The judicial systems applicable solely to Egyptians are supervised by the ministry of justice, to which has been attached since 1890 a British judicial adviser. Two systems of laws are administered:—(1) the Mehkemehs, (2) the Native Tribunals. The mehkemehs, or courts of the cadis, judge in all matters of personal status, such as marriage, inheritance and guardianship, and are guided in their decisions by the code of laws founded on the Koran. The grand cadi, who must belong to the sect of the Hanifis, sits at Cairo, and is aided by a council of Ulema or learned men. This council consists of the sheikh or religious chief of each of the four orthodox sects, the sheikh of the mosque of Azhar, who is of the sect of the Shafi‘is, the chief (nakib) of the Sherifs, or descendants of Mahomet, and others. The cadis are chosen from among the students at the Azhar university. (In the same manner, in matters of personal law, Copts and other non-Moslem Egyptians are, in general, subject to the jurisdiction of their own religious chiefs.)
For other than the purposes indicated, the native judicial system, both civil and criminal, was superseded in 1884 by tribunals administering a jurisprudence modelled on that of the French code. It is, in the words of Lord Cromer, “in many respects ill adapted to meet the special needs of the country” (Egypt, No. 1, 1904, p. 33). The system was, on the advice of an Anglo-Indian official (Sir John Scott), modified and simplified in 1891, but its essential character remained unaltered. In 1904, however, more important modifications were introduced. Save on points of law, the right of appeal in criminal cases was abolished, and assize courts, whose judgments were final, established. At the same time the penal code was thoroughly revised, so that the Egyptian judges were “for the first time provided with a sound working code” (Ibid. p. 49). The native courts have both native and foreign judges. There are courts of summary jurisdiction presided over by one judge, central tribunals (or courts of first instance) with three judges, and a court of appeal at Cairo. A committee of judicial surveillance watches the working of the courts of first instance and the summary courts, and endeavours, by letters and discussions, to maintain purity and sound law. There is a procureur-général, who, with other duties, is entrusted with criminal prosecutions. His representatives are attached to each tribunal, and form the parquet under whose orders the police act in bringing criminals to justice. In the markak (district) tribunals, created in 1904 and presided over by magistrates with jurisdiction in cases of misdemeanour, the prosecution is, however, conducted directly by the police. Special Children’s Courts have been established for the trial of juvenile offenders.
The police service, which has been subject to frequent modification, was in 1895 put under the orders of the ministry of the interior, to which a British adviser and British inspectors are attached. The provincial police is under the direction of the local authorities, the mudirs or governors of provinces, and the mamurs or district officials; to the omdas, or village head-men, who are responsible for the good order of the villages, a limited criminal jurisdiction has been entrusted.
Religion.—The great majority of the inhabitants are Mahommedans. In 1907 the Moslems numbered over ten millions, or 91.8% of the entire population. The Christians in the same year numbered 880,000, or 8% of the population. Of these the Coptic Orthodox church had some 667,000 adherents. Among other churches represented were the Greek Orthodox, the Armenian, Syrian and Maronite, the Roman Catholic and various Protestant bodies. The last-named numbered 37,000 (including 24,000 Copts). There were in 1907 over 38,000 Jews in Egypt.
The Mahommedans are Sunnites, professing the creed commonly termed “orthodox,” and are principally of the persuasion of the Shafi‘is, whose celebrated founder, the imam ash-Shafi‘i, is buried in the great southern cemetery of Cairo. Many of them are, however, Hanifis (to which persuasion the Turks chiefly belong), and in parts of Lower, and almost universally in Upper, Egypt, Mālikis. Among the Moslems the Sheikh-el-Islam, appointed by the khedive from among the Ulema (learned class), exercises the highest religious and, in certain subjects, judicial authority. There is also a grand cadi, nominated by the sultan of Turkey from among the Ulema of Stamboul. Valuable property is held by the Moslems in trust for the promotion of religion and for charitable purposes, and is known as the Wakfs administration. The revenue derived is over £250,000 yearly.
The Coptic organization includes in Egypt three metropolitans and twelve bishops, under the headship of the patriarch of Alexandria. The minor orders are arch-priests, priests, archdeacons, deacons, readers and monks (see [Copts]: Coptic Church).
Education.—Two different systems of education exist, one founded on native lines, the other European in character. Both systems are more or less fully controlled by the ministry of public instruction. The government has primary, secondary and technical schools, training colleges for teachers, and schools of agriculture, engineering, law, medicine and veterinary science. The government system, which dates back to a period before the British occupation, is designed to provide, in the main, a European education. In the primary schools Arabic is the medium of instruction, the use of English for that purpose being confined to lessons in that language itself. The school of law is divided into English and French sections according to the language in which the students study law. Besides the government primary and secondary schools, there are many other schools in the large towns owned by the Moslems, Copts, Hebrews, and by various missionary societies, and in which the education is on the same lines. A movement initiated among the leading Moslems led in 1908 to the establishment as a private enterprise of a national Egyptian university devoted to scientific, literary and philosophical studies. Political and religious subjects are excluded from the curriculum and no discrimination in regard to race or religion is allowed.
Education on native lines is given in kuttabs and in the Azhar university in Cairo. Kuttabs are schools attached to mosques, found in every village and in every quarter of the larger towns. In these schools the instruction given before the British occupation was very slight. All pupils were taught to recite portions of the Koran, and a proportion of the scholars learnt to read and write Arabic and a little simple arithmetic. Those pupils who succeeded in committing to memory the whole of the Koran were regarded as fiki (learned in Mahommedan law), and as such escaped liability to military conscription. The government has improved the education given in the kuttabs, and numbers of them have been taken under the direct control of the ministry of public instruction. In these latter schools an excellent elementary secular education is given, in addition to the instruction in the Koran, to which half the school hours are devoted. The number of pupils in 1905 was over 12,000 boys and 2000 girls. Grants-in-aid are given to other schools where a sufficiently good standard of instruction is maintained. No grant is made to any kuttab where any language other than Arabic is taught. In all there are over 10,000 kuttabs, attended by some 250,000 scholars. The number of pupils in private schools under government inspection was in 1898, the first year of the grant-in-aid system, 7536; in 1900, 12,315; in 1905, 145,691. The number of girls in attendance rose from 598 in 1898 to 997 in 1900 and 9611 in 1905. The Copts have about 1000 primary schools, in which the teaching of Coptic is compulsory, a few industrial schools, and one college for higher instruction.
Cairo holds a prominent place as a seat of Moslem learning, and its university, the Azhar, is considered the first of the eastern world. Its professors teach “grammatical inflexion and syntax, rhetoric, versification, logic, theology, the exposition of the Koran, the traditions of the Prophet, the complete science of jurisprudence, or rather of religious, moral, civil and criminal law, which is chiefly founded on the Koran and the traditions, together with arithmetic as far as it is useful in matters of law. Lectures are also given on algebra and on the calculations of the Mahommedan calendar, the times of prayer, &c.” (E. W. Lane, Modern Egyptians). The students come from all parts of the Mahommedan world. They number about 8000, of whom some 2000 are resident. The students pay no fees, and the professors receive no salaries. The latter maintain themselves by private teaching and by copying manuscripts, and the former in the same manner, or by reciting the Koran. To meet the demand for better qualified judges for the Moslem courts a training college for cadis was established in 1907. Besides the subjects taught at the Azhar university, instruction is given in literature, mathematics and physical science. The necessity for a reorganization of the Azhar system itself being also recognized by the high Moslem dignitaries in Egypt, a law was passed in 1907 creating a superior board of control under the presidency of the Sheikh el-Azhar to supervise the proceedings of the university and other similar establishments. This attempt to reform the Azhar met, however, with so much opposition that in 1909 it was, for the time, abandoned.
In 1907, of the sedentary Egyptian population over seven years of age, some 12% of the Moslems could read and write, female literacy having increased 50% since 1897; of the foreign population over seven years of age 75% could read and write. Of the Coptic community about 50% can read and write.