Heather J. Sharkey's American Evangelicals in Egypt: Missionary Encounters in an Age of Empire offers a compelling examination of American Presbyterians' efforts to evangelize Egypt. Whether writing about attempts to reform Coptic Christianity or to gain converts among the Muslim population, the author delivers a well-written, although at times dense, history of the social, political, and cultural upheaval Presbyterian missionaries caused in Egypt.
Sharkey starts by revealing that Presbyterians first delivered their message to what they referred to as the poor, simple-minded Coptic peasants who resided in the countryside. Comparing their conditions to those of African Americans after the American Civil War, Sharkey shows that although both groups were Christian, they practiced what missionaries perceived as forms of primitive Christianity. Therefore, like their American counterparts, Presbyterian missionaries in Egypt stressed education, respectability, and reform among the Coptic population. Also highlighted in this section of the book are the social pressures reformed Coptic Christians (Evangelicals) exerted upon Egyptian society and the controversies they caused. The first occurred as a result of a debate over the issue of religious icons. Sharkey argues that “attitudes toward iconography and saint worship showed a distancing of the Evangelicals from the Coptic Orthodoxy” (pp. 39–40). The second occurred in 1879, when the state officially recognized the Protestant community as a distinct sect, which gave Egyptian Protestants legal recognition as being independent from the Coptic Orthodoxy.
In later chapters, Sharkey redirects her emphasis to the Muslim population. As detailed in Chapter 3, Presbyterian missionaries viewed Islam as strictly off limits; however, by 1900 they began to reverse their earlier policy, as the evangelization of Muslims became top priority. Although at times seen as mere nuisances by the colonial regime, missionaries used colonial protection in Egypt to make their first inroads in gaining Muslim converts. One of the major strengths of the book is Sharkey's examination of the social, cultural, and political repercussions Muslims faced as a result of their conversion. Males faced social ostracism, disinheritance, and nullification of marriages to Muslim women. The threat of reprisal from family members proved an even more serious concern. Overall, what comes to the surface is that Presbyterians' efforts to convert the Muslim population threatened the social fabric of Islamic society.
Chapter 4 stands out as Sharkey's best and serves as a critical transition point in the book. After World War I, Egypt faced a homegrown intellectual movement that pitted modern thinkers against Muslim conservatives, with the former questioning the role of Islam in a modern society. Presbyterian missionaries saw this debate through the lens of the American “fundamentalist–modernist controversy” (p. 102). In response to the “modernists,” as well as to other forces, Muslim activists formed groups. Religiously conservative and at times radical, the Muslim activists began to use Christian missionaries as scapegoats. As Sharkey points out, 1926 served as a critical year, with the collision of religious conservative and modernist thinkers. ʿAli ʿAbd al-Raziq and Taha Hussein, two of Egypt's leading thinkers, questioned the continued need for a caliph and offered a historical interpretation of the Qurʾan that led to public outrage and controversy. As covered more extensively in later chapters, many Muslims saw the American University of Cairo (AUC) as a major contributor to the conflict. Although it was completely separate from the American Presbyterian missionaries, many Muslim activists ignored the distinction and described the school as a “hole of snakes and vipers” (p. 120) where Western political thought as well as Christianity were espoused to attack Islam and Egyptian culture. Throughout the chapter, Sharkey elegantly shows how Muslims hampered the American Presbyterians' efforts to Christianize the Muslim population, connecting the missionaries with AUC. Coupling antimissionary resistance and a sluggish U.S. economy that made financial support difficult, Sharkey ends the chapter by illustrating the hardships Presbyterian missionaries endured during the 1930s, which resulted in the overall decline of missionary activity in the country after World War II.
Chapter 5 is the shortest chapter of the book and one of the most interesting. Introduced to the reader in Chapter 4, AUC and its founder Charles R. Watson serve as the primary focus of study. Much of the chapter details the tension between AUC and Presbyterian missionaries and the conflict that ensued over the disputed mission and purpose of the university. Most Muslim activists demonized AUC, but as Sharkey points out, Watson ironically remained very much aware and respectful of Islam, even to the point of outright criticizing the heavy-handed efforts of Presbyterian missionaries to convert the Muslim population. Here, the author might have attempted to analyze the rhetoric of the nationalists and AUC in greater depth by making more of an effort to bring to the reader's attention that AUC, although seen as a Western institution, remained very aware of the Islamic environment in which it operated.
In “Turning to the Life of the Church: American Mission in an Age of Egyptian Decolonization and Arab–Israeli Politics, 1945–1967,” the last chapter of the book, the author turns her attention to the political forces that influenced Egyptian society after World War II and away from the religious pressure being exerted on the country by Presbyterian missionaries. Sharkey reveals that the changing political climate in Egypt eventually brought an end to the Presbyterian efforts in the country. As a result of decolonization, the Nasser regime, and the growing Arab–Israeli conflict, Egyptian nationalism flourished, bringing an end to the great effort to Christianize Egypt. In many ways, the post World War II climate forced Egyptians to choose between the West and their native culture and religion. In addition, U.S. support of Israel led to an intolerance of Western political influence, which was linked to missionary enterprise in the eyes of many Egyptians. Overall, Sharkey delivers a thoughtful work that will aid anyone looking to better understand Christian missionary efforts in Egypt during the colonial period. Although original in the Egyptian context, a comparative study of other colonial settings—Kenya for example—would yield very similar findings. Overall, two words sum up Sharkey's efforts: well done.
