Christianity in the Middle East

Middle Eastern Christians
Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem
Total population
15–20 million[1][2][3][4]
Regions with significant populations
 Egypt10–15 million[5][6][7][8][9][10][11]
 Lebanon1,700,000–2,000,000 (est.)[8]
 Syria850,000–950,000 (2018 est.)
 Cyprus793,000 (2008)[12]
 Iran369,000–370,000[13]
 Iraq300,000–490,000[14][8][a]
 Jordan250,000–400,000[8]
 Turkey200,000–320,000[15][16][17]
 Israel185,000 [18][8][a]
 Palestine50,000–100,000[19][8][a]
 Bahrain1,000[20][8][17][a]
 Kuwait400[21][22][a]
 Yemen<100[8][a]
 Qatar<10[8][17][a]
 Saudi Arabia<10[8][a]
 United Arab Emirates<10[8][a]
 Oman<10[8][17][a]
Languages
Arabic, Aramaic, Coptic, Armenian, Greek, Georgian, Persian, Turkish, Hebrew, Bulgarian
Religion
Christianity
[a].^ (excluding foreign residents)
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Christian percentage per country[23][24][25]
Country Percent
 Cyprus
 
 98.8%
 Lebanon
 
 41.35%
 Kuwait
 
 18.2%
 Egypt
 
 15%
 Bahrain
 
 14.3%
 Qatar
 
 13.8%
 UAE
 
 13%
 Palestine
 
 6%
 Jordan
 
 6%
 Israel
 
 3.5%
 Syria
 
 3%
 Iraq
 
 2.5%
 Iran
 
 2%
 Turkey
 
 0.2%

Relative size of Christian traditions in the Middle East & North Africa.[3]

  Catholic (43.5%)
  Eastern/Oriental Orthodox (43%)
  Protestant (13.5%)
  Other Christian (0.1%)

Christianity, which originated in the Middle East during the 1st century AD,[26] is a significant minority religion within the region, characterized by the diversity of its beliefs and traditions, compared to Christianity in other parts of the Old World. Today, Christians make up approximately 5% of the Middle Eastern population, down from 13% in the early 20th century.[27][28] Cyprus is the only Christian majority country in the Middle East, with Christians forming between 76% and 78% of the country's total population, most of them adhering to Eastern Orthodox Christianity. Lebanon has the second highest proportion of Christians in the Middle East, around 40%, predominantly Maronites. After Lebanon, Egypt has the next largest proportion of Christians (predominantly Copts), at around 10% of its total population. Copts, numbering around 10 million, constitute the single largest Christian community in the Middle East.[29]

The Eastern Aramaic speaking Assyrians of northern Iraq, northeastern Syria, southeastern Turkey, and parts of Iran have suffered due to ethnic cleansing, religious discrimination, and persecution for many centuries. During the 20th century, the percentage of Christians in the Middle East fell mainly as a result of the late Ottoman genocides:[38] the Armenian genocide, Greek genocide, and Assyrian genocide committed against them by the Ottoman Turks and their allies,[39] leading many to flee and congregate in areas in northern Iraq, northeastern Syria, North America, and Western Europe.[36][37][40] The great majority of Aramaic speaking Christians are followers of the Assyrian Church of the East, Chaldean Catholic Church, Syriac Orthodox Church, Ancient Church of the East, Assyrian Pentecostal Church and Assyrian Evangelical Church. In Iraq, the numbers of Christians has declined to between 300,000 and 500,000 (from 0.8 to 1.4 million before 2003 US invasion). Assyrian Christians were between 800,000 and 1.2 million before 2003.[41] In 2014, the Chaldean and Syriac population of the Nineveh Plains in northern Iraq was scattered to Dohuk, Erbil and Jordan due to ISIS forcing the Assyrian and Syriac Christian community out of their historical homeland, but since the defeat of the Islamic State in 2017, Christians began to slowly return.[42]

The next largest Christian group in the Middle East are the once Aramaic speaking and now Arabic-speaking Maronites who are Eastern-Rite Catholics and number some 1.1–1.2 million across the Middle East, mainly concentrated within Lebanon. In Israel, Maronites together with smaller Aramaic-speaking Christian populations of Syriac Orthodox and Greek Catholic adherence, are legally and ethnically classified as either Arameans or Arabs, per their choice. Arab Christians are descended from Arab Christian tribes, Arabized Greeks or recent converts to Protestantism. Most Arab Christians are adherents of the Melkite Catholic Church and Eastern Orthodox Church. They numbered over 1 million before the Syrian Civil War: some 700,000 in Syria, 400,000 in Lebanon, 200,000 in Israel, Palestine, and Jordan, with small numbers in Iraq and Egypt. Most Arab Catholic Christians are originally non-Arab, with Melkites and Rum Christians who are descended from Arabized Greek-speaking Byzantine populations. They are members of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church, an Eastern Catholic Church. They number over 1 million in the Middle East. They came into existence as a result of a schism within the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch due to the election of a Patriarch in 1724.

Armenians are present in the Middle East, and their largest community, estimated to have 200,000 members, is located in Iran.[43] The number of Armenians in Turkey is disputed and a wide range of estimates is given as a result. More Armenian communities reside in Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq, Egypt, Israel, and formerly also Syria until the Syrian Civil War. The Armenian genocide, which was perpetrated by the Ottoman government and Turkish Muslims both during and after World War I, drastically reduced the once sizeable Armenian population in the Middle East.[44]

The Greeks, who had once inhabited large parts of the western Middle East and Asia Minor, declined in number due to the Arab–Byzantine wars, then suffered another decline after the Ottoman invasion of Anatolia, and all but vanished from Turkey as a result of the Greek genocide, which was perpetrated by the Ottoman government and Turkish Muslims both during and after World War I, and the expulsions that followed the war.[45] Today, the largest Middle Eastern Greek community resides in Cyprus and numbers around 810,000[12] Cypriot Greeks constitute the only Christian majority state in the Middle East, although Lebanon was founded with a Christian majority in the first half of the 20th century. Smaller Christian groups in the Middle East include Georgians, Ossetians, and Russians. There are also several million foreign Christian workers in the Gulf states, mostly from the Philippines, India, Sri Lanka, and Indonesia: Bahrain has 1,000 Christian citizens,[20] and Kuwait has 400 native Christian citizens,[21] in addition to 450,000 Christian foreign residents in Kuwait.[22] Although the vast majority of Middle Eastern populations descend from Pre-Arab and Non-Arab peoples extant long before the 7th century AD Arab Islamic conquest, a 2015 study estimates there are also 483,500 Christian believers from a previously Muslim background in the Middle East, most of them being adherents of various Protestant churches.[46] Converts to Christianity from other religions such as Islam, Yezidism, Mandeanism, Yarsan, Zoroastrianism, Baháʼísm, Druze, and Judaism exist in relatively small numbers amongst the Kurdish, Turks, Turcoman, Iranian, Azeri, Circassian, Israelis, Kawliya, Yezidis, Mandeans, and Shabaks.[citation needed]

Christians are persecuted widely across the Arab and Muslim world and the ongoing situation has been compared to a genocide.[47][48][49] According to a 2018 report commissioned by the British government, Christians are “on the verge of extinction in the Middle East”, explaining that “Evidence shows not only the geographic spread of anti-Christian persecution, but also its increasing severity. In some regions, the level and nature of persecution is arguably coming close to meeting the international definition of genocide, according to that adopted by the UN.”[50][51] In 2024, the International Christian Concern again raised warnings about the persecution of Christians in the Middle East.[52]

Christian communities have played a vital role in the Middle East.[53] Middle Eastern Christians are relatively wealthy, well educated, and politically moderate, as they have today an active role in social, economic, sporting and political spheres in their societies in the Middle East.[54][55] Scholars and intellectuals agree Christians in the Middle East have made significant contributions to Arab and Islamic civilization since the introduction of Islam, and they have had a significant impact contributing the culture of the Mashriq, Turkey, and Iran.[55][56]

  1. ^ Malik, Habib C. (2013). Islamism and the Future of the Christians of the Middle East. Hoover Press. ISBN 978-0-8179-1096-9. Today, between 10–12 million native Christians remain in the Middle East, concentrated mainly in Egypt, the Levant (Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and the Palestine territories), and Iraq. Their numbers, however, continue to dwindle due to a variety of factors, both internal and external.
  2. ^ Leonard, Thomas M. (2006). Encyclopedia of the Developing World. Psychology Press. ISBN 978-1-57958-388-0. Today, Christians number between 12 million and 14 million in the Arab countries of the Middle East, although the exact population remains obscure given its politicization.
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  6. ^ a b Mohamoud, Yousra A.; Cuadros, Diego F.; Abu-Raddad, Laith J. (1 June 2013). "Characterizing the Copts in Egypt: Demographic, socioeconomic and health indicators". QScience Connect (2013): 22. doi:10.5339/connect.2013.22. ISSN 2223-506X. Copts constitute 5.1% (95% confidence interval (CI): 4.6%–5.5%) of the population, while Muslims account for the remaining majority at 94.9%. Given that the current total Egyptian population is estimated to be 83,806,767, 21 the number of Copts in Egypt is then 4,274,145 (95% CI: 3,855,111–4,609,372).
  7. ^ a b HARVARD DIVINITY SCHOOL, Religious literacy project. "Coptic Christianity in Egypt". RLP.HDS.harvard.edu. Archived from the original on 28 July 2020. Retrieved 23 April 2020. The Coptic Church experienced a religious revival beginning in the 1950s, and currently claims some seven million members inside of Egypt.
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  9. ^ a b "Who are Egypt's Coptic Christians?". CNN. 10 April 2017. The largest Christian community in the Middle East, Coptic Christians make up the majority of Egypt's roughly 9 million Christians. About 1 million more Coptic Christians are spread across Africa, Europe, the United Kingdom and the United States, according to the World Council of Churches.
  10. ^ a b "Egypt". United States Department of State. The U.S. government estimates the population at 99.4 million (July 2018 estimate). Most experts and media sources state that approximately 90 percent of the population is officially designated as Sunni Muslims and approximately 10 percent is recognized as Christian (estimates range from 5 to 10 percent). Approximately 90 percent of Christians belong to the Coptic Orthodox Church, according to Christian leaders.
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  53. ^ Curtis, Michael (2017). Jews, Antisemitism, and the Middle East. Routledge. p. 173. ISBN 9781351510721. Christian communities and individuals have played a vital role in the Middle East, the cradle of Christianity as of other religions.
  54. ^ Belt, Don (15 June 2009). "Pope to Arab Christians: Keep the Faith". HuffPost. Retrieved 25 May 2018.
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