Early Christianity in Arabia/Section 13

by Thomas Wright

SECTION XIII.

The same year which had witnessed the defeat of the Christian power in Arabia by the idolaters of Mecca, about two months after that event,^[1] and whilst Abrahah still occupied the throne of Yaman,^[2] gave birth to one of the greatest enemies the church has ever experienced. The grandfather of Muhammed was the same Abdolmotalleb who had opposed the arms of Abrahah, who was not only the chief of the tribe of Koreish, but appears to have been related to the royal family of Hamyar.^[3] The history of Muhammed prior to his assumption of the character of a prophet is exceedingly obscure, perhaps we may venture to say entirely unknown. The earliest Arabian writers who have composed his life lived at least some centuries after the events they relate;^[4] and the evident absurdity of the greater part of their anecdotes is sufficient to justify us in rejecting the whole. One portion was most likely invented by the impostor himself, the other, perhaps the greater, was the work of his followers.^[5] Amongst the ignorant and superstitious every uncommon event is full of mystery and terror, an ominous intimation of the events of futurity, and thus the revolutions of comets drag with them those of kingdoms and empires, and every meteor or planetary motion is the precursor of misery of famine, or of massacres. Abundance of such inauspicious appearances, if we believe the historians of the time, announced the coming of the future scourge of Rome and Persia. The hour which gave him birth extinguished the eternal fires on the idolatrous altars of Persepolis:^[6] and at the same time fourteen towers of the royal palace of Noushirwan at Modaïne (Al Madayn) fell with a terrible crash, portending by their downfall that of the empire of the Khosroës.^[7] The confidential minister of the Persian king, Al Mûbedhân, in addition to these prodigies, dreamt that he saw his camel beaten by an Arabian horse, and that the river Tigris had overflowed its bounds. The minister of Noushirwan, we are told, was endowed with the faculty of divination, and in the morning he compared his dream with the other events of the night, and was enabled to inform the terrified monarch that some new and unexpected danger was impending from the quarter in which Arabia lay. The king immediately conferred with Al Nomân, the king of Hirah, by whose advice he deputed Abdo'l-Masihun, an Arab of the tribe of Ghassan, to make strict inquiries throughout the peninsula.^[8] Such were the events which, according to the Arabian writers, preceded the coming of their prophet. But part of the Persian palace might have fallen, or the sacred fires might have been unexpectedly extinguished, had Muhammed never been born.

From his birth to his fortieth year, Muhammed is said to have been educated, and to have lived, in the sinful and idolatrous manners of his fellow countrymen.^[9] Part of the intervening period he is reported to have spent in Syria, but in what manner may be considered as somewhat uncertain.^[10] His usurpation of the title of a prophet of God was doubtlessly a plot which had been maturely formed, and his expectations of its ultimate success were entirely grounded on the political state of the age. He had watched with no eye of unconcern the two great rival empires tearing each other to pieces, and he had ventured from the first to promise his followers the plunder of the treasures of Khosroës and of Cæsar.^[11] He saw how readily the Arabs of the north embraced the new faith of the Christians, and he doubted not that a new religion, formed agreeable to their character, and seconded by the pretence of a divine mission, would be equally successful among the Arabs of the interior. His first attempts, which were made on his own family and relations, were enforced by dint of persuasion and deception. When, however, he began to make public his pretensions, he met with greater opposition than perhaps he had expected; the Koreish were bigotted to their old idolatrous creed, and the Christians and Jews would do all in their power to set their minds against him. His persuasions were treated with contempt, his threats were resented with violence, and his followers were obliged to seek refuge from persecution in Ethiopia, and himself, with some of his most faithful partisans, at the city of Yatreb or Medina.^[12]

In his prophetic character, Muhammed had hitherto affected to profess the meek humility of that Jesus, whose ministry he pretended that he was come to supersede, and declared that it was not the will of God that his worship should be propagated by force.^[13] But change of power brought with it change of principles. He had now gained a band of followers, and became in every sense a robber, a bandit, an enemy of all around him; a year or two brought about another change, and he became a conqueror. To recount the predatory exploits of the prophet and his followers against the various tribes around Medina, would but be wearisome to the reader:^[14] within eight years after his flight, Muhammed was solemnising the festival of the Ramadhân at Kodaïd, on his way to the conquest of Mecca.^[15] The Koreish were terror-struck at his unexpected approach, and the city was quickly delivered into his hands.

Muhammed was sensible that by acquiring possession of the sacred city he had not secured the affections of the Koreish; but by an affected show of clemency he hoped to banish hatred and distrust from their minds. The keys of the Kaaba were delivered to him by Otham; but he returned them to their former possessor, who either won by his clemency, or awed by his sword, embraced the faith of the conqueror.^[16] Khalid was severely reprimanded for permitting the slaughter of eight and twenty of the Koreish, and a general pardon was extended to the whole tribe, with the exception of six men and four women, who had been notorious for their hatred to the doctrines and person of the prophet. The penitence, however, or rather the riches and influence, of Hobar ibn al Aswad, who had been his personal enemy, procured his pardon, and he was informed that Islamism had the power of effacing and abolishing all past offences.^[17] Amongst the Celtic inhabitants of ancient Britain, the bards had a predominating influence over the mind of the prince and his warriors, and it is pretended that they roused the resentment of the English king Edward, as being the greatest obstacle to his conquests. A similar influence was enjoyed by the poets of the turbulent tribes of Arabia, and several, who had drawn on themselves the wrath of the conqueror by the bitterness of their invectives against him, were included among the number of the proscribed.^[18] The poet Achsa had made verses in honour of Muhammed, and was once on his way to visit him, but the Koreish, fearing lest his verses might encourage the Arabs to fight in the cause of their enemy, prevailed on him to return.^[19] Chofah ibn Nadijah, another poet of celebrity, was slain in the war between Muhammed and his native tribe.^[20] Caab ben Zohair, as well as his father Zohair, were among the most celebrated of the Arabian bards, and belonged to the family of Kais Ghilan, of the tribe of the Masenites. His grandfather, uncle, and many of his kinsmen, had also excelled in the same art.^[21] Muhammed considered that the same talents which had been exerted against him, might be equally efficacious when employed in his service; their conversion procured them a share in the pardon,^[22] and the clemency of the prophet was rewarded with a poem by Caab composed in his praise.^[23] This piece of flattery appears to have had its desired effect, and the son of Zohair was rewarded by the gift of Muhammed's own cloak.^[24] The poets Amru'l-Kais^[25] and Lebid were also amongst the enemies of the new religion, but the latter changed, his opinions on reading one of the chapters of the Koran which had been suspended on the walls of the Kaaba, and Muhammed gloried in his conversion.^[26] His example was followed among others by the poet Alhothaijah, who afterwards deserted and relapsed into his former opinions.^[27]

The year which made Muhammed master of Mecca, may be considered as that which established the religion of Islam, and the empire of the Saracens. The greater part of the Arabian tribes had been expecting in silence the issue of the contest; the possession of the Kaaba had made the Koreish the most powerful of the independent tribes, and their fall was speedily followed by the subjugation of the rest. Embassies and deputations crowded from all quarters seeking the protection and favour of the victor, and the Giadamites, and some few others, were solitary instances of opposition.^[28]

When we contemplate with impartiality the character of Muhammed, we must be convinced that he was a man of superior natural abilities to most of his contemporary countrymen. The influence, however, which he obtained over his disciples, was in most cases the effect of the lowest species of cunning, working on an ignorant class of people. His enterprise was begun and carried through under the pompous title of a divine mission, and its authority was supported by documents which he asserted to have been an immediate communication of the Deity, and which his own affected ignorance of writing and reading satisfied them were not his own. These documents collected together formed the Koran, that mass of wild and unmeaning matter, which has been received so devoutly by his followers.^[29]

If we consult the opinions of the Moslem on the subject of the Koran, we shall find them as unintelligible and incoherent as the work itself. One tells us that it contains sixty thousand miracles;^[30] another that it is itself a miracle greater even than that of raising the dead to life;^[31] and all true believers were compelled to acknowledge that it was uncreate, and had been in existence long before the creation of the world.^[32] When we turn to the Christian writers, we find many of their opinions equally inconsistent, and scarcely more satisfactory;^[33] but presuming on this reputed ignorance of the impostor, they have generally agreed in assigning to him at least an assistant in its composition. Muhammed himself complains that on their first publication, some had attributed his Korans to human authority, and even intimates that a stranger was the object of their suspicions, and the argument by which he repels the charge is calculated to convince no one but a Mussulman.^[34] The generality of the Arabian commentators are agreed that the person suspected was a Greek, or at least, a Christian.^[35] That others were concerned in his plans, and assisted him perhaps by publishing his miracles, we may easily believe; but the legends of Bohira, or Sergius, are obscure, absurd, and therefore improbable.^[36]

The Arabian writers have improved upon the asserted ignorance of Muhammed; and it has become a fundamental principle of belief that he could neither read nor write a single letter.^[37] This, combined with the pure and elegant language in which they agree that the Koran is not only unequalled, but that it is utterly impossible to equal it, is one of their great arguments for its divine extraction. But those who have most obstinately defended the ignorance of Muhammed, contrasted with the elegance of the Koran, with a view of depriving him of the credit of its composition, have not contemplated the state of literature in Arabia at the time of his appearance, or considered what might, under his peculiar circumstances, bear such a denomination. The time of his birth was the golden age of Arabian literature, for it was during the reign of Amru ben Hind at Hirah, who was contemporary with the greatest of the Arabian poets.^[38] Under the despotic government of the khalifs the Arabs might be more celebrated for their learning, for their skill in astrology, in grammar, in geography, or in the more abstruse science of geometry and numbers, but taste and purity of language belonged only to their free ancestors of the ages which preceded the reign of Islam. As the writers of the age of fallen Greece employed their talents in writing scholia on the pure writers of past times, so the learned Saracens could only recite and explain the works of the illiterate writers who preceded them, without possessing the power to imitate them. The poets of Arabia, like the bards of the west, were not shackled by minute and crippling rules of composition, their works were the spontaneous productions of their imagination, and perhaps they might disdain the servile task of perpetuating their effusions by the use of writing. At least we may suppose that skill in writing was no proof of a liberal education, as among their descendants it has generally been the business of more servile minds.^[39] The genius of Muhammed might equal that of any of his contemporaries,^[40] and it would be quite sufficient to produce the Koran, although he were unable to write at all.

The poet Lebid, the last of the seven authors of the Moallakat, pretended to be converted to the religion of Muhammed, by reading a single passage out of the second Sura of the Koran. He had suspended his own poem in the Kaaba to challenge competition; on his return he found the passage from the Koran which Muhammed had placed by the side of it; he read it, instantly withdrew his own, and declared that no one was able to write such elegant language without divine inspiration. The passage is still extant, and is considered one of the most beautiful in the Koran, but it does not answer the expectations which we might be led to form, and speaks less to the credit of Muhammed, than it evinces the bad taste of Lebid.^[41] The language of these vaunted revelations is not more calculated to strike with conviction than the matter they contain. Had the people been more civilized, the clumsiness of Muhammed's miracles must in themselves have frustrated his purposes. But the monks, who in this kind of argument were not inferior to himself, had paved the way, the angel Gabriel most providentially forbade discussion or controversy, and the swords of his associates effected the rest. He knew that his religion was weak in spiritual strength, and he called upon his people to defend it with the strength of their arms.

There were three classes of people in Arabia whom it was Muhammed's wish to conciliate, — the Koreish and other tribes who were idolaters — the Christians — and the Jews.^[42] The conversion of the Koreish was always the first object of his desire. The possession of the Kaaba would give him an influence over that vast number of pilgrims who yearly repaired to it; he changed indeed the name but not the form of their rites, and the idolatrous worshippers of its idols continued to encompass it with their steps in the name of the prophet.^[43] When he entered Mecca as a conqueror, he gave immediate orders for the destruction of its idols, but he appeased their exasperated adorers by his extravagant tales of the sanctity of their abode. He declared to them that the place was the immediate choice of God;^[44] that the same day in which the Almighty had created the heaven and the earth, he had established Mecca to be an inviolable sanctuary and asylum;^[45] in the time of Adam the spot was occupied by a tent sent down from heaven to serve as a place for man to render worship to his Creator, and to solicit the forgiveness of his sins, and the holy tent was often visited by Adam and Seth, till the latter built over it a temple of stone for the use of his posterity; this temple having been overthrown by the deluge, was rebuilt by Abraham and his son Ismael.^[46] The Arabians had been long famed among profane and ecclesiastical writers for the worship of a stone;^[47] it was this stone, placed in the most holy spot of the Kaaba, that attracted the homage of so many thousands; Muhammed encouraged the continuance of the same adoration, and declared that this holy stone came out of paradise, and was brought from heaven by Gabriel, who gave it to Abraham; the Christians, with more truth, declared it to be an ancient idol, the personification of Venus;^[48] the same charge was alleged by the Carmathians, who carried it away among the plunder of Mecca during the khalifate of Mocktader,^[49] and it has been again renewed by the Wahabites of the present day.^[50] Thus the religion of Muhammed was established without altering the form of that which had preceded it, the worship of the Pagan Arabs was permitted to proceed in its usual course, the Koreish were still allowed the possession of the house of God, and continued to reap the same profit as usual from the devotees who came to visit the Kaaba, and drink of the sacred well of Zemzem, to which their devotion was increased by the assurance that it was the identical spring which had been produced by God to allay the thirst of Hagar and Ismael.^[51] The memory of those who had constructed the fiery pits into which were thrown the Christians of Nadjran, was marked with detestation,^[52] but the recent glory of his tribe was sanctified by divine revelation, and it was declared that God himself, by his miraculous interposition, had punished the impiety of Abrahah, who had dared to violate the sanctity of a place which had been made holy by the presence of the patriarchs.^[53] The new religion was suited to the inclinations of those for whom it was made, for it allowed and even encouraged their predatory habits, and flattered their lusts.^[54]

At first Muhammed affected to shew great favour towards the Christians. His nurse was an Ethiopian slave,^[55] and in his own country, as well as during his stay in Syria, he must have had numerous opportunities of learning the corrupted doctrines of Christianity then professed in those parts, and the characters of their professors. "Tell them," he said to Omar, "that their souls are as our souls, their riches as our riches, and that we rejoice at their prosperity, and grieve for their misfortunes, as we do for our own. He who oppresses a Christian shall have him for an accuser at the day of judgment. He who injures a Christian injures me."^[56] He saw with what ease every new sectary obtained a party amongst them, and it was his object to gain one to support himself. He accused them of a blind and improper submission to their monks and priests,^[57] whilst he wished to reduce them to a still more blind subjection to himself. He acknowledged the Gospel history, and the books of the Old Testament, he even made the history, sanctity, and miracles of Jesus a fundamental part of his belief,^[58] and on the conversion of a Jew he was compelled first to acknowledge the Redeemer,^[59] and to believe in his miraculous birth. But he said they had lost or altered the true Gospel, and accused them of having corrupted its doctrines by their dissensions and divisions.^[60] He told them that he was come direct from God for the purpose of composing their dissensions, and to lead them in the right way, that he had existed before the existence of the world, which was made for him,^[61] artfully applying to himself the prophecies of former ages.^[62] With these professions, he invited the Christians to join his standard,^[63] and declared his willingness to embrace them. The wild professions and doctrines of Manes and Mazdak had found numbers to embrace them, and they were less rational even than those of Muhammed.

The Jews were, perhaps, least inclined to embrace the proposals of the impostor, yet his followers were allied to them by similarity of customs and traditions, and, when they were included amongst the number of those who were invited to repentance, many, believing Muhammed to be the promised Messiah, were induced to join him.^[64]

1. Five and fifty nights after بخمس وخمسن ليلة‎ according to Nuweir, p. 92, that is, he adds, بعد عشرين سنة من ملك انوشروان‎ in the twentieth year of the reign of Noushirwan.
2. Hamza, p. 40.
3. When he went to congratulate Seif Dzi Jezen on his restoration to the crown of Hamyar, Seif demanded who he was. "I am," said he, "Abdolmotalleb, the son of Hashem, the son of Abd Menáf." " Then," said the king, "you are the son of our brother," ابن اخينا‎ Mesoud, p. 152.
4. The Sonna, which is the chief source of the Arabian histories of Muhammed, was not compiled within two or three centuries of the time in which he lived. Abulfeda, who is the best authority, was king of Hamah, and was born in the year 672 of the Hegira, and died in 733. The Greek historians who were nearly contemporary with Muhammed, give no particulars of his life. Nicephorus, who was born about a.d. 758, and wrote the Byzantine history from the death of Maurice, does not give any account of Muhammed, but says that A.D. 631, the Saracens broke out from Æthribus (Αιθριβου—Yatreb) a region of Arabia Felix, and invaded the surrounding regions, (p. 15,) and that in 634 they invaded the district of Antioch, and committed many atrocities, but were defeated. (p. 16.) At pp. 17, 18, he gives a brief history of the invasion of Syria by Omar. The later writers, Theophanes, Zonaras, Euthymius, &c. have taken all they say of him from Saracen information.
5. The following may be taken as a tolerable specimen of their compositions—Un jour Abdo'llah (the father of Muhammed) raconta à son père un miracle des plus surprenans: "ô mon père," dit-il, "après m'être promené dans le champ des cailloux de la Mecque, comme j'étois au haut du mont Yatreb, il sortit incontinent de mon dos deux lumières, dont l'une s'éleva vers l'orient, et l'autre vers l'occident. En même tems ces deux lumières, après avoir fait dans l'air plusieurs cercles, entrelacés l'un dans l'autre, se rejoignirent ensemble en forme d'une nuée subtile et raréfiée, qui s'envolant vers le ciel, y entra et disparut à mes yeux: Un moment après, cette nuée sortit du ciel, elle ce rapprocha de moi en un clein d'œil; et comme je m'assis au même lieu, saisi d'étonnement, j'entendis une voix, comme sortant de dessous moi, et qui me dit: Paix soit à toi, ô Abdo'llah, dans le dos du quel est renfermée la lumiére Mahomed. Puis m'étant avancé çà et là en quelque lieu sec et aride pour m'y asseoir, sous quelqu'arbre, l'herbe et l'arbre reverdissaient, l'arbre même recourbait sur moi ses branches; et quand je m'en éloignais, la terre où il était planté semblait se mouvoir vers moi, pour me congratuler. Gagnier, Vie de Moham. tom. i. p. 63.
6. Sir W. Ouseley, Travels in Pers. vol. ii. Abulfeda, Vit. Moham. p. 3.
7.  

   وبات ايوان كسري وهو منصدع
   كشمل اصحاب كسري غير ملتعم٭‎

   "And the portico of Kisra (Khosroës) became broken, as also the friends of Kisra were not in unity." Abu Abdallæ carmen mysticum Borda dictum, ed. Uria, 4to. Traj. 1771, complet 61, &c. See also Abulfed. Vit. Moham. p. 3. (ed. Gagn.)

8. Abulfeda, de Vit. Moham. ibid. Abu Abdallah, p. 25. Gagnier, Vie de Mahomet, tom. i. p. 79.
9. Maracci, Prodrom. pp. 10, 16.
10. The oriental accounts of his mercantile life, and his expeditions to Bostra and Damascus, are very little to be depended upon. I am not aware of one contemporary or nearly contemporary writer who mentions them, and if known to the Christian writers, they would certainly have taken advantage of them in their controversial writings. Michael Febure, in his Teatro della Turchia, says that Muhammed was a soldier in the army of Heraclius, and that he had deserted, and afterwards, with the assistance of Sergius, had raised a rebellion in Arabia. It would be curious to know what was his authority. If such had been the case, Muhammed would not fail to conceal it, and in the state in which Arabia was, few or none would be likely to know whether in Syria he had acted the part of a soldier or a merchant. See Maracci, p. 36.
11. Afterwards, in expressing their discontent, some of his followers complained — "promittebat nobis Mohammed fore, ut Kesræ et Cæsaris thesauros devoraremus." Abulfed. Vit. Moham. p. 76.
12. Abulfeda, de Vit. Moham. c. xi. p. 23, &c.
13. Koran, Sura 2.
14. The exploits of Muhammed from the hegira, or flight, to the conquest of Mecca, are given compendiously by Gibbon, and in detail by Gagnier and Abulfeda.
15. Gagnier, Vie de Mahomet, tom. ii. p. 114. Kodaïd is described by Al Edrisi, as a place between Medina and Mecca, seventy miles from the latter, and five from the sea.
16. Gagnier, tom. ii. p. 131.
17. Id. ib.
18. Gagnier, tom. ii. p. 207.
19. Fundgruben des Orients, band v. pp. 3, 4.
20. Rasmussen, Hist. Præcip. Arab. regn. p. 93.
21. Freytag, prologus in Carmen Caabi ben Sohair, p. xii. xiii.
22. Gagnier, tom. iii. p. 207.
23. The original Arabic of this poem, with a Latin version, has been edited in 4to. by Freytag, under the title of Caabi ben Sohair carmen in laudem Mobammedis dict. cum carm. Motenabbi et carmine ex Hamasa. Hal. 1823.
24. Caab filius Zoheir, cui, quamvis sibi infesto, ob elegantissimum epigramma iu laudem suam conscriptum, lacernam propriam donavit. Maracci, Vit. Moham. p. 28.
25. Amru'l-Kais wrote satires against Mohammed. D'Herbelot, Bibliothèque Orientale, in Amru'l-Kais.
26. Peiper, Dissertat. de Moallaka Lebidi, p. 13.
27. Freytag, prolog. in carmen Caabi ben Sohair, p. xiv.
28. Al Bochanu, ap. Gagnier, not. in Abulfed. p. 111. Gagnier, Vie de Moham. tom. ii. p. 154.
29. Vix dici potest, quid determinate contineat Alcoranus: est enim miscella et farrago innumerarum rerum. Maracci, p. 34. The German translator of Mosheim, J. A. Christoph von Einem, imagined that the work which now bears this name is not the real Koran of Mohammed. Das Buch, welches von den Mahumedaner der Koran genennt wird, bestehet aus verschiedenen Papieren und Reden, die Man nach seinem Tode gefunden und gesammlet hat, und ist nicht das achte Gesetz, dessen Vortreflichkeit Muhammed selbst so sehr erhebt. Veilleicht lieset Man einige Stükke des wahren Korans in dem heutigen Koran: dass aber der eigentliche Koran, oder das von Muhammed den Arabern vorgeschriebene Gesetz, von Muhammed selbst in unserm Koran aufseinen wahren Koran sich beruft, und ihn lobt. Ein Buch, welches in einem andern Buche empfohlen und gelobt wird, das muss von dem Buche, in welchem es gelobt wird, unterschieden sein. (not. in Mosheim, band iii. pp. 221, 292.) But H. von Einem does not appear to have considered that each Sura was originally a separate Koran, and therefore that one Koran might without impropriety be mentioned and extolled in another.
30. Al Janabi, ap. Maracci, Vit. Moham. p. 43.
31. Ahmed ibn Abdolhalim, ibid.
32. Maracci, p. 44.
33. Maracci piously thinks that it may be the production of the devil, who appeared to Muhammed in the shape of an angel. Est enim locutio Alcoranica valde similis illi qua utuntur dæmones in energumenis, vel arreptitiis, vel quando se ab hominibus audiri sinunt. (p. 41). Maracci lived in a superstitious age, and we must pardon his want of judgment, and excuse his credulity.
34. "We know indeed that they already say—truly a man teacheth him: but the language of him whom they suspect is a barbarous language, and this is pure Arabic عربي مبين‎." Koran, Sur. 16. § 100.
35. Maracci, p. 37.
36. On Muhammed's first journey to Bostra, they tell us, a certain learned monk, called Bohira, or Sergius, or according to others, Caab, met him, and declared that he was destined by God to be his prophet, that he had read prophecies of him in the evangelists and in the prophets, and that he had a book, which was written in the time of Christ, and which related entirely to Muhammed, and contained his whole history. Maracci, p. 13. The words of the Koran afford indisputable testimony that some one was suspected of assisting Muhammed, and that he was a stranger; by comparing this with the legends of Bohira, I think it not improbable that some such Christian was an accomplice with him, and that he was employed in spreading reports of his sanctity, and in publishing false prophecies of his mission. The Arabic and Christian legends may be consulted in Maracci, pp. 35, 36; Gagnier, tom. i. p. 79; Abulpharagius, in the Arabic edition of Pococke, p. 162; Sale, Preliminary Discourse, § 2; Prideaux, who supposes him to have been a Jew. Euthymius says that the doctrines of Muhammed were composed of the dogmata of the Nestorians, Arians, and Jews. Maomethica, pp. 537, 552, in the Bibliotheca Veterum Patrum, tom. xii.
37. Chardin, Voyages on Perse, tom. iv. p. 33. A Persian poet cited by d'Herbelot in Mohammed, speaking of the prophet, says —"Mon bien-aimé n'a jamais été a l'écôle et n'a jamais sçu écrire une seule ligne, et cependant il sçait resoudre, d'un seul clin d'œil, toutes les plus grandes difficultés." p. 649.
38. Maracci, Vit. Muham. p. 10.
39. An illustration of this may be found in the travels of D'Arvieux in Arabia.
40. Muhammed war ein Genie, er fühlte das Schöne, doch misglückte ihm aus grosser Unkunde das Nachamen, und nur von selbst brachen bisweilen durch seine ungelehrte Erziehung eigenthümliche Funchen des Schönen hervor. Michaelis, Review of Boysen's Koran, in the Orientalische Bibliothek, band viii. p. 75.
41. The language of the Koran, and the history of Lebid, is discussed at length by Michaelis, in the Vorrede to his German edition of the Arabic Grammar of Erpenius.
42. "Truly, those who believe, and those who are Jews, and the Christians, and the Sabæans, whoever will believe in God and in the last day, and shall act uprightly; they shall have their reward with their God, neither shall they fear, or be sad." Sur. ii. § 61.
43. Maracci, p. 27. In Chardin's time the number of pilgrims who visited Mecca every year was estimated at 900,000. Voyage en Perse, tom. iv. p. 168. Warner pretended that the Koreish had abstained from idolatry from the time of Abraham to that of Muhammed, and that they worshipped one God. Vertot, discours sur l'Alcoran, in his Histoire des Chevaliers de Malte, tom. i. p. 557.
44. Koran, Sur. ii. § 126; iii. § 96.
45. Gagnier, tom. ii. p. 136.
46. Herbelot, v. Caaba. The temple of the Kaaba is evidently referred to by Diodorus Siculus, who says that between the country of the Thamudites and the Sabæans ἱερον αγιοτατον ἱδρυται τιμωμενον ὑπο παντων Αραβων περιττοτερον. lib. iii. p. 2.
47. Αραβιοι σεβουσι μεν, οντινα δε ουκ οιδα· το δε αγαλμα ὁ ειδον, λιθος ην τετραγωνος. Max. Tyr. Dissert, viii. § 8. Παλαι μεν οἱ Σκυθαι, την ακινακην· οἱ Αραβες, τον λιθον· οἱ Περσαι, τον ποταμον προσεκυνουν. Clem. Alex. Protrept. p. 29. Arnobius calls it informem lapidem, lib. vi. Suidas describes the Arabian deity — το δε αγαλμα λιθος εστι μελας, τετραγωνος, ατυπωτος, ὑψος ποδων δ’ ευρυς δυο, ανακειται δε επι βασεως χρυσηλατου. Suidas in Θευσαρης.
48. Διοτι επανω αυτουσιασε τῃ Αγαρ ὁ Αβραμ· αλλοι δε, ὁτι προσεδησεν αυτῳ την καμηλον, μελλων θυσαι τον Ισαακ.—ὁ δε ῥηθεις λιθος, κεφαλη της Αφροδιτης εστιν, ἡν παλαι προσεκυνουν οἱ Ισμαηλιται.—φερει γαρ μεχρι και νυν τοις ακριβως κατασκοπουσιν εκ γλυφιδος αποτυπωσιν κεφαλης. Euthymius Zingabenus, p. 14, ed. Sylburg.
49. Les Carmathes, après avoir pillé la Mecque sous le khalifat de Moctader, enleverent cette pièrre, qu'ils disaient, avec assez de vraisemblance, être un aucien idole: on voulut leur donner cinq mille dinars d'or pour la racheter: mais ils les refuserent, et la retinrent pendant 22 ans, à sçavoir, depuis l'an 317 de l'Hegire, jusqu' au 339, qu'ils la rapporterent à Coufah, sous le khalifat de Mothî. D'Herbelot in Hagiar Alassouad.
50. "The Wahabees have asserted that the veneration paid to the black stone was idolatrous; and disapproved of the ceremonies practised by the pilgrims at the stone of Abraham, which is placed near the well of Zemzem, and supposed to have on it the mark of the patriarch's foot, formed while he stood there to build the Caaba." Lord Valentia's Travels, vol. ii. p. 389.
51. بير زمزم‎ puteus Zemzem. Dicitur hic a Deo productus, ut Hagar et Ismael sitim suam levarent. Reland de Relig. Moham. p. 121.
52. "Accursed were the contrivers of the pit of fire supplied with fuel, when they sat round the same, and were witnesses of what they did against the true believers; and they afflicted them for no other reason, but because they believed in the mighty, the glorious God, unto whom belongeth the kingdom of heaven and earth." Koran, Sur. lxxxv.
53. Sur. xv. p. 501. Sale's Vers.
54. The Mussulmans boast that at Muhammed's birth, angels were heard in the clouds, singing—Induite illum stola Adam, et sublimitate Noë, et scientia Abraham, et lingua Ismael, et pulchritudine Joseph, et patientia Jacob, et voce David, et castitate Johannis, et honorificentia Jesu, et fortitudine Moysi, &c. Maracci, p. 11. When the Arabian ladies complained that Muhammed had not left them a corner of paradise, he readily answered—qu'elles ressusciteraient toutes à l'âge de quinze ans, et avec une beauté parfaite; ce qui consola et réjouit les vielles et les laides. Vertot, Discours sur 1'Alcoran. Conf. Hottinger, Hist. Orient, lib. ii. c. 4. The liberty, however, which was allowed in regard to women does not appear to have always been approved—Quatre choses, mon frère, observes a Mahomedan doctor, sont pleines de dangers, évite les avec soin: la faveur des princes, la société des méchans, l'amour du monde, et le commerce des femmes. Pend Nameh, in the Fundgruben des Orients, band ii. p. 20.
55. Her name was Omm Aïman. Abulfed. Vit. Moham. p. 2.
56. Elmacin, Hist. Saracen, lib. i. p. 11.
57. Sale, note in Koran, Sur. iii. p. 44. 4to. edit.
58. The following is an epitome of the Mohammedan history of Christ, given by Leland (de Relig. Moham. p. 42) from the Taarich—"Isa (Jesus—عيسي‎) was the son of Mary (مريم‎), who was the daughter of Imram of the children of Israel (بنى اسرائيل‎): and he was a legate sent from the high God, who sent to him from heaven the book of the Gospel. He was also a lawgiver, and called men to the worship of God: and when the Jews endeavoured to kill him, he was carried away to heaven." See Petri Abbatis Epist. in Bibliander, tom. i. pp. 2, 3. Ρικαρδου ανασκευη της κατα του καταρατου Μαχουμεθ, in the same collection, tom. ii. p. 124, 125. In the tract on the Mohammedan religion, edited by Reland, p. 20, is the following account of the canonical books which were acknowledged to have descended from heaven:—"These books are in number one hundred and four, of which the high God sent ten to Adam, fifty to Seth, thirty to Idrisi (Enoch), ten to Abraham, one to Moses, which is the Pentateuch (التورية‎‎—תורה), one to Isa (Jesus), which is the Gospel (الانجيل‎—ευαγγελεαν), one to David, which is the book of Psalms, and one to Muhammed, which is the Koran." In this enumeration he adopted the opinions of the old Sabians, who pretended to possess the books of Adam, Seth, Enoch and Abraham, of the Jews, and of the Christians. He pretended that in his ascent to heaven he saw Yahia (يحي‎ John) and Isa (عيسي‎ Jesus) in the second heaven. Abulfed. Vit. Moham. p. 35.
59. Et si quis Judæus fieri vult Mahumetista, cogitur prius credere Christo: cui talis fuit interrogatio: credisne Christum fuisse flatu dei ex virgine natum, et ultimum prophetam Hebræorum? Quo concesso, fit Mahumetanus. Mart. Alph. Vivaldus, in not. ad Petri de la Cevalleria, Zelum Christi.
60. Koran, Sur. v. p. 84. Sale.
61. Chardin, tom. iv. pp. 34, 35.—"L'illustre apôtre des croyans est le prince du monde présent et du monde futur, il est le sceau des envoyés du Trés-Haut, le dernier dans l'ordre des temps, il est la gloire de tous les prophètes qui l'ont précédé. Pend-Nameh, translated in the Fundgruben des Orients, band ii. p. 15. "Comment a-t-il pu éprouver le besoin de quelqu'une des créatures, ce Prophète pour qui seul l'univers a été tiré de néant, Mohammed, le maître de l'un et de l'autre monde, des génies et des hommes, des Arabes et des Barbares!" Arab poet cited by the translator.
62. Maracci, Prodrom. p. 15. The Muhammedans said that there was a passage in the Testament, where ειποντος τουτο του Χριστου τοις Ιουδαιοις, ὁτι ευαγγελιζομαι ὑμιν, ἱνα γινωσκητε, ὁτι μετ’ εμε μελλει ελθειν ὁ αποστολος και προφητης: το αυτο εστι γεγραμμενον και εν τῳ του Μωσεως παλαιῳ—but that the Christians had erased these passages from all the copies out of envy. Johan. Catacuzen, κατα του Μωαμεθ, απολογια τεταρτη, p. 55. ed. Basil. See d'Herbelot, Bibliothoque Orient, in Mohammed. p. 650.
63. Koran, Sur. v. § 15. Sur. lxi.
64. Anastasius, Hist. Eccl. p. 103; Theophanes, p. 276; Enustinus in Genealog. Mahom. p. 10; and Abbas Urspergensis in Chronico, p. 150, ap. Bayle, art. Moham. [CC]