Benevolent Ladies

173 Benevolent societies began sprouting all over Egypt in the 1870s. Charity establishments included the so called "economy kitchens" that offered free meals to the poor. This might be the first seed of NGO's in this country.

In his Diwan series, Dr. Yunan Labib Rizk traces the history of charity and other societies with similar aims. "Championing charity", the headline of Al-Ahram's editorial of 1 April 1903, heralded the founding of a benevolent society of this name by a group of "upstanding citizens" in order "to assist poor women to get married". This development, the article continues, "I particularly welcome in a large oriental city such as Cairo, home to all religious sects & denominations and a crossroads for all nations.

This alone is sufficient to demonstrate its value as a vivid model for all to emulate." To be certain, the author maintained, charitable institutions of this sort, wherever they exist, contribute greatly to alleviating the pain and wretchedness of poverty. After all, "poverty is not a disgrace, just as wealth is not a virtue. All men are brothers in this world. The noblest are those who are the most charitable, most benevolent and most compassionate".

If there is anything to glean at all from this announcement, it is that benevolent societies had become so widespread and diversified that some were dedicated to finding spouses for poor women "in defence of virtue." Civic institutions of this nature had been making inroads into Egyptian society since the end of the reign of the Khedive Ismail, through the remainder of the 19th century under British occupation, reaching their peak at the beginning of the 20th century.

Numerous social and political phenomena contributed to this trend. To a considerable extent, it was due to the evolution of a class of large and mid-level agrarian landowners who formed the backbone of charitable activity in Egyptian society. The benevolent works they instituted were inspired by the ancient legacy of awqaf (religious endowment) foundations. Bequeathed to Egyptian society since the Middle Ages, the waqf foundations increasingly came to constitute the bedrock of public services in education, housing, health care and other areas of humanitarian assistance, as the central government relinquished its function in these domains. It was a tradition that could not easily be cast aside, given the religious motivation behind it. Certainly too they were also motivated by the aura of prestige such works conferred upon them.

Alongside this class, the latter quarter of the 19th century saw the rapid rise of the effendi or government functionary class. Members of this class evinced a strong willingness to engage in charitable activities, particularly in the major urban centres of Cairo, Alexandria and the capital cities of the provinces.

 If they did not have the financial facilities of the major landed classes, they had the organisational skills, diligence and dedication, particularly in the field of education. The shrinking role of the government, which had been providing this service to the public since Mohamed Ali founded the modern state, created a demand for individuals to take the initiative to fill the gap thus generated. The gradual acceptance and, by the end of the reign of Ismail, the generally universal conviction that secular education held the key to social and economic advancement furthered the incentive in this domain.

The rise in foreign missionary activity in the fields of education and health was also a contributing factor to the development of local charitable efforts. French, American and Italian missionaries, which enjoyed the privileges conferred upon foreign communities by the capitulation system, were particularly active and there can be no doubt that their increasing presence in important domains of public life provoked considerable consideration among Muslims and Copts alike. Muslims naturally feared that the missionaries' ultimate objective was to convert them to Christianity.

In a sense, the Copts had more cause for concern, having observed that the restraint exercised by the foreign missionaries with regard to the Muslims for fear of popular reaction did not apply to them and that foreign missionaries were seeking to convert Orthodox Copts to the Protestant or Catholic creeds. It is not surprising, therefore, that when the Coptic Tawfiq Society was established, its founders claimed as one of its justifications the need to counteract the foreign denominational schools that were attempting to lure Copts away from their faith.

The foreign presence in Egypt in itself was an incentive to Egyptians to enter the field of community work. The endeavours of foreign communities, whether those of Syrian or European origin, to build schools, hospitals and orphanages for their members and to found charitable societies that not infrequently brought them together with native Egyptians undoubtedly contributed to the spread of such manifestations of philanthropy among the various sectors of Egyptian society. Whatever the causes for the flourishing of charitable work at the outset of this century, it was a subject that garnered the coverage and backing of the nation's newspapers, notably Al-Ahram.

In its 13 January 1904 edition, the newspaper featured a front-page story on "Benevolent homes and pious deeds in the Egyptian capital". Many of these activities were sponsored by the French. An "old age home" was at that time a particularly innovative notion. The home that was opened by French nuns had as its purpose "to serve the elderly who are no longer capable of earning a living. Fifty-one individuals of all nationalities are currently being housed in the shelter where they find food and a bed and where they are cared for by nuns."

Another order of French nuns founded a hospital in which, according to this article, they provided free treatment for around 4,500 patients a year, of whom more than 3,500 were Egyptians.

It is interesting to note that, next door to the hospital, the nuns opened what they called the "economy kitchen" which offered "free meals to the poor and elderly who have no family members to care for them."

Financing such endeavours naturally remained one of the primary concerns of the foreigners operating such institutions. One of the most common means to raise funds were the charity bazaars and auctions sponsored by the wives of the foreign consuls. Not infrequently, foreign banks and companies operating in Egypt would offer donations in their names. At the same time, many preferred to enter their contributions "anonymously".



The newspaper's keenest interest focused on the charitable societies founded by the Maronite and Greek Orthodox communities in Cairo.

Egyptians did not lag far behind the foreign communities in the founding of charitable societies. Indeed, by the end of the reign of Ismail in 1879, the first and most famous of such institutions, the Islamic Charity Society had been founded with the mission of "educating and instilling into the young the spirit of knowledge." The names of many illustrious national figures were linked to this society. Notable among them were Abdallah Nadim and Mohamed Abdu. Perhaps the following report of the general assembly meeting of this society, published in Al-Ahram on 20 May 1901, best serves to illustrate the status this society enjoyed and the nature of the activities it sponsored.

"The first order of business of this meeting was to elect the board of directors. Standing for nomination were a host of individuals whose names reverberate in Egyptian history: Ibrahim Bek Momtaz, Alawi Bek, Saad Zaghlul and Hassan Abdel-Razeq. The board chairman was "the venerable scholar, Sheikh Mohamed Abdu, the Mufti of Egypt."

One notes from the report that the society's activities were primarily focused on education. At that time, it operated four schools, one each in Cairo, Alexandria, Assiut and Tanta, with a total student enrollment of 311. In this meeting, the society moved to employ 15 of the graduates from these schools. Funding for the society was generally provided by private donations from prominent individuals and membership fees. More important to the society, however, were the waqf foundations established for it by wealthy patrons. In the following year's report, we find that "Lady Fatma has bestowed 179 feddans of land in trust, Lady Bakhita 21 feddans, Lady Mayana has contributed 60 feddans and Ismail Bek Assem has granted us 1,533 feddans of land in trust."

The Islamic Charity Society rivaled its foreign counterparts in sponsoring charity deeds, although these occasions had a markedly different character, as is evidenced by the announcement about one such function published in Al-Ahram on 28 November 1902. The programme for this occasion featured: "Beautifully decorated pavilions in the Ezbekiya Gardens, fireworks, military music, popular mizmar (a reed flute) and tambourine folk music, circus acts, shadow puppet performances, Arabic songs sung by the illustrious Youssef El-Manialawi and Mohamed Effendi El-Sab'ao."

The benevolent Islamic Moral Society, founded in Alexandria in 1889, was of particular interest to Al-Ahram for having founded "a refuge for orphans and foundlings" in 1902. The orphanage held its official opening on 21 October 1903. The ceremonies were attended by the Khedive Abbas II, who had donated LE 800 to the institution.

The first Coptic charity society was founded in 1881. However, the Coptic Tawfiq Society, founded 10 years later by a group of young men, soon acquired greater fame, although originally it was located in a single room in the Anglo-Egyptian club. Perhaps the major difference between the two societies was that the latter preferred to work outside the framework of the Coptic Patriarchy, which gave it a certain secular flavour, earning it much criticism by the church. Its founders, although young in age, were all members of well-known Coptic families and, therefore, bound by a common social background, as well as common objectives to assist the poor and orphans and to build schools.