Nation
Egypt
EE-jipt · Modern Egypt
Egypt is a nation of the biblical world.
What is known
History
- Founded
- One of the ancient world's oldest civilizations, a Roman province by the NT era
- Population
- Estimated 4–7 million residents in Roman Egypt in the 1st century AD, including a substantial Jewish diaspora community — Philo put it at 'no fewer than a million' (In Flaccum 43), though many historians consider that figure inflated and the actual number is uncertain
- Coordinates
- 31.1980° N, 29.9192° E
Archaeology
By the Roman period, Egypt held one of the largest Jewish diaspora communities in the ancient world, with Jews occupying two of Alexandria's five quarters. Archaeological evidence including the 2nd-century Catacombs of Kom el-Shoqafa documents this sizeable, Greek-speaking Jewish population. No single site is tied to the biblical flight-into-Egypt narrative itself; later Coptic tradition places holy-family stops at multiple locations, but these are devotional rather than archaeologically confirmed.
Scripture references
- Matthew 2:13-15 — The flight into Egypt
- Acts 2:10
- Acts 7:9-36
On a modern map
Further reading
Reflect
Egypt sheltered Jacob's family before it enslaved their children — is any comfort in your life slowly becoming a captivity?
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