CAIRO — The idea of using religious endowment funds to finance major national investment projects has unleashed a religious controversy about the legality of the use of endowment funds.

On Dec. 26, President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi met with Minister of Religious Endowments Mohamed Mokhtar Jumaa and the head of the Endowments Authority, Ahmed Abdel-Hafiz, to discuss the use of endowment assets to support national projects to help promote growth of the Egyptian economy. Both Jumaa and Abdel-Hafiz expressed agreement with Sisi's overall approach, which he had set in motion in 2016.

The total value of Egypt’s endowment assets and properties is not known. Some press estimates, however, put the value of Islamic endowment assets at about $10 billion, while Abdel-Hafiz estimates the Endowment Authority's total assets, including property and investments, to be about $40 billion.

Religious endowments, or waqfs, consist of income-producing property whose usufruct is assigned by its original owner to a mosque or some other Islamic institution. The endowments are used to carry out charitable works, such as building schools, orphanages, hospitals and mosques, and distributing clothes and food to the poor and needy, among other activities.