people and his flock, and gazed around at the crowd which had pressed into the nave of the church. He raised his golden sceptre and they fell silent. Then he spoke,
saying, ‘Sons of Christ, in the name of the living God I bless this day of yours, and all your days. I start my sermon with the truth which Paul the Apostle speaks in his second epistle to
Timothy when he says to him, and to every Christian in every time and every place: “Endure hardship with us like a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No one serving as a soldier gets involved in
civilian affairs – he wants to please his commanding officer. Similarly, if anyone competes as an athlete, he does not receive the victor’s crown unless he competes according to the
rules.”’
I thought for a moment that the bishop meant me by what he said and that this was one of his mysterious miracles. He raised his voice until it reverberated against the walls of the solemn
church. ‘Let me start with this. Let me remind you that we live in a time of sedition, thus we are in the midst of a holy war. The light of Christ has spread so that it today almost covers
the earth and dispels the darkness which lasted so long. But the forces of darkness are still nestling here and there, looking down on God’s earth in the guise of sedition and of heresies
which burrow into people’s hearts. We will not cease fighting them as long as we live. We have dedicated ourselves to our Lord Jesus Christ. Let us be the soldiers of the truth, content only
with the wreath of heavenly triumph. Let us be loyal to the religion of the Saviour, that we may join the martyrs and the saints who passed through the world to obtain heavenly glory and eternal
life.’
I noticed many eyes full of tears and many faces almost bursting with enthusiasm. All eyes were pinned on Bishop Cyril, who had full command of their emotions. His Greek phrases were powerful
and eloquent, as though he spoke with the tongue of the apostles and with the heart of the early fathers. My mind wandered and I gazed into the far distance. Then he caught my attention again,
saying, ‘As for those who call themselves the Tall Brothers, we will not review their case, which has been decided, and we will not engage in a new heretical dispute to examine the soundness
of the beliefs of their master Origen, after Pope Theophilus, the bishop of this great city, condemned him, thirteen years before he proceeded to the higher kingdom. I will not repeat to them the
resolutions of the Holy Synod of the church of Alexandria, which condemned Origen in the year 135 of the Martyrs, that is the year 399 of the incarnation of Christ. I will not repeat to you the
resolutions of the subsequent synods which affirmed the condemnation, deposition and excommunication of Origen, for there were many synods held in Jerusalem, Cyprus and Rome. I will not repeat to
you the resolutions passed by the eminent fathers at those synods, because they are well known and widely circulated. Those who are literate may read them, and those who do not read may go to the
church library and ask one of the fathers to read them to you. But I say today that I will not allow any review of the beliefs of a philosopher who died a century and a half ago, a philosopher who
worked on theology and went astray and committed heresy, a philosopher whose ordination as a priest was invalid. Let his followers, the Tall Brothers,
8
hold
their tongues and behave humbly, as Jesus Christ behaved humbly. They should cease touring the towns, tall and giddy with doubts, and cease stirring up trouble and heretical notions which threaten
the true faith, the true faith which we have devoted our lives to defend, as righteous soldiers of Jesus Christ.’
Suddenly one of the people standing shouted out, in a voice so raucous that he almost wrenched his throat from the shouting. ‘Blessed are you from heaven, Pope. Blessed are your words in
the name of the living God!’ He began to repeat the same phrase, until the others behind him started repeating it too. The enthusiasm almost unhinged the minds of the congregation, and their
chants to Bishop Cyril shook the walls of the church. The bishop made the sign of the cross in the air and raised his sceptre for the crowd twice, and their enthusiasm exploded insanely. Some of
them fainted and fell among the throng, some of their bodies began to convulse with the chanting, and some of them closed their tearful eyes. The bishop, or pope as they call him in Alexandria,
turned and disappeared behind the door to the pulpit amidst a group of senior priests holding crosses bigger than any I had ever seen.