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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Lebanon
Index
Figure 5. Distribution of Religious Sects, 1983
Shias during ashura, the
commemoration of the martyrdom of Husayn
Courtesy As'ad AbuKhalil
A women in a Christian village works at home to help
support her family
Courtesy United Nations/Photo by B. Cirone
Divisions within the Christian and Muslim faiths were
considerable, but most observers accepted the Christian-Muslim
dichotomy as the most salient in Lebanese society. Even so,
identification by religious affiliation often blurs subtle social
and economic considerations.
Religion in Lebanon is not merely a function of individual
preference reflected in ceremonial practice of worship. Rather,
religion is a phenomenon that often determines social and political
identification. Hence, religion is politicized by the confessional
quota system in distributing power, benefits, and posts
(see The Basis of Government
, ch. 4).
A sectarian group binds its members together on the basis of
their professed allegiance to the teaching of the faith and their
common location within the sectarian social and political map
(see fig. 5, Distribution
of Religious Sects, 1983). Ethnicity does not
strictly apply to Lebanon's confessional communities, since more
than 90 percent of all Lebanese are ethnically and linguistically
Arabs. But the distinctiveness of Lebanon's confessional
communities approximates the notion of sect to that of ethnicity.
The exceptions are Kurds, Armenians, and Jews, who constitute
ethnic groups in the classical sense. In sum, an understanding of
the Lebanese mosaic requires an awareness of ethnicity and
confessionalism because the similarity between the two concepts has
become clearer in present-day Lebanon, where each sectarian group
has its own agenda, political culture, and leaders.
The exact number of Lebanon's sects has always been disputed.
In 1936, the French Mandate established the first official law
regarding sects in Syria and Lebanon. The sects were enumerated as
follows: nine patriarchal sects, one Latin church, the Protestant
sect (including eleven Christian denominations) and five Muslim
sects (Sunni, Shia, Druze, Alawi, and Ismaili). At that time, the
Muslims rejected their division into separate sects, and
consequently they were excluded from the appendix of the law.
Following independence, only non-Muslims were included in a
1951 law enumerating officially recognized sects in the following
order: Maronites, Greek Orthodox, Greek Catholics, Armenian
Orthodox (Gregorian), Armenian Catholics, Syrian Orthodox
(Jacobites), Syrian Catholics, Chaldean Catholics, Nestorian
Assyrians, Latins (Roman Catholics), Protestants, and Jews. The law
specified that each sect was free to manage its waqf (religious
endowment) properties, as well as its personal status laws for its
members. The Alawi and Ismaili sects were considered numerically
insignificant, which left them without legally sanctioned
institutions. Other Muslim sects, Sunnis, Shias, and Druzes were
considered still covered by the provisions of Ottoman Law.
Data as of December 1987
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