Egypt has been a republic since 18 June 1953. President Mohamed Hosni Mubarak has been the President of the Republic since October 14, 1981, following the assassination of former President Anwar Sadat. President Mubarak is currently serving his fourth term in office. He is the leader of the ruling National Democratic Party. Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif was sworn in as Prime Minister on 9 July 2004, following the resignation of Dr. Atef Obied from his office.
The Shura Council's legislative powers are limited. On most matters of legislation, the People’s Assembly retains the last word in the event of a disagreement between the two houses.
The Western Desert accounts for about two-thirds of the country's land area. For the most part, it is a massive sandy plateau marked by seven major depressions. One of these, Fayoum, was connected about 3,600 years ago to the Nile by canals. Today, it is an important irrigated agricultural area.
The current Coptic Orthodox Pope of Alexandria and the Patriarch of the Holy See of Saint Mark is Pope Shenouda III; the most recent Greek Orthodox Melkite Patriarch is Patriarch Theodoros II. These positions should not to be confused with that of the Roman Catholic Pope in Rome, nor with either of the other two bishops bearing the title of Patriarch of Alexandria (one in communion with the Roman Pope and the other the head of one of the canonical Eastern Orthodox churches).
Mummies have been an object of intense interest in the West since archaeologists began finding them in large numbers. 19th century aristocrats would often entertain themselves by buying mummies, having them unwrapped, and holding observation sessions. These sessions destroyed several mummies, because the exposure to the air caused them to desintegrate.
The capital city, Cairo, is Africa's largest city and has been renowned for centuries as a center of learning, culture and commerce of Egypt.
The best-known mummies are those that have been embalmed with the specific purpose of preservation, particularly those in ancient Egypt. Egyptians believed the body was home to a person's Ka which was essential in one's afterlife.
The first Christians in Egypt were mainly Alexandrian Jews such as Theophilus, whom Saint Luke the Evangelist addresses in the introductory chapter of his gospel. When the church was founded by Mark during the reign of the Roman emperor Nero, a great multitude of native Egyptians (as opposed to Greeks or Jews) embraced the Christian faith. Christianity spread throughout Egypt within half a century of Mark's arrival in Alexandria as is clear from the New Testament writings found in Bahnasa, in Middle Egypt, which date around the year 200 AD, and a fragment of the Gospel of Saint John, written in Coptic, which was found in Upper Egypt and can be dated to the first half of the second century. In the second century Christianity began to spread to the rural areas, and scriptures were translated into the local language, namely Coptic
Egypt has endured as a unified state for more than 5,000 years, and archeological evidence indicates that a developed Egyptian society has existed for much longer. Egyptians take pride in their pharaonic heritage and in their descent from what many consider mankind's earliest civilization. The Arabic word for Egypt is Misr, which originally connoted "civilization" or "metropolis".
The Royal Library of Alexandria was once the largest in the world. It is usually assumed to have been founded at the beginning of the 3rd century BC during the reign of Ptolemy II of Egypt after his father had set up the Temple of the Muses or Museum. The initial organization is attributed to Demetrius Phalereus. The Library is estimated to have stored at its peak 400,000 to 700,000 scrolls.
A primarily male spiritual manifestation is Sufism, an Islamic mystical tradition. Sufism has existed since the early days of Islam and is found in all Islamic countries. The name derives from the Arabic word suf (wool), referring to the rough garb of the early mystics. Sufism exists in a number of forms, most of which represent an original tarika developed by an inspired founder, or shaykh. These shaykhs gradually gathered about themselves murids, or disciples, whom they initiated into the tarika. Gradually the murids formed orders, also known as turuq, which were loyal to the shaykh or his successors. The devotions of many Sufi orders center on various forms of the dhikr, a ceremony at which music, body movements, and chants induce a state of ecstatic trance in the disciples. Since the early 1970s, there has been a revival of interest in Sufism. Egypt's contemporary Sufis tend to be young, college-educated men in professional careers.
Though considered a low-income country, Egypt has a thriving media and arts industry, with more than 30 satellite channels and more than 100 motion pictures produced a year. To bolster its media industry, especially with the keen competition from the Persian Gulf states and Lebanon, it has built a large media city that it has promoted as the "Hollywood of the East". Egypt has the only opera house amongst Arab countries.
During the first few centuries of the Christian era, Egypt was the ultimate source of a great deal of ascetic literature in the Coptic language. Egyptian monasteries translated many Greek and Syriac works, which are now only extant in Coptic.
Coptic Orthodox Christianity is the indigenous form of Christianity that, according to tradition, the apostle Mark established in Egypt in the middle of the 1st century AD (approximately AD 60). It is the national church of Egypt. The church is one of the Oriental Orthodox churches. Its leader is the Pope of Alexandria and the Patriarch of the Holy See of Saint Mark. The current incumbent is Pope Shenouda III.
The "Koiné" dialect of the Greek language was important in Hellenistic Alexandria, and was used in the philosophy and science of that culture, and was also studied by later Arabic scholars.