Fifteen years after Egypt’s uprising, how faith and politics reshaped a generation
- Written by Nareman Amin, Assistant Professor of Contemporary Islam, Michigan State University
Fifteen years ago, Egyptians from all walks of life took to the street[1] to demand “bread, freedom, social justice.” They were protesting the oppressive[2] 30-year rule of Hosni Mubarak.
Egypt had been under martial law for 31 years[3]. This meant that political opposition was silenced, and opponents were often imprisoned and tortured. Police brutality was the norm.
Egypt’s economy was also weak and relied heavily on foreign aid and loans from the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. Even though the country’s per capita gross domestic product was growing, almost 25% of the population was living in poverty[4] by 2011.
Neighboring Tunisia had toppled its dictator, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, on Jan. 14, 2011, after 28 days of protest. The Tunisian revolution’s[5] success led to a wave of uprisings against corruption, injustice and economic inequality across the region, including the January 2011 revolution in Egypt.
For many who joined the movement in Egypt, there was a newfound sense of unity, equality and nationalism. Egyptians young and old, Muslim and Christian, rich and poor, man and woman, stood arm-in-arm for 18 days, until Mubarak resigned[6] on Feb. 11, 2011.
Mubarak’s resignation signaled to many Egyptians the power of common will and determination.
Slowly, however, political divisions set in. While there were exciting voting opportunities[7] that seemed free and fair for the first time in modern Egyptian history, there were many disappointments in this nascent and short-lived democratic experiment.
In my recently published book, “Is God for Revolution? Affect, Youth and Islam[8],” I investigate these political changes, but through the lens of religion.
Islam in Egypt
Egypt is a Muslim-majority country. Islam can be felt, seen and heard in every corner of the nation: The melodic call to prayer rings out five times a day to remind Muslims to stop what they are doing and turn their attention to God in worship.
Minarets of mosques and domes of churches dot the sepia-toned Egyptian sky. The Quran plays in shops, taxi cabs and on radios and television[10] in local cafes. Most women wear veils[11] as part of a religious obligation; men grow long beards, which they believe to be a prophetic tradition.
Scholars of Islam like Saba Mahmood[12], Charles Hirschkind[13], Aaron Rock-Singer[14] and others have noted a resurgence in these physical aspects of Islamic piety since the 1970s. Some of these scholars attribute it to Islamic groups like the Muslim Brotherhood, established by Hasan al-Banna in 1928[15] as a response to the cultural and political incursions of the British occupation.
Salafis are another group who urged people to be good Muslims by believing in Allah – the Arabic word for God – and looking and acting the part as well. The Salafis believe they follow the Islam of the “pious predecessors,” or salaf – that is, the generations during and immediately following the life of the Prophet Muhammad.
The Muslim Brotherhood and Salafis offered social services for the poor and preached their versions of Islam widely.
The research
I lived in Egypt between 2007 and 2012 and visited every summer until 2018, when I formally began conducting interviews for this book.
In 2018 and 2019, I spoke with 61 middle- and upper-middle class Muslim Egyptians who were in their early- to mid-20s when the Egyptian uprising began in 2011. Most interviewees were from big cities like Cairo and Alexandria, but some also grew up in smaller villages and towns across Egypt.
For them, the revolution and the social and political freedoms it came with offered them a space to question everything in their lives, including how they relate to the Islamic teachings they grew up with and heard from Muslim parents and preachers.
For example, many of the interviewees came to believe that there are many paths to gaining God’s favor. Some turned to Sufism, or mystical Islam, for answers. Others left Islam altogether.
My interviewees all grew up with the sights and sounds of Islam surrounding them. Their parents and schools also taught them an Islam that highlighted both belief in God and physical practices like the veil, beards and prayer. For many of the people I spoke to, these rituals and visible markers of Islam were no longer as important as they had been raised to believe.
Heidi, a human rights activist, explained that the revolution was an eye-opener, especially for women. She explained that, after the revolution, she took off the veil and now places more importance on the ethical and spiritual rather than the ritualistic aspects of Islam.
“The revolution broke the fear barrier we had of thinking for ourselves … including about religion,” she said[16].
Similarly, Hasan, a tech entrepreneur, who once used to be conservative in his understanding of what makes one a good Muslim, told me that after the uprising, he came to believe that “religion is not one single path, and that no one action can take you to heaven.” He became more accepting of the different ways people relate to Islam.
Some of my interviewees turned to Eastern practices like yoga and meditation, sometimes even mixing them with Sufism[17] or Islamic mysticism[18]. I spoke to Sonia, an Egyptian American Muslim woman who received training in various wellness methods like pranic healing, breath work and meditation, and I attended her sessions online during the COVID-19 pandemic.
In post-revolution Egypt, she held sessions in yoga studios in which she guided practitioners through traditional breath work and meditation. She asked practitioners to chant the names of Allah in Arabic: al-Nur (the Light) and al-Rahman (the Merciful), in sync with their rhythmic, conscious breathing.
In these spaces, one would find energy crystals, and incense wafting in and out of the room[19]. Attendees, both Muslim and non-Muslim, would sit in a semicircle around Sonia, trying to reach something transcendent, spiritual, maybe even universal.
Not all my interviewees approved of this spiritual practice. Basim, an entrepreneur, felt that practices like Sonia’s were not Islamic; they were a mishmash of Eastern practices that pull on the Islamic tradition selectively for marketing purposes.
Sonia, however, felt that people should not be judged for how they choose to build a connection with God or something transcendent.
Other interviewees left Islam altogether. Six of the people I spoke to had become atheist or agnostic. There were atheists in Egypt[20] before 2011, but shortly after the uprising, more people became vocal about their lack of belief. The media widely reported on what it framed as a worrying trend in society[21].
Why did this happen?
The revolution opened a space for people who may never have come together to join one another in protest. Once Mubarak fell, people found unprecedented freedom of speech[22], freedom of assembly and freedom to take part in politics.
Among those who openly joined the political scene after Mubarak’s removal were the Muslim Brotherhood and political arms of the Salafis, who made considerable political gains[23] in 2011 and 2012.
In June 2012, Muhammad Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood became the first democratically elected president of Egypt. But just a year into his administration, Mursi was deposed by the military[24]. People who staged demonstrations and sit-ins to protest his deposition were violently removed from public squares and killed[25].
Religion in post-revolution politics
How religion was used in the political processes led almost all my interviewees to rethink matters of faith[26], practice and religious authority[27].
Data from the Arab Barometer[28], which conducts public opinion surveys in the Middle East, shows similar trends over the past decade. In 2011, when respondents were asked if Egypt would be better off if religious people held public office, 53% disagreed. By 2022, the figure had risen to 80%. Views on religious practice also indicated a change.
At the very beginning of the 2011 movement, for example, many of the Islamic scholars my interviewees followed argued that revolting against a ruler[30], no matter how unjust, is a sin and forbidden in the Islamic tradition. Later, when Islamists like the Muslim Brotherhood came to power, most of my interviewees were shocked that many of these Islamist politicians played the political game, which meant lying and reneging on promises made.
When Mursi became president, his supporters compared his rule with that of the prophet. Others used offensive language[31] to describe political opponents who did not share their political vision.
My interviewees believed that these behaviors[32] were antithetical to the ethical and moral codes of the Islamic tradition[33] that these Islamists and their supporters preached for years prior to the uprising and their political ascent.
Things came to a head when Mursi was deposed through a violent coup. The country was divided between those who praised the military for restoring order and stability in Egypt and those who decried the move as a massacre[34] that ushered in the end of the democratic experiment.
All my interviewees were horrified by the massacre, leading a few to question why a just God would allow hundreds of innocent people to be killed in such a way. Worse yet was that some of the religious scholars who forbade people from protesting against Mubarak in 2011 urged people to protest against Mursi in 2013, with a few even condoning the massacre or at least staying silent in the face of renewed oppression.
The Egyptians I interviewed witnessed all these events and reacted emotionally to them. And because religion was at the center of these political processes in ways that almost all my interviewees viewed as hypocritical and opportunistic, my interviewees wanted to break away from the version of Islam that the Islamists and their supporters represented.
Fifteen years on, though the political and economic aims of the 2011 movement have not been realized, the social afterlives of a revolution live on.
References
- ^ took to the street (www.aljazeera.com)
- ^ protesting the oppressive (www.amnesty.org)
- ^ martial law for 31 years (www.britannica.com)
- ^ 25% of the population was living in poverty (www.cesr.org)
- ^ Tunisian revolution’s (www.britannica.com)
- ^ Mubarak resigned (www.bbc.com)
- ^ voting opportunities (carnegieendowment.org)
- ^ Is God for Revolution? Affect, Youth and Islam (global.oup.com)
- ^ Emad Aljumah/Moment via Getty Images (www.gettyimages.com)
- ^ radios and television (cup.columbia.edu)
- ^ wear veils (www.britannica.com)
- ^ Saba Mahmood (press.princeton.edu)
- ^ Charles Hirschkind (cup.columbia.edu)
- ^ Aaron Rock-Singer (scholar.google.com)
- ^ established by Hasan al-Banna in 1928 (www.cfr.org)
- ^ she said (global.oup.com)
- ^ mixing them with Sufism (www.religionwatch.com)
- ^ Islamic mysticism (uncpress.org)
- ^ energy crystals, and incense wafting in and out of the room (www.religionwatch.com)
- ^ atheists in Egypt (www.jstor.org)
- ^ worrying trend in society (www.aljazeera.com)
- ^ unprecedented freedom of speech (www.reuters.com)
- ^ considerable political gains (www.bbc.com)
- ^ deposed by the military (www.theguardian.com)
- ^ violently removed from public squares and killed (www.hrw.org)
- ^ rethink matters of faith (doi.org)
- ^ practice and religious authority (www.arabbarometer.org)
- ^ Arab Barometer (www.arabbarometer.org)
- ^ Sayed Hassan/Getty Images Sport (www.gettyimages.com)
- ^ revolting against a ruler (doi.org)
- ^ offensive language (www.cnn.com)
- ^ these behaviors (www.france24.com)
- ^ antithetical to the ethical and moral codes of the Islamic tradition (www.arabbarometer.org)
- ^ decried the move as a massacre (www.amnesty.org)
Authors: Nareman Amin, Assistant Professor of Contemporary Islam, Michigan State University