1The great Athanasius of Alexandria wrote in Greek, but anyone who wants to read the earliest writings that he composed as a bishop must do so in Coptic and Syriac translations. These are his Festal Letters, the annual epistles that the bishop of Alexandria sent to Christians in the winter to announce the dates of Easter, Lent, and Pentecost, and to exhort them in the Christian life. The first letter, for Easter 329, survives completely in Syriac and partially in Coptic, and the following year’s letter, for Easter 330, survives fragmentarily only in Coptic.

2Easter was an annual festival modeled on the Jewish Passover, which required sacrifice in the Temple in Jerusalem and involved a dinner that was both festive and solemn. Therefore, the themes of time, place, and food appear frequently in Athanasius’s Easter letters. For example, in his first letter he praised the virtue of being “in season,” as Paul exhorted in 2 Timothy 4:2, and then he turned to the significance of fasting.1 We lack the beginning of the second letter, for Easter 330, but in the surviving fragment, Athanasius extolled the benefits of being alone. All the saints, he wrote, fled the wide and broad way and “remained alone, living virtuously.” He cited as examples Jeremiah, Elijah, Elisha, Moses, Isaac, and Jacob. “Quietness and withdrawal from human beings in the troubles of life,” he argued, are “powerful” practices that make a person a friend of God and worthy of revelation.2

3The two years that postponed and preceded the Twelfth International Congress of Coptic Studies offered the Congress participants and billions of other people ample opportunity to test whether Athanasius was correct about the benefits of being quiet and withdrawn from other human beings. Perhaps some scholars, like me, had mixed feelings as the COVID-19 pandemic spread across the globe in the winter and spring of 2020. On the one hand, I felt anxious and uncertain; I grieved for the sick and dying; and I worried about my vulnerable friends and family. On the other hand, as the commitments that I had made were cancelled, one after another, I experienced freedom and even relief. There were presentations that I no longer had to write, meetings that I did not have to attend, and reports that I would not have to read. I had often hoped to be able to stay home, have nowhere to go, and read and write whatever I wanted without interruption for several months. Now such a time had come.

4I suspect that nearly all scholars take some comfort in being quiet and alone and having time for reading and thinking. How else could we do our work? But I suspect too that this appreciation for being alone can be especially strong among those of us in Coptic studies. Whether we are archaeologists, historians, or papyrologists, and whether we study antiquity, the Middle Ages, or the contemporary Coptic world, we engage with a culture deeply imbued with the values of monasticism. Some of us are monks ourselves; most of us are not. But even those of us who are not monks probably have grown to respect monastic withdrawal and its values of simplicity, stillness, reading, and contemplation. Certainly Athanasius had.3

5I devoted my pandemic time primarily to two scholarly projects. One concerned the Gospel of Judas.4 I found that work fascinating, and I still do, but this “secret report of judgment,” as the author called it, hardly provided any spiritual nourishment as the weeks of isolation became months. But my second project was working with the Roman historian David Gwynn to create the first complete English translation of all of Athanasius’s surviving Festal Letters.5 This was a true labor of love, made possible only by the superb 2003 critical Italian translation by Alberto Camplani, to whom we should be grateful.6

6When Dr. Gwynn and I began work on this task, I had anticipated many of the problems and issues that we had to address—the introduction of the forty-day fast of Lent; the quotation and interpretation of hundreds of biblical passages; the polemic against Arians, Jews, and Melitians; the identification of various consuls and prefects. But as I read the letters in pandemic isolation, I became more interested in something that I had noticed before but had not deeply considered. In 330, as we have seen, the young bishop Athanasius eloquently extolled the virtues of being quiet and apart from other people, but as the years went on, and he found himself exiled and therefore separated from his followers five times, this theme disappeared, and separation became an affliction to be overcome; in turn, Athanasius increasingly praised being together in one place. Perhaps many of us who are introverted scholars experienced something similar: as the pandemic dragged on, the solitude that had at first been a relief became a burden. Rather than withdrawal into quiet, pandemic isolation began to feel like exile.

7The organizers of the Congress and the Board of the International Association for Coptic Studies postponed our assembly in Brussels from 2020 to 2021 and then from 2021 to 2022 reluctantly; we wished to meet on schedule, but the health and safety of the participants and of their families and friends gave us no choice. Likewise, the exiled Athanasius did not choose to be separated from other people; it was forced upon him.7 Exile invited him to think about the costs of being apart and how he and his followers could most benefit from being reunited and celebrating the festival together. Perhaps Athanasius can provide us with some inspiration for thinking about our own negotiation of separation and reunion. The bishop wrote about his experience of exile in multiple works, but the Festal Letters are especially relevant to us because they concerned a regularly scheduled assembly that could not happen as usual.8 The community’s leader, Athanasius, could not be present, but so too the clergy that supported him were absent, and probably many ordinary Christians did not participate in an Easter celebration led by a bishop whom they did not recognize as legitimate.

8The themes of separation and reunion open the tenth Festal Letter, which Athanasius wrote in the winter of 338, not long after returning from his first exile in November 337. He had spent the preceding two Easters in Trier. No Festal Letters from those years survive, but in the letter for 338 Athanasius says that, even though he had been so far away from his people, he had nonetheless fulfilled his duty of notifying them of the approaching feast. He had done so “even from the ends of the earth,” which is what western Europe seemed to him.9

9On the one hand, Athanasius called his separation from the Alexandrians an “affliction” caused by men who were enemies not merely of himself but of the truth. On the other hand, he wrote that, even when brothers and sisters are separated by a vast distance, God brings them together when they consider the same things, pray for one another, and celebrate the feast at the same time. Athanasius then gave thanks to God for his return to Alexandria and his deliverance from his afflictions.10 In this tenth letter, the bishop looked back at exile from the joy of reunion and thus did not dwell long on the pain of separation; instead, he warned his flock against the heresies and plots of those whom he called “Ariomaniacs.”

10Three years later, however, in 341, Athanasius found himself once again in exile, this time in Rome. From there he sent his thirteenth Festal Letter, which provides a much more extensive meditation on the affliction of separation.11 All human beings are tested by afflictions, labors, and sufferings in this world, the bishop wrote, and these tests come from God. God tests his people with afflictions for one of two reasons. The first is so that true saints, like Job and Paul, may display their virtue to others and so provide inspiring examples. In the case of more normal people, afflictions from God are meant to provoke greater self-awareness: in times of trouble and suffering, we can see our true character and recognize both our strengths and our shortcomings. Therefore, Athanasius and his followers should celebrate Easter with joy, knowing that they suffer for the sake of the truth and that their afflictions will make them better people. Athanasius did not deny that separation is still painful, and thus God encouraged him to write a letter, so that, he said, “we might comfort ourselves and incite one another to the good.”

11I find three aspects of Athanasius’s discussions of separation possibly relevant to our experience of pandemic isolation and the difficulty of meeting together in person under the shadow of disease.

12First, Athanasius forthrightly acknowledged that separation is both painful and potentially productive. On the one hand, he invites us not to be reluctant to share the ways in which the last two years have been difficult for us. Pandemic isolation has undermined our scholarly work in very practical ways. Some of us have had to care for children who could not go to school or take care of elderly relatives who could not fend for themselves, and some of us have been sick. Probably all of us had trouble getting books from closed libraries. But even more, the pandemic has affected us emotionally, leaving us exhausted and making the disciplined toil of research more challenging than ever. Many days watching a comedy series on television has been far more appealing to me than reading another page of Shenoute.

13And yet Athanasius claimed that afflictions could produce greater self-awareness and a resolve to amend one’s life in certain ways. I hope that the pandemic has been an opportunity to reflect on the priorities we set in our personal and professional lives. What sacrifices have we made in our pursuit of publications? Why have we chosen the scholarly projects that we have? Have these been the right choices for ourselves and for the fields to which we seek to contribute? As the pandemic recedes, how might we fashion personal and professional lives that reflect renewed appreciation for what is truly important for us and for Coptic studies? If we ask ourselves such questions and then act on the answers, we will acknowledge, as Athanasius did, that we can learn from the difficulties that we have endured.

14Second, Athanasius was confident that distance could be overcome through letter writing. In this respect he continued a Christian tradition that goes back to Saint Paul, who believed that a letter could substitute imperfectly for his physical presence (1 Cor 10:1–11). The loss of letters from both Paul and Athanasius reveals the fragility of ancient mail and manuscript reproduction. Today we have email, texting, and video calls to remain in contact with those from whom we are separated, and in the scholarly community we all have become experts in the use of virtual meeting software.

15The organizers of this Congress remained determined to hold an entirely in-person meeting—and rightly so. There are irreplaceable benefits to being physically together, especially when we meet only every four years. In-person discussions are only imperfectly replicated in virtual meetings, and nothing can replace the informal discussions that happen over coffee, during meals, and when walking from session to session. The quadrennial in-person Congress must remain at the center of our Association’s life.

16And yet the pandemic has revealed to us how much can be accomplished virtually. The Board of the IACS used to meet only every two years—at the Congress and two years before the Congress at the planned site. That certainly limited how much the Board could accomplish. In 2022, however, the Board, despite having members on three different continents (Australia, Europe, and North America) was able to meet virtually three times before the Congress. I hope that the new Board will continue to exploit this possibility in the years ahead and thus find ways for the IACS to be more active than it has been in the past.

17Moreover, the obstacles to attending this Congress that many scholars have encountered represent only an intensification of difficulties that many IACS members face even in the best of times. The cost of travel to and lodging in distant locations, family and institutional responsibilities, personal health and mobility issues, the environmental damage of air travel—these and other factors prevent or discourage colleagues from attending the Congress. Such problems especially affect scholars in Egypt and graduate students wherever they are; the political and economic conditions of 2022 prevented many colleagues from Egypt and Russia from attending. Fortunately, the organizers were able to make it possible for many of these colleagues to present their papers online to those in person. The IACS and the directors of the Congress—and above all, the generous Hany Takla and Christian Cannuyer—have worked to make funds available to some scholars in need, but I believe that we should explore how virtual tools can enhance the access of a wider range of scholars to the conversations in Coptic studies. Holding a hybrid meeting is complex and expensive, but some professional associations, such as the Society of Biblical Literature in North America, are beginning to supplement their regular in-person meeting with a regular virtual meeting. We would do well to follow Athanasius in using whatever means of communication we have to overcome the distances between us and to enable those who cannot travel to participate in our conversations.

18Third, Athanasius told his followers that, even if they were separated, they were together in spirit if they considered the same things, prayed for one another, and celebrated the same festival. So too, even in isolation, I found myself less alone as I read and learned from the articles and books of colleagues who are near and far, alive and dead, and I knew that scholars scattered in places like Australia, Egypt, and Europe were working on the same texts and problems. Even more profoundly, the scholarly world, including Coptology, is not immune from the tensions and debates that have divided well-meaning people over the last several years. The ethics of cultural heritage, questions of inclusion and diversity, keeping the humanities alive and relevant in an age of skepticism—these are issues that have the potential to divide us, but we can find unity in our shared commitment to Coptic studies and our willingness to listen to and learn from one another.

19By using new forms of communication, by reflecting on what’s valuable in our professional lives and what should be changed, and by rededicating ourselves to our shared interest in Coptic history, literature, and culture, we can imitate how Athanasius encouraged Egyptian Christians to deal with separation and distance.

20Athanasius not only addressed separation in his Festal Letters; he devoted far more attention to how Egyptian Christians should come together to celebrate the Pasch. What are the right and wrong ways for the community to gather and commemorate the events of Good Friday and Easter? For one thing, Athanasius condemned Christians who celebrated Easter with excessive feasting and drunkenness.12 Although it behooves participants in a scholarly Congress to avoid excess in eating and drinking, I recommend that we set aside Athanasius on this point and enjoy with no guilt the food and drink that our hosts have generously prepared and that the great city of Brussels offers. With greater relevance tous, Athanasius encouraged his followers to assemble for and observe the Paschal feast with two virtuous dispositions—ethical behavior and enthusiastic attentiveness.

21First, Athanasius repeatedly exhorted Christians to observe Easter by living virtuously. In fact, he sometimes defined the Passover as ethical reformation. “Truly the Passover is abstinence from evil in favor of virtue and the passage from death to life,” he wrote in 333.13 In the second letter he composed, for Easter 330, Athanasius concluded in this way:

For truly this is the feast: when sinners transfer themselves from the sinful life to the better one; when we remember the poor and do not neglect hospitality; when we clothe the naked and welcome into our homes those who have no homes; above all, when we have love for God and our neighbor, fulfilling the law and the prophets.14

22Athanasius did not leave his exhortations to virtue abstract, but he listed concrete actions that Christians must perform—care for the poor and homeless, disciplined sexuality, and so on—that is, the asceticism of the ordinary Christian.15

23As we resume in-person conferences, let us commit ourselves to ethical behavior in our dealings with one another, to treating one another with respect and empathy, and to the hospitable inclusion of colleagues of all races, nationalities, gender identities, professional positions, and ages. At this meeting the IACS Board asks us also to consider ethical behavior in the handling of items of cultural heritage, including papyri, manuscripts, and artifacts of all kinds. The Board has proposed a statement, and at the Business Meeting on Saturday we will ask the members in attendance to authorize an on-line vote on it.16 By adopting such a statement we join other major professional organizations, including the Society for Classical Studies, the American Society of Papyrologists, and the Association internationale de papyrologues (AIP). When we discuss these important questions, we should listen with special respect and attention to our Egyptian and Coptic colleagues. To be sure, the literary, artistic, and material products of Coptic culture speak to all people and belong rightly to the shared inheritance of the best of human thought and action. I have conducted my professional life from that conviction. Nonetheless, we must consider carefully how our actions contribute, wittingly or not, to the illegal trade in antiquities and to the unauthorized despoiling of Egyptians and Copts of their unique heritage. Moreover, the IACS needs to be more proactive in including in its offices and on the Board scholars from areas other than Europe and North America and scholars who work on medieval and modern Coptic literature, history, and culture. In so doing we will follow Athanasius’s exhortations to come together to reflect on how me might transfer ourselves to a more virtuous life.

24Second, Athanasius warned Christians against coming to the Passover “unthinkingly or inattentively”; rather, they should come “enthusiastically and attentively.” The bishop quoted Luke 22:15, in which Jesus says to his disciples, “I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you.” Christians should likewise approach the feast with the eager desire that Jesus expressed. Enthusiastic attention is required, Athanasius claimed, because the goal of the feast is to arouse the mind and compel the intellect to contemplate good things.17

25I suspect that, after we have waited six years for another Congress, I do not need to encourage anyone here to be enthusiastic. But I have found in my teaching that two years of teaching and meeting with other people virtually has left me and my students less adept at giving our full attention in person. I find myself more tempted to drift away from the lecture or discussion and check my cell phone or tablet. Sometimes my in-person students forget they are not at home and muted, and they talk to a neighbor. In general, we have become, I think, more passive in how we take in what we get through a screen. Despite our enthusiasm, then, it may take a while for some of us to get back our meeting skills fully. On the one hand, let us be patient with folks like me who may be less adept than we once were at in-person interaction. On the other hand, let us redouble our efforts to listen to each paper attentively, to engage in discussions generously, and to offer each other constructive suggestions about our work.

26Athanasius composed his final Festal Letter in winter 373, only months before he died in May. Unfortunately, only two short fragments survive, although both do so in the original Greek. In these fragments Athanasius treated the sacrifices made in the Jerusalem Temple as symbols of the new Christian practice. In the first fragment he said that Christians make their sacrifices when they recognize their fellowship with poor. In the second he celebrated the inclusion of Gentiles like himself in the people of God. “This is a great sign,” he wrote, “that we who were strangers are called member of the household, that we who were once foreigners have become fellow citizens of the saints, and that we have been named children of the Jerusalem above, of which what Solomon constructed was a type.”18 Athanasius rejoiced that he had been included in the community of Christians, even if he did not deserve that inclusion. Likewise, I celebrate that I have been included in the community of scholars who study the Coptic heritage and who make its riches and insights available to students, to scholars beyond the borders of Coptology, and to the wider public. I encourage us to expand that community and to foster stronger connections among its members, whether we are meeting in person at a Congress or dispersed across the globe in our solitary studies.