Egypt

Just a few that I know of...

Anubis is the Greek name for a jackal-headed god associated with mummification and the afterlife (death), occording the Egyptian Mythology. (was also seen as the deity of embalming)

Osiris is the God of Death and Rebirth in Egyptian Mythology.

Answer 1

It depends how the question is read.

If it is referring to the Bible, it is because they enslaved the Jews harshly (exodus ch.1).

If it is referring to the 20th, and 21st century, there are a number of reasons:

Denial of Nationality: In 1926, the Egyptian Nationality Code was passed and provided citizenship to people who were Arab or Muslim, effectively denying Jews citizenship. While in the late 1920s, it only led to second lower-class status, in the late 1940s and 1950s, it would serve as a premise to "prove" Jewish disloyalty. (If they are not citizens, how could they be loyal.)

Nazification of Egyptian Independence: The violence in Manatory Palestine between the Jewish Yishuv and the ethnic Arabs in the 1920s and 1930s began to anger Egyptians. Nazi-trained Arab leaders like Haj Amin Al-Husseini visited Egypt and helped lead Arab Nationalist and Islamist movements, like the nascent Muslim Brotherhood. These organizations saw the Nazis as allies in their struggle against the British (who were occupying Egypt) and the Jewish Yishuv (who were entering mandatory Palestine). As a result, they became increasingly Anti-Semitic in their rhetoric.

Bombings of Jewish Areas: In 1945, the Jewish Quarter was violently attacked in a pogrom with 10 deaths, more than 300 injuries and a lot of property destruction, including a synagogue and a hospital. Numerous acts would follow in the subsequent years including the 1948 bombings which killed 70 Jews and riots that killed many more. There were more bombings in 1949, resulting in 34 deaths. While the violence cooled down in the 1950s, there were sporadic riots and attacks of the Jewish community.

Forced Firing: In July 1947, the Egypt government passed a law that said that every company in Egypt must employ at least 90% Egyptian nationals. Since Jews were not Egyptian nationals (see Denial of Nationality), this effectively resulted in the firing of many Jews, making their livelihoods impossible.

Expulsion in 1956: The Egyptian Government blamed the Egyptian Jews for treachery and treason with Zionists (which were unfounded claims) during the Arab-Israeli War of 1956, leading to the expulsion of 25,000 Jews, the incarceration of 1,000 Jews and the confiscation of all of their properties. In November, the Egyptian Government explained that "all Jews and Zionists were enemies of the state". In order to effectively confiscate the Jews' property while expelling them, the Jews were forced to sign affadavits showing that they wished to "donate" all of their belongings to the Egyptian Government. A similar event would reoccur to the much Jewish population in 1967 after the Six Day War.

In the Biblical period, that is to say, from the Old Kingdom to the New Kingdom in Egypt, there is no register ever found to confirm slavery (work or trade) in the egyptian society, in the tens of thousands of documents in papyrus already translated, and dispersed all around the world in museums and collections, as well as in egyptian stone inscriptions or paintings from that era.

"A century of research by archaeologists and Egyptologists has found no evidence whatsoever which can be related to an Egyptian captivity." In Exodus, Carol Meyers, Cambridge University Press, 2005.

The only reference of slavery in Ancient Egypt is the Old Testement.

There was forced labour, yes, but only for criminals and war prisioners.

On the other hand, in Ancient Egypt, women had legal citizen rights, and could even divorce and have personal proprieties. Egypt was millenia ahead of Sumeria, Babylon, Greece, Israel, Phoenice, Carthago, Rome, etc., even to European society, not so long ago!

This may be strange to many people, because of the western Christian-Jewish religious tradition.

In fact, in the Ancient History, there were two civilizations that did not have a slave based economy: Egypt and the Minoan civilization, in Crete. Around 1420 BCE, the Minoan civilization was replaced gradually by the Mycenaeans, a Greek influenced society based in slavery, just like in Classical Greece.

In Egypt, slavery was introduced by the Persians, first in 343 BCE, and later under the Greek Ptolomaic Kingdom, Roman conquest and other invaders.

However, before the Persian conquest, there were, indeed, two periods of slavery. They occurred during the Second Intermidiate Period ruled by the Hyksos (15th dynasty, from 1650 BCE to 1550 BCE), and during part of the Third Intermidiate Period, under Nubian and Assyrians rulers.

Later, the Egyptian culture lost its identity, and slavery became a rule.

In the Book of Exodus, the description of enslavement of the Jewish people is historically contradictory.

And please note the following:

- Many Jews came to Egypt, fleeing from the destruction of the First Temple in Jerusalem by the Babylonians; why should they look for refuge in Egypt, if Egypt were the inferno descibed in the Bible?

- In the Book of Exodus, it is clearly mentioned that the Israelites, lead by Moses through the Sinai desert - and BEFORE YHWH's condemnation to remain in the wilderness until the generation that left Egypt passes away - complain and longed for Egypt.

For Egypt, where they were slaves, their lives at the mercy of their owners?...

- The prophet Jeremiah looked for refuge...

...in Egypt!

- Mary, Joseph and Jesus run away from Bethlehem, in their own country, and looked for a safe shelter...

...in Egypt!

Is it necessary to give more examples? [Comments on the "Examples" moved to the Discussion Section]

It is related to Moses having reached a level of prophecy higher than that of any other prophet (Numbers ch.12, Deuteronomy ch.34). Because of that, he was chosen by God as the person most suitable to carry out the greatest missions (the leading of the Israelites out of Egypt and then across the Sea of Reeds, the receiving of the Torah, and the leading of the Israelites throughout the next forty years). See also:

Biography of Moses

Many people know this story very well, but it explainswhyand when Jesus escaped to Egypt:

After Jesus was born, the wise men (or magi) saw the star in the sky and set off to find baby Jesus. It took them a few years, and they arrived in Herod's palace in Jerusalem, Israel. In the Old Testament of the Bible it had been predicted that when a new King was born, a star would appear. The wise men knew this and had come to the palace, expecting to find a baby king somewhere royal. They asked Herod, who was King at the time, where the baby was. King Herod did not know about a new baby being born, and was determined to sort it out. He feared this baby would grow up and try to take the throne of Israel from him. So he called a meeting and asked his wise men and advisers about the baby and the star. They told him the Prophet Micah (his prophecies are in the book Micah in the Old Testament) had predicted that a savior, the King of all Kings, would be born in Bethlehem. Herod called a secret meeting with the magi (wise men looking for Jesus) and told them that they would find the baby King in Bethlehem, and when they had found the baby to report back to him, so he could go and worship the baby too. But King Herod really wanted to kill the child, to stop the threat of him taking his throne. He didn't realise what the prophet Micah had meant when he said the King of all Kings". The wise men followed the star from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, where they found Jesus (Jesus would be around 2 years old by now). They gave him the gifts they had brought for him - strange gifts for a baby - Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh. The men bowed down and worshipped Jesus, joyful to have found him. That night God warned the magi in a dream not to return to Herod. They returned home via a different route.

Herod realised he had been tricked, and was furious. He told his guards to go out into Bethlehem and kill every male child aged 2 years old and under. Joseph was warned that night in a terrible dream that he had to leave Bethlehem to escape Herod's wrath and his men, so that night they escaped to Egypt and stayed there until Herod was dead. Then they returned to Nazareth, Mary and Joseph's (and now Jesus') home town.

So Jesus escaped to Egypt to escape being killed by King Herod. You can read the story for yourself in the Bible - in Matthew 2 in the new Testament.

NOTE: several things that were prophesied in the Old testament are fulfilled in this story. Also, notice that nowhere in the Bible does it say that there were 3 wise men (magi). We don't know how many there were - but there was more than 1! If you don't have a Bible, here is the story:

1After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi (wise men) from the east came to Jerusalem 2and asked, "Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him."

3When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. 4When he had called together all the people's chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Christ was to be born. 5"In Bethlehem in Judea," they replied, "for this is what the prophet has written:

6" 'But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,

are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;

for out of you will come a ruler

who will be the shepherd of my people Israel.'"

7Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. 8He sent them to Bethlehem and said, "Go and make a careful search for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him."

9After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen in the east went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. 10When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. 11On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh. 12And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.

The Escape to Egypt

13When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. "Get up," he said, "take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him." 14So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, 15where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: "Out of Egypt I called my son."

16When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. 17Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled:

18"A voice is heard in Ramah,

weeping and great mourning,

Rachel weeping for her children

and refusing to be comforted,

because they are no more."

The Return to Nazareth

19After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt 20and said, "Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child's life are dead."

21So he got up, took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. 22But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning in Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, 23and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets: "He will be called a Nazarene."