may be married (before ordination) to a virgin;[1] after ordination he cannot marry again. All, except monks, are married and many carry on some mean trade. As for the deacons, Beth says: "These are truly miserable creatures, boys thirteen or fourteen years old, often blind boys who are ordained as some sort of provision for them."[2] The minor orders (for instance, the Lectorate) are now extinct.
Egypt, the home of monasticism, has still quantities of monks. As among the Orthodox, they form the aristocracy of the clergy. Only monks can become bishops. They abstain always from flesh-meat, sing the divine office, and do manual work. There are a number of large and, archæologically, extremely interesting Coptic monasteries throughout Egypt, which are the homes of all that is characteristic in the sect.[3] The most famous Coptic monasteries are St. Mercurius (Dair Abū-sSaifain, see pp. 268-269) at old Cairo;[4] then four in the Nitrian desert, where once was a great number, notably AlBaramūs,[5] those said to have been founded by St. Antony and St. Paul in the Eastern desert by the Red Sea,[6] and Dair AsSūriāni, also in the Nitrian desert, where Curzon found precious manuscripts.[7] The abbots of AlBaramūs, St. Antony, and St. Paul are now bishops. There are two classes of monks, inasmuch as some only, who aspire to higher perfection, after years of probation receive the "angelic habit" and are bound by severer rules. The abbot (ḳummuṣ)[8] is appointed by a rite which looks very like a sacramental ordination. The title ḳummuṣ is also given as an honour to the chief priest of certain great churches, who is a titular abbot or archpriest. Beth even distinguishes two orders, "archpriests" and "priests."[9] But
8 From (
Greek characters). Copt: hygomenos.
- ↑ Secular priests are invariably married. Indeed, the law seems to imply that they must be. Among the testimonies required before ordination is one that the candidate is lawfully married (Butler: op. cit. ii. 319). I am not sure whether a Coptic bishop would refuse to ordain a celibate man; but I think he would.
- ↑ Beth: op. cit. 134.
- ↑ Long and accurate descriptions of these will be found in A. J. Butler: Ancient Coptic Churches of Egypt, vol. i.
- ↑ Butler: op. cit. i. 75-154.
- ↑ Ib. 286-340.
- ↑ Ib. 342-348.
- ↑ Ib. 316-326. R. Curzon: Visits to Monasteries in the Levant, chap. vii.-viii. (ed. 6, Murray, 1881), pp. 98-113.
- ↑ 8
- ↑ Op. cit. p. 134.
