This was perhaps the most flourishing time of the Coptic Church. The Mohammedan government was friendly, the Melchites were unable to annoy, and the mills and oil presses of the patriarchate were bringing in good revenue, which the patriarch used to relieve distress throughout the whole country during a time of famine. So John Semnudæus was a second Joseph. But he was not permitted to end his days in peace. John attempted to act as mediator between the Emperor of Ethiopia and the King of Nubia, who were at war. Abdel-Aziz was induced to treat this action as a political intrigue for the overthrow of the power of Islam, and he condemned the patriarch to be beheaded. Happily the governor was persuaded to spare John's life, and he contented himself with ending the incident by ordering certain sentences affirming the Mussulman faith to be written on the church doors.[1]
Something more nearly approaching real persecution was practised by the emir's eldest son, Asabah, who was influenced by an apostate Copt named Benjamin. He laid a capitation tax of a gold piece on every monk and a tax of a thousand pieces of gold on every bishop, and he forbade anybody for the future to take monastic vows. The father and the son died near the same time; but this did not mend matters. The Caliph Abdel-Melech appointed his son Abdallah to be governor of Egypt (a.d. 705). He proved to be a savage tyrant after the fashion of one of the monsters of cruelty in the Arabian Nights. For instance, he would order a guest's head to be taken off while sitting with him at table. When the patriarch Alexander ventured to enter the palace to do homage to the new emir, Abdallah flung him into prison and demanded 3,000 pieces of gold as the price of his freedom. This governor of a province of the Mussulman Empire was acting just like a brigand from the mountains. The patriarch had no means for raising his ransom till George his deacon obtained leave for his liberation to
- ↑ Neale calls this the "First Persecution under Abdel-Aziz.'
