Cairo’s Mosques and Churches

I write too much. It’s too much to read, even for me sometimes. Who cares? What–if anything I create–will last so long? And does it even matter if I leave a trace on earth?

So I’ll write just the words I wrote at the time–things to remember, to bring back the sounds, smells, and atmosphere of the moment. From this cool morning in January 2020 in Cairo walking through Islamic and Coptic Cairo.

 

Al-Nasser Mohammed Ibn Kalawoun, Mosque of the Citadel

“Shoes off please”, as we walked into the open air mosque. Shade. Intense quiet inside these walls. Sunbeams by the mihrab.  East goes the qibla.

Cold stones and still-dewey rugs. A momentary smell near the middle, something dead? Sounds of sweeping, sweeping, sweeping. A breeze. Lanterns swaying on long chains.  Imagine them candlelit! The corinthian columns…so many, all different. Salvaged from other churches, other mosques, other forgotten or fallen-out-of-favor buildings. One column with a sundial–now in the wrong place to work. This one with crosses, also useless in a mosque. Some white marble columns, some red granite, a few of black stone. These ancient columns from the Pharaohs, the Byzantines, the Copts. How did the architects in 1300 figure out how many bricks to use to even out the different heights and level the ceiling, the arches?

Out onto the patio. On a clear day, we’d have seen the Pyramids for the first time. Today, we gazed into the distance, and saw only haze. A sandy smog blowing in from the Sahara. We looked out over the Cairo neighborhood. Down there was the Madrassa, and the mosque where the Shah of Iran is interred. The stone floor of the Citadel patio–two overlapping squares form an 8-pointed Islamic star. A manicured tree keeps watch at the precipice. Sunshine, and the faint sounds of Cairo’s traffic below.

 

 

The Alabaster Mosque of Muhammad Ali Pasha

 

A mosque made of alabaster? Can it be true? Imagined silky cold white, translucent, glowing. Didn’t imagine the Sahara’s sand.

 

Oh my. The many minarets. And then inside the great hall…the chandeliers! Oh my at the chandeliers. Ghost like in their dusty elegance. I remembered the words of Mark Twain on his visit to Cairo in 1867:

“the little birds have built their nests in the globes of the great chandeliers that hang in the mosque, and how they fill the whole place with their music and are not afraid of anybody because their audacity is pardoned, their rights are respected, and nobody is allowed to interfere with them, even though the mosque be thus doomed to go unlighted.”

 

Oh to hear bird songs here. Is this the same dust that Twain saw? Many visitors sat on the floor–I wished to linger too, maybe for hours. I wished to sit…no, lay on the floor and stare up at that ceiling, at those chandeliers. Hours, yes.

Mosque-Madrassa of Sultan Hassan

Red carpet entry into a vast courtyard. Four nooks representing the four sects of Islam–presumably where each sect sat for learning their spin on the scriptures. The floors, the light, the ablution fountain, and the unbelievable height of the arches, and length of the lantern chains. What scale!

 

Intermission

Lunch at Aikhan Cafe = soft gooey rice with a ramekin of stewed eggplants and peppers. Tea, tahini, babaganoush, pickled veggies and a pita. Filling, light, and wholesome. Next up, Coptic Cairo.

The Hanging Church

Coptic Christians represent about 10-15% of Egypt. The hanging church hangs over a former fortress. Mosaics line the courtyard entry–telling the story of Simon the Tanner and moving a mountain. Inside it’s cozy, close together pews. The vaulted ceiling frees the eyes upward, built to resemble Noah’s ark. The pulpit’s 15 columns–1 for Jesus leads the way, 14 others follow. One each per disciple, plus two followers who were not titled “disciples”. A black column for Judas, and grey ones for Doubting Thomas, and followers Mark and Luke.

Candles danced before St. Luke’s “Mona Lisa” painting, now an icon, respected, visited. I lit a candle there…for hope, for grace, for art that survives so long. I tried reading the notes and prayers left in a glass box by St. George’s icon. I studied the 40 faces of martyred nuns in another painted icon. A column here is said to weep and have images of Mary materialize. Fish are carved into the wooden pews. Incense burns. And that ark ceiling lifts the eyes up. Are we gathered two-by-two?

 

 

St Sergius & St Bacchus Church

 

 

 

Jewish Cairo? “No Jews are left in Egypt”, says our guide.

No photos are allowed in Ben Ezra Synagogue. But what beautiful moments sitting and sketching the windows, shaped like the ten commandment tablets (as if I know the shape) with old glass of warped clear, blue, and yellow. Intricate alabaster, mother of pearl, and carved woodwork filled the center of the main room. Many religious texts survived because they were hidden and preserved here. Throughout history, what is saved and what is destroyed? What is lost and what is found? And what paths have we set out on as a result of these edits?

 

Thank you for reading

Select photos are available on Etsy.

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Carol Fletcher is a traveling, dog-loving, tree-hugging, coffee-addicted, Nashville born-and-raised photographer living in Chicago. To see more photo essays and projects, please visit www.carolfletcher.com.