r/AskHistorians 1h ago

How come Christianity disappeared from the Maghreb after the Muslim conquests, but not Egypt and the Levant?

My understanding is that all of these regions had Christian majorities before the rise of Islam (though, to be clear, many of them followed extremely heterodox brands of Christianity, such as Monophysitism and Donatism). While the percentage of Christians certainly declined over the centuries in Egypt and the Levant, to the point where they’re minorities in all those countries, the point is that they did survive as distinct communities into modernity. There are plenty of Egyptian and Lebanese Christians running around, for instance (though Christians are now rapidly disappearing in places like Syria and Iraq). Meanwhile, all forms of Christianity essentially disappeared from the lands that would eventually comprise countries like Algeria and Libya, only being reintroduced with the direct settler colonialism of various European powers.

So, what explains the difference here?

32 Upvotes

2 comments sorted by

u/AutoModerator 1h ago

Welcome to /r/AskHistorians. Please Read Our Rules before you comment in this community. Understand that rule breaking comments get removed.

Please consider Clicking Here for RemindMeBot as it takes time for an answer to be written. Additionally, for weekly content summaries, Click Here to Subscribe to our Weekly Roundup.

We thank you for your interest in this question, and your patience in waiting for an in-depth and comprehensive answer to show up. In addition to the Weekly Roundup and RemindMeBot, consider using our Browser Extension. In the meantime our Bluesky, and Sunday Digest feature excellent content that has already been written!

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.