A European Informational Website
learn more
Arab Christians are people who are ethnically Arab or culturally and linguistically Arabized and who follow the religion of Christianity.
The majority of Christian Arabs live in the Middle East where, although Islam is undoubtedly the preponderant religion, significant religious minorities exist in a number of countries. The largest number of Arab Christians, whether in real numbers or in proportion to a country's population, are to be found in Egypt, Israel (as well as the Palestinian territories), Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria. Emigrant Arab communities throughout the Americas, especially among the Arab populations of Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, and the United States, are overwhelmingly Christian. In Brazil alone, Arabs number over 12 million and are mostly Christian.
Not all Christians in the Arabic-speaking world consider themselves to be Arabs. They may, however, admit the word Arab differently, depending on which aspect of their identity they wish to emphasize (political, linguistic, or ethnic). The largest population of Arabic-speaking Christians are the Copts of Egypt, few of whom would identify as Arabs.[1] Most identify merely as Egyptians with roots going back to Ancient Egypt. They reserve the term Arab for the inhabitants of the Arabian Peninsula, and still regard the Arabs as invaders. Similarly, some Lebanese Maronites emphasize Lebanon's link to the ancient Phoenicians or Mardaites. In reality, Maronites have a complex ancestry of Greek, Roman, Hebrew, Assyrian and Arab descent. On the other hand, some of the most influential (secular) Arab nationalists were Levantine Eastern Orthodox Christians like Michel Aflaq, founder of the Baath Party, George Habash, founder of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and Constantin Zureiq.
Historically, a number of minority Christian sects that were persecuted as heretical under Byzantine rule (such as Monophysites) actually began to enjoy more religious freedom under initial Arab Muslim occupation than they had under Byzantine (Orthodox Christian) rule. This tolerance however waxed and waned. For instance, Egyptian Christians suffered under varying eras of Arab Muslim rule of Egypt, leading in part to the decline of Christianity.
Throughout many eras of history, Arab Christians have co-existed fairly peacefully with followers of the other religions of the Middle East (principally Islam and Judaism). Even after the rapid expansion of Islam from the 7th century AD onwards through the Islamic conquests (or Ghazwa), many Christians chose not to convert to Islam and instead maintain their pre-existing beliefs. As "People of the Book", Christians in the region are accorded certain rights by theoretical Islamic law (Shari'ah) to practice their religion free from interference or persecution; that was, however, strictly conditioned with first paying a special amount of money (tribute) obliged from non-Muslims called 'Jizyah' (pronounced Jiz-ya), in form of either cash or goods, usually a wealth of animals, in exchange for their safety and freedom of worship. The tax was not levied on slaves, women, children, monks, the old, the sick,[2][3] hermits, or the poor.[4]
Arab Christians predate Arab Muslims, as there were many Arab tribes which adhered to Christianity since the first century, including the Nabateans and the Ghassanids (who were of Qahtani origin and spoke Yemeni-Arabic as well as Greek), who protected the south-eastern frontiers of the Roman and Byzantine Empires in north Arabia. The tribes of Tayy, Abd Al-Qais, and Taghlib were also known to have included a large number of Christians prior to Islam. The southern Arabian city of Najran was also a center of Arab Christianity, and were made famous by virtue of their persecution by the king of neighboring Yemen, himself an enthusiastic convert to Judaism. The leader of the Arabs of Najran during the period of persection, Al-Harith, was canonized by the Roman Catholic Church as St. Aretas.
Arab Christians have made significant contributions to Arab civilization and still do. Many of Arab literature's finest poets were Arab Christians, and many Arab Christians were physicians, writers, government officials, and men of letters.
Lebanon contains the largest number of Christians in proportion to its total population. It is believed that they made up around 45% of Lebanon's population before the Lebanese civil war, but their percentage may be as low as 35% now (1,300,000). They belong largely to the Maronite Church, with a sizable minority belonging to the Greek Orthodox, Melkite Greek Catholic, Syriac Orthodox, and Syrian Catholic churches among others. There is, however, uncertainty about the exact numbers because an official census has not been taken in Lebanon since 1932.
In Syria, Christians formed just under 15% of the population (about 1.2 million people) under the 1960 census, but no newer census has been taken. Current estimates put them at about 10% of the population (2,000,000), due to lower rates of birth and higher rates of emigration than their Muslim compatriots.
In Jordan, Christians constitute about 7% of the population (about 400,000 people), though the percentage dropped sharply from 18% in the early beginning of the twentieth century, this drop is largely due to low birth rates in comparison with Muslims. Nearly 70 - 75% of Jordanian Christians belong to the Eastern Orthodox Church, the other part adheres to Catholicism with small minority to Protestant churches. Christians are well integrated in the Jordanian society and have a high level of freedom. Nearly all Christians belong to the middle or upper classes. Moreover, Christians enjoy more economic and social opportunity in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan than elsewhere on the Middle East. Although they constitute less then ten per cent of the total population, they have disproportionately large representation in the Jordanian parliament ( 10% of the Parliament) and hold important government portfolios, ambassadorial appointments abroad, and positions of high military rank.
Jordanian Christians are allowed by the public and private sectors to leave their work to attend mass on Sundays. All Christian religious ceremonies are publicly celebrated in Jordan. Christians have established good relations with the royal family and the various Jordanian government officials and they have their own ecclesiastic courts for matters of personal status.
About 1.6% or 100,000 of Palestinians in the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip are Christian,[5] while four times as many Palestinian Christians, 400,000, now live in the diaspora. Both the founder of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, George Habash, and the founder if its offshoot, the DFLP, Nayif Hawatmeh, were Christians, as is prominent Palestinian activist and former Palestinian Authority minister Hanan Ashrawi.
Israel is believed to be the only country in the Middle East where the Christian population is not declining.<[2] Christians have had political representation in the Knesset (Parliament), and are the most educated group among Israel's Arab population. Of the Christians, the majority (some 117,000) are Arabs and live mainly in urban areas, including Nazareth, Shfar'am and Haifa. Although many denominations are nominally represented, the majority are affiliated with the Melkite Greek Catholic, Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches. Although Arab, their general demographic profile is more similar to Jews, rather than Muslims.[3][4]
There are tiny communities of Roman Catholics in Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco. Most of the members in North Africa, however, are foreign missionaries or immigrant workers, while only a minority among them are converted Arabs (or their descendants) or descendants of converted Berbers, often brought to Christian (Catholic) belief during the modern era or under French colonialism. Charles de Foucauld was renowned for his missions in North Africa among Muslims, including African Arabs.
Many millions of Arab Christians also live in a diaspora elsewhere in the world. These include such countries as Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Cuba, Dominican Republic and the United States. Despite the common belief in the United States that "Arab" equals "Muslim", the majority of self-identifying Arabs in the United States are Eastern Rite Catholic or Orthodox, according to the Arab American Institute. On the other hand, most American Muslims are black or of South Asian (Indian or Pakistani) origin. There are also many Arab Christians in Europe, especially in France (due to its historical connections with Lebanon).
The traditionally Roman Catholic inhabitants of Malta speak Maltese, which is derived from a variation of Arabic. However, they are not considered Arab Christians due to strong European influences over the centuries. For example, the Maltese language is written in Latin, not Arabic, script and is heavily influenced by Italian.
Like Arab Muslims and Arab Jews, Arab Christians refer to God as Allah, since this is the word in Arabic for "God". The use of the term Allah in Arab Christian churches predates Islam by several centuries. In more recent times (especially since the mid 1800s), some Arabs from the Levant region have been converted from these native, traditional churches to more recent Protestant ones, most notably Baptist and Methodist churches. This is mostly due to an influx of Western, predominantly American Evangelical, missionaries.
Please note that many of these figures, particularly the Maronites would not identify themselves as Arab