{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_10163/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_10163","id":"gutenberg_10163","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10163","summary":null,"tags":["Category: History - Religious","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Islam"],"text":"_AMERICAN LECTURES ON THE HISTORY OF RELIGIONS_\n\nSERIES OF 1914-1915\n\n\n\n\nMohammedanism\n\nLectures on Its Origin, Its Religious and Political Growth, and Its Present\nState\n\n\n\nby\n\n\n\nC. Snouck Hurgronje\n\nProfessor of the Arabic Language in the University of Leiden, Holland\n\n\n\n\n1916\n\n\n\n\nANNOUNCEMENT.\n\nThe American Lectures on the History of Religions are delivered under\nthe auspices of the American Committee for Lectures on the History of\nReligions. This Committee was organized in 1892, for the purpose of\ninstituting \"popular courses in the History of Religions, somewhat after\nthe style of the Hibbert Lectures in England, to be delivered by the best\nscholars of Europe and this country, in various cities, such as Baltimore,\nBoston, Brooklyn, Chicago, New York, Philadelphia.\"\n\nThe terms of association under which the Committee exists are as follows:\n\n1.--The object of this Committee shall be to provide courses of lectures on\nthe history of religions, to be delivered in various cities.\n\n2.--The Committee shall be composed of delegates from the institutions\nagreeing to co-operate, with such additional members as may be chosen by\nthese delegates.\n\n3.--These delegates--one from each institution, with the additional members\nselected--shall constitute themselves a council under the name of the\n\"American Committee for Lectures on the History of Religions.\"\n\n4.--The Committee shall elect out of its number a Chairman, a Secretary,\nand a Treasurer.\n\n5.--All matters of local detail shall be left to the co-operating\ninstitutions under whose auspices the lectures are to be delivered.\n\n6.--A course of lectures on some religion, or phase of religion, from\nan historical point of view, or on a subject germane to the study of\nreligions, shall be delivered annually, or at such intervals as may be\nfound practicable, in the different cities represented by this Committee.\n\n7.--The Committee (a) shall be charged with the selection of the lectures,\n(b) shall have charge of the funds, (c) shall assign the time for the\nlectures in each city, and perform such other functions as may be\nnecessary.\n\n8.--Polemical subjects, as well as polemics in the treatment of subjects,\nshall be positively excluded.\n\n9.--The lectures shall be delivered in the various cities between the\nmonths of September and June.\n\n10.--The copyright of the lectures shall be the property of the Committee.\n\n11.--The compensation of the lecturer shall be fixed in each case by the\nCommittee.\n\n12.--The lecturer shall be paid in installments after each course, until he\nshall have received half of the entire compensation. Of the remaining half,\none half shall be paid to him upon delivery of the manuscript, properly\nprepared for the press, and the second half on the publication of the\nvolume, less a deduction for corrections made by the author in the proofs.\n\nThe Committee as now constituted is as follows: Prof. Crawford H. Toy,\nChairman, 7 Lowell St., Cambridge, Mass.; Rev. Dr. John P. Peters,\nTreasurer, 227 W. 99th St., New York City; Prof. Morris Jastrow, Jr.,\nSecretary, 248 So. 23d St., Philadelphia, Pa.; President Francis Brown,\nUnion Theological Seminary, New York City; Prof. Richard Gottheil, Columbia\nUniversity, New York City; Prof. Harry Pratt Judson, University of Chicago,\nChicago, Ill.; Prof. Paul Haupt, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Md.;\nMr. Charles D. Atkins, Director, Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences;\nProf. E.W. Hopkins, Yale University, New Haven, Conn.; Prof. Edward Knox\nMitchell, Hartford Theological Seminary, Hartford, Conn.; President F.K.\nSanders, Washburn College, Topeka, Kan.; Prof. H.P. Smith, Meadville\nTheological Seminary, Meadville, Pa.; Prof. W.J. Hinke, Auburn Theological\nSeminary, Auburn, N.Y.; Prof. Kemper Fullerton, Oberlin Theological\nSeminary, Oberlin, N.Y.\n\nThe lecturers in the course of American Lectures on the History of\nReligions and the titles of their volumes are as follows:\n\n1894-1895--Prof. T.W. Rhys-Davids, Ph.D.,--_Buddhism_.\n\n1896-1897--Prof. Daniel G. Brinton, M.D., LL.D.--_Religions of Primitive\nPeoples_.\n\n1897-1898--Rev. Prof. T.K. Cheyne, D.D.--_Jewish Religious Life after the\nExile_.\n\n1898-1899--Prof. Karl Budde, D.D.--_Religion of Israel to the Exile_.\n\n1904-1905--Prof. George Steindorff, Ph.D.--_The Religion of the Ancient\nEgyptians_.\n\n1905-1906--Prof. George W. Knox, D.D., LL.D.--_The Development of Religion\nin Japan_.\n\n1906-1907--Prof. Maurice Bloomfield, Ph.D., LL.D.--_The Religion of the\nVeda_.\n\n1907-1908--Prof. A.V.W. Jackson, Ph.D., LL.D.--_The Religion of Persia_.[1]\n\n1909-1910--Prof. Morris Jastrow, Jr., Ph.D.--_Aspects of Religious Belief\nand Practice in Babylonia and Assyria_.\n\n1910-1911--Prof. J.J.M. DeGroot--_The Development of Religion in China_.\n\n1911-1912--Prof. Franz Cumont.[2]--_Astrology and Religion among the Greeks\nand Romans_.\n\n[Footnote 1: This course was not published by the Committee, but will form\npart of Prof. Jackson's volume on the Religion of Persia in the series of\n_Handbooks on the History of Religions_, edited by Prof. Morris Jastrow,\nJr., and published by Messrs. Ginn & Company of Boston. Prof. Jastrow's\nvolume is, therefore, the eighth in the series.]\n\n[Footnote 2: Owing to special circumstances, Prof. Cumont's volume was\npublished before that of Prof. DeGroot. It is, therefore, the ninth in the\nseries and that of Prof. DeGroot the tenth.]\n\nThe lecturer for 1914 was Professor C. Snouck Hurgronje. Born in\nOosterhout, Holland, in 1857, he studied Theology and Oriental Languages\nat the University of Leiden and continued his studies at the University of\nStrassburg. In 1880 he published his first important work _Het Mekkaansch\nFeest_, having resolved to devote himself entirely to the study of\nMohammedanism in its widest aspects. After a few years' activity as\nLecturer on Mohammedan Law at the Seminary for Netherlands-India in Leiden,\nhe spent eight months (1884-5) in Mecca and Jidda. In 1888, he became\nlecturer at the University of Leiden and in the same year was sent out\nas Professor to Batavia in Netherlands-India, where he spent the years\n1889-1906. Upon his return he was appointed Professor of Arabic at the\nUniversity of Leiden. Among his principal published works may be mentioned:\n_Mekka_, The Hague, 1888-9; _De Beteekenis van den Islam voor zijne\nBelijders in Oost Ind\u00efe_, Leiden, 1883; _Mekkanische Sprichw\u00f6rter_, The\nHague, 1886; _De Atjehers_, Leiden, 1903-4, England tr. London, 1906; _Het\nGaj\u00f4land en zijne Bezvoners_, Batavia, 1903, and _Nederland en de Isl\u00e2m_,\nLeiden, 1915.\n\nThe lectures to be found in the present volume were delivered before\nthe following Institutions: Columbia University, Yale University, The\nUniversity of Pennsylvania, Meadville Theological Seminary, The University\nof Chicago, The Lowell Institute, and the Johns Hopkins University.\n\nThe Committee owes a debt of deep gratitude to Mr. Charles R. Crane for\nhaving made possible the course of lectures for the year 1914.\n\nRICHARD GOTTHEIL\n\nCRAWFORD H. TOY\n\n_Committee on Publication_.\n\nApril, 1916.\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\nSOME POINTS CONCERNING THE ORIGIN OF ISL\u00c2M.\n\nTHE RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENT OF ISL\u00c2M.\n\nTHE POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT OF ISL\u00c2M.\n\nISL\u00c2M AND MODERN THOUGHT.\n\nINDEX.\n\n\n\n\n\nMohammedanism\n\n\nI\n\nSOME POINTS CONCERNING THE ORIGIN OF ISL\u00c2M\n\n\nThere are more than two hundred million people who call themselves after\nthe name of Mohammed, would not relinquish that name at any price, and\ncannot imagine a greater blessing for the remainder of humanity than to be\nincorporated into their communion. Their ideal is no less than that the\nwhole earth should join in the faith that there is no god but Allah and\nthat Mohammed is Allah's last and most perfect messenger, who brought the\nlatest and final revelation of Allah to humanity in Allah's own words. This\nalone is enough to claim our special interest for the Prophet, who in the\nseventh century stirred all Arabia into agitation and whose followers soon\nafter his death founded an empire extending from Morocco to China.\n\nEven those who--to my mind, not without gross exaggeration--would seek the\nexplanation of the mighty stream of humanity poured out by the Arabian\npeninsula since 630 over Western and Middle Asia, Northern Africa, and\nSouthern Europe principally in geographic and economic causes, do not\nignore the fact that it was Mohammed who opened the sluice gates. It would\nindeed be difficult to maintain that without his preaching the Arabs of the\nseventh century would have been induced by circumstances to swallow up\nthe empire of the Sasanids and to rob the Byzantine Empire of some of its\nrichest provinces. However great a weight one may give to political and\neconomic factors, it was religion, Isl\u00e2m, which in a certain sense united\nthe hitherto hopelessly divided Arabs, Isl\u00e2m which enabled them to found\nan enormous international community; it was Isl\u00e2m which bound the speedily\nconverted nations together even after the shattering of its political\npower, and which still binds them today when only a miserable remnant of\nthat power remains.\n\nThe aggressive manner in which young Isl\u00e2m immediately put itself in\nopposition to the rest of the world had the natural consequence of\nawakening an interest which was far from being of a friendly nature.\nMoreover men were still very far from such a striving towards universal\npeace as would have induced a patient study of the means of bringing the\ndifferent peoples into close spiritual relationship, and therefore from an\nendeavour to understand the spiritual life of races different to their own.\nThe Christianity of that time was itself by no means averse to the\nforcible extension of its faith, and in the community of Mohammedans which\nsystematically attempted to reduce the world to its authority by force of\narms, it saw only an enemy whose annihilation was, to its regret, beyond\nits power. Such an enemy it could no more observe impartially than one\nmodern nation can another upon which it considers it necessary to make war.\nEverything maintained or invented to the disadvantage of Isl\u00e2m was greedily\nabsorbed by Europe; the picture which our forefathers in the Middle Ages\nformed of Mohammed's religion appears to us a malignant caricature. The\nrare theologians[1] who, before attacking the false faith, tried to form a\nclear notion of it, were not listened to, and their merits have only become\nappreciated in our own time. A vigorous combating of the prevalent fictions\nconcerning Isl\u00e2m would have exposed a scholar to a similar treatment to\nthat which, fifteen years ago, fell to the lot of any Englishman who\nmaintained the cause of the Boers; he would have been as much of an outcast\nas a modern inhabitant of Mecca who tried to convince his compatriots of\nthe virtues of European policy and social order.\n\n[Footnote 1: See for instance the reference to the exposition of the\nPaderborn bishop Olivers (1227) in the Paderborn review _Theologie und\nGlaube_, Jahrg. iv., p. 535, etc. (_Isl\u00e2m_, iv., p. 186); also some of the\naccounts mentioned in G\u00fcterbock, _Der Isl\u00e2m im Lichte der byzantinischen\nPolemik_, etc.]\n\nTwo and a half centuries ago, a prominent Orientalist,[2] who wrote\nan exposition of Mohammed's teaching, felt himself obliged to give an\nelaborate justification of his undertaking in his \"Dedicatio.\" He appeals\nto one or two celebrated predecessors and to learned colleagues, who have\nexpressly instigated him to this work. Amongst other things he quotes\na letter from the Leiden professor, L'Empereur, in which he conjures\nBreitinger by the bowels of Jesus Christ (\"per viscera Jesu Christi\") to\ngive the young man every opportunity to complete his study of the religion\nof Mohammed, \"which so far has only been treated in a senseless way.\" As a\nfruit of this study L'Empereur thinks it necessary to mention in the first\nplace the better understanding of the (Christian) Holy Scriptures by the\nextension of our knowledge of Oriental manners and customs. Besides such\npromotion of Christian exegesis and apologetics and the improvement of the\nworks on general history, Hottinger himself contemplated a double\npurpose in his _Historia Orientalis_. The Roman Catholics often vilified\nProtestantism by comparing the Reformed doctrine to that of Mohammedanism;\nthis reproach of Crypto-mohammedanism Hottinger wished \"talionis lege\" to\nfling back at the Catholics; and he devotes a whole chapter (Cap. 6) of his\nbook to the demonstration that Bellarminius' proofs of the truth of the\nChurch doctrine might have been copied from the Moslim dogma. In the second\nplace, conforming to the spirit of the times, he wished, just as Bibliander\nhad done in his refutation of the Qor\u00e2n, to combine the combat against\nMohammedan unbelief with that against the Turkish Empire (\"in oppugnationem\nMahometanae perfidiae et Turcici regni\").\n\n[Footnote 2: J.H. Hottinger, _Historia Orientalis_, Z\u00fcrich, 1651 (2d.\nedition 1660).]\n\nThe Turks were feared by the Europe of that time, and the significance of\ntheir religion for their worldly power was well known; thus the\npolitical side of the question gave Hottinger's work a special claim to\nconsideration. Yet, in spite of all this, Hottinger feared that his labour\nwould be regarded as useless, or even wicked. Especially when he is obliged\nto say anything favourable of Mohammed and his followers, he thinks it\nnecessary to protect himself against misconstruction by the addition of\nsome selected terms of abuse. When mentioning Mohammed's name, he says:\n\"at the mention of whom the mind shudders\" (\"ad cujus profecto mentionem\ninhorrescere nobis debet animus\"). The learned Abb\u00e9 Maracci, who in 1698\nproduced a Latin translation of the Qor\u00e2n accompanied by an elaborate\nrefutation, was no less than Hottinger imbued with the necessity of\nshuddering at every mention of the \"false\" Prophet, and Dr. Prideaux,\nwhose _Vie de Mahomet_ appeared in the same year in Amsterdam, abused and\nshuddered with them, and held up his biography of Mohammed as a mirror to\n\"unbelievers, atheists, deists, and libertines.\"\n\nIt was a Dutch scholar, H. Reland, the Utrecht professor of theology, who\nin the beginning of the eighteenth century frankly and warmly recommended\nthe application of historical justice even towards the Mohammedan religion;\nin his short Latin sketch of Isl\u00e2m[1] he allowed the Mohammedan authorities\nto speak for themselves. In his \"Dedicatio\" to his brother and in his\nextensive preface he explains his then new method. Is it to be supposed,\nhe asks, that a religion as ridiculous as the Isl\u00e2m described by Christian\nauthors should have found millions of devotees? Let the Moslims themselves\ndescribe their own religion for us; just as the Jewish and Christian\nreligions are falsely represented by the heathen and Protestantism by\nCatholics, so every religion is misrepresented by its antagonists. \"We\nare mortals, subject to error; especially where religious matters are\nconcerned, we often allow ourselves to be grossly misled by passion.\"\nAlthough it may cause evil-minded readers to doubt the writer's orthodoxy\nhe continues to maintain that truth can only be served by combating her\nopponents in an honourable way.\n\n[Footnote 1: _H. Relandi de religione Mohammedica libri duo_, Utrecht, 1704\n(2d ed. 1717).]\n\n\"No religion,\" says Reland, \"has been more calumniated than Isl\u00e2m,\"\nalthough the Abb\u00e9 Maracci himself could give no better explanation of the\nturning of many Jews and Christians to this religion than the fact that\nit contains many elements of natural truth, evidently borrowed from the\nChristian religion, \"which seem to be in accordance with the law and the\nlight of nature\" (\"quae naturae legi ac lumini consentanea videntur\").\n\"More will be gained for Christianity by friendly intercourse with\nMohammedans than by slander; above all Christians who live in the East must\nnot, as is too often the case, give cause to one Turk to say to another\nwho suspects him of lying or deceit: 'Do you take me for a Christian?'\n(\"putasne me Christianum esse\"). In truth, the Mohammedans often put us to\nshame by their virtues; and a better knowledge of Isl\u00e2m can only help to\nmake our irrational pride give place to gratitude to God for the undeserved\nmercy which He bestowed upon us in Christianity.\" Reland has no illusions\nthat his scientific justice will find acceptance in a wide circle \"as he\nbecomes daily more and more convinced that the world wishes to be deceived\nand is governed by prejudice\" (\"qui quotidie magis magisque experior mundum\ndecipi velle et praeconceptis opinionibus regi\").\n\nIt was not long before the scale was turned in the opposite direction,\nand Isl\u00e2m was made by some people the object of panegyrics as devoid of\nscientific foundation as the former calumnies. In 1730 appeared in London\nthe incomplete posthumous work of Count de Boulainvilliers, _Vie de\nMahomet,_ in which, amongst other things, he says of the Arabian Prophet\nthat \"all that he has said concerning the essential religious dogmas is\ntrue, but he has not said all that is true, and it is only therein that his\nreligion differs from ours.\" De Boulainvilliers tells us with particular\nsatisfaction that Mohammed, who respected the devotion of hermits and\nmonks, proceeded with the utmost severity against the official clergy,\ncondemning its members either to death or to the abjuration of their faith.\nThis _Vie de Mahomet_ was as a matter of fact an anti-clerical romance, the\nmaterial of which was supplied by a superficial knowledge of Isl\u00e2m drawn\nfrom secondary sources. That a work with such a tendency was sure to arouse\ninterest at that time, is shown by a letter from the publisher, Coderc, to\nProfessor Gagnier at Oxford, in which he writes: \"He [de Boulainvilliers]\nmixes up his history with many political reflections, which by their\nnewness and boldness are sure to be well received\" (\"Il m\u00eale son Histoire\nde plusieurs r\u00e9flexions politiques, et qui par leur hardiesse ne manqueront\npas d'\u00eatre tr\u00e8s bien re\u00e7ues\").\n\nJean Gagnier however considered these bold novelties very dangerous and\nendeavoured to combat them in another _Vie de Mahomet_, which appeared from\nhis hand in 1748 at Amsterdam. He strives after a \"juste milieu\" between\nthe too violent partisanship of Maracci and Prideaux and the ridiculous\nacclamations of de Boulainvilliers. Yet this does not prevent him in his\npreface from calling Mohammed the greatest villain of mankind and the most\nmortal enemy of God (\"le plus sc\u00e9l\u00e9rat de tous les hommes et le plus mortel\nennemi de Dieu\"). His desire to make his contemporaries proof against the\npoison of de Boulainvilliers' dangerous book gains the mastery over the\npure love of truth for which Reland had so bravely striven.\n\nAlthough Sale in his \"Preliminary Discourse\" to his translation of the\nQor\u00e2n endeavours to contribute to a fair estimation of Mohammed and his\nwork, of which his motto borrowed from Augustine, \"There is no false\ndoctrine that does not contain some truth\" (\"nulla falsa doctrina est\nquae non aliquid veri permisceat\"), is proof, still the prejudicial view\nremained for a considerable time the prevalent one. Mohammed was branded\nas _imposteur_ even in circles where Christian fanaticism was out of the\nquestion. Voltaire did not write his tragedy _Mahomet ou le fanatisme_ as\na historical study; he was aware that his fiction was in many respects at\nvariance with history. In writing his work he was, as he himself expresses\nit, inspired by \"l'amour du genre humain et l'horreur du fanatisme.\" He\nwanted to put before the public an armed Tartufe and thought he might\nlay the part upon Mohammed, for, says he, \"is not the man, who makes war\nagainst his own country and dares to do it in the name of God, capable of\nany ill?\" The dislike that Voltaire had conceived for the Qor\u00e2n from a\nsuperficial acquaintance with it, \"ce livre inintelligible qui fait fr\u00e9mir\nle sens commun \u00e0 chaque page,\" probably increased his unfavourable opinion,\nbut the principal motive of his choice of a representative must have been\nthat the general public still regarded Mohammed as the incarnation of\nfanaticism and priestcraft.\n\nAlmost a century lies between Gagnier's biography of Mohammed and that of\nthe Heidelberg professor Weil (_Mohammed der Prophet, sein Leben and seine\nLehre_, Stuttgart, 1843); and yet Weil did well to call Gagnier his last\nindependent predecessor. Weil's great merit is, that he is the first in his\nfield who instituted an extensive historico-critical investigation without\nany preconceived opinion. His final opinion of Mohammed is, with the\nnecessary reservations: \"In so far as he brought the most beautiful\nteachings of the Old and the New Testament to a people which was not\nilluminated by one ray of faith, he may be regarded, even by those who\nare not Mohammedans, as a messenger of God.\" Four years later Caussin\nde Perceval in his _Essai sur l'histoire des Arabes_, written quite\nindependently of Weil, expresses the same idea in these words: \"It would be\nan injustice to Mohammed to consider him as no more than a clever impostor,\nan ambitious man of genius; he was in the first place a man convinced of\nhis vocation to deliver his nation from error and to regenerate it.\"\n\nAbout twenty years later the biography of Mohammed made an enormous advance\nthrough the works of Muir, Sprenger, and N\u00f4ldeke. On the ground of much\nwider and at the same time deeper study of the sources than had been\npossible for Weil and Caussin de Perceval, each of these three scholars\ngave in his own way an account of the origin of Isl\u00e2m. N\u00f4ldeke was\nmuch sharper and more cautious in his historical criticism than Muir or\nSprenger. While the biographies written by these two men have now\nonly historical value, N\u00f4ldeke's _History of the Qor\u00e2n_ is still an\nindispensable instrument of study more than half a century after its first\nappearance.\n\nNumbers of more or less successful efforts to make Mohammed's life\nunderstood by the nineteenth century intellect have followed these without\nmuch permanent gain. Mohammed, who was represented to the public in turn as\ndeceiver, as a genius mislead by the Devil, as epileptic, as hysteric, and\nas prophet, was obliged later on even to submit to playing on the one\nhand the part of socialist and, on the other hand, that of a defender of\ncapitalism. These points of view were principally characteristic of the\ntemperament of the scholars who held them; they did not really advance our\nunderstanding of the events that took place at Mecca and Medina between 610\nand 632 A.D., that prologue to a perplexing historical drama.\n\nThe principal source from which all biographers started and to which they\nalways returned, was the Qor\u00e2n, the collection of words of Allah spoken by\nMohammed in those twenty-two years. Hardly anyone, amongst the \"faithful\"\nand the \"unfaithful,\" doubts the generally authentic character of its\ncontents except the Parisian professor Casanova.[1] He tried to prove a\nlittle while ago that Mohammed's revelations originally contained the\nannouncement that the HOUR, the final catastrophe, the Last judgment would\ncome during his life. When his death had therefore falsified this prophecy,\naccording to Casanova, the leaders of the young community found themselves\nobliged to submit the revelations preserved in writing or memory to a\nthorough revision, to add some which announced the mortality even of the\nlast prophet, and, finally to console the disappointed faithful with the\nhope of Mohammed's return before the end of the world. This doctrine of the\nreturn, mentioned neither in the Qor\u00e2n nor in the eschatological tradition\nof later times, according to Casanova was afterwards changed again into the\nexpectation of the Mahd\u00ee, the last of Mohammed's deputies, \"a Guided of\nGod,\" who shall be descended from Mohammed, bear his name, resemble him\nin appearance, and who shall fill the world once more before its end with\njustice, as it is now filled with injustice and tyranny.\n\n[Footnote 1: Paul Casanova, _Mohammed et la fin du monde,_ Paris, 1911.\nHis hypotheses are founded upon Weil's doubts of the authenticity of a few\nverses of the _Qor\u00e2n_ (iii., 138; xxxix., 31, etc.), which doubts were\nsufficiently refuted half a century ago by N\u00f4ldeke in his _Geschichte des\nQor\u00e2ns_, 1st edition, p. 197, etc.]\n\nIn our sceptical times there is very little that is above criticism, and\none day or other we may expect to hear that Mohammed never existed. The\narguments for this can hardly be weaker than those of Casanova against the\nauthenticity of the Qor\u00e2n. Here we may acknowledge the great power of what\nhas been believed in all times, in all places, by all the members of the\ncommunity (\"quod semper, quod ubique, quod ab omnibus creditum est\"). For,\nafter the death of Mohammed there immediately arose a division which none\nof the leading personalities were able to escape, and the opponents spared\neach other no possible kind of insult, scorn, or calumny. The enemies of\nthe first leaders of the community could have wished for no more powerful\nweapon for their attack than a well-founded accusation of falsifying the\nword of God. Yet this accusation was never brought against the first\ncollectors of the scattered revelations; the only reproach that was made\nagainst them in connexion with this labour being that verses in which\nthe Holy Family (Ali and Fatimah) were mentioned with honour, and which,\ntherefore, would have served to support the claims of the Alids to the\nsuccession of Mohammed, were suppressed by them. This was maintained by the\nShi'ites, who are unsurpassed in Isl\u00e2m as falsifiers of history; and the\npassages which, according to them, are omitted from the official Qor\u00e2n\nwould involve precisely on account of their reference to the succession,\nthe mortality of Mohammed.\n\nAll sects and parties have the same text of the Qor\u00e2n. This may have its\nerrors and defects, but intentional alterations or mutilations of real\nimportance are not to blame for this.\n\nNow this rich authentic source--this collection of wild, poetic\nrepresentations of the Day of judgment; of striving against idolatry; of\nstories from Sacred History; of exhortation to the practice of the cardinal\nvirtues of the Old and New Testament; of precepts to reform the individual,\ndomestic, and tribal life in the spirit of these virtues; of incantations\nand forms of prayer and a hundred things besides--is not always\ncomprehensible to us. Even for the parts which we do understand, we are not\nable to make out the chronological arrangement which is necessary to gain\nan insight into Mohammed's personality and work. This is not only due to\nthe form of the oracles, which purposely differs from the usual tone\nof mortals by its unctuousness and rhymed prose, but even more to the\ncircumstance that all that the hearers could know, is assumed to be known.\nSo the Qor\u00e2n is full of references that are enigmatical to us. We therefore\nneed additional explanation, and this can only be derived from tradition\nconcerning the circumstances under which each revelation was delivered.\n\nAnd, truly, the sacred tradition of Isl\u00e2m is not deficient in data of\nthis sort. In the canonical and half-canonical collections of tradition\nconcerning what the Prophet has said, done, and omitted to do, in\nbiographical works, an answer is given to every question which may arise in\nthe mind of the reader of the Qor\u00e2n; and there are many Qor\u00e2n-commentaries,\nin which these answers are appended to the verses which they are supposed\nto elucidate. Sometimes the explanations appear to us, even at first sight,\nimprobable and unacceptable; sometimes they contradict each other; a good\nmany seem quite reasonable.\n\nThe critical biographers of Mohammed have therefore begun their work of\nsifting by eliminating the improbable and by choosing between contradictory\ndata by means of critical comparison. Here the gradually increasing\nknowledge of the spirit of the different parties in Isl\u00e2m was an important\naid, as of course each group represented the facts in the way which best\nserved their own purposes.\n\nHowever cautiously and acutely Weil and his successors have proceeded, the\ncontinual progress of the analysis of the legislative as well as of the\nhistorical tradition of Islam since 1870 has necessitated a renewed\ninvestigation. In the first place it has become ever more evident that the\nthousands of traditions about Mohammed, which, together with the Qor\u00e2n,\nform the foundation upon which the doctrine and life of the community\nare based, are for the most part the conventional expression of all the\nopinions which prevailed amongst his followers during the first three\ncenturies after the Hijrah. The fiction originated a long time after\nMohammed's death; during the turbulent period of the great conquests there\nwas no leisure for such work. Our own conventional insincerities differ so\nmuch--externally at least--from those of that date, that it is difficult\nfor us to realize a spiritual atmosphere where \"pious fraud\" was practised\non such a scale. Yet this is literally true: in the first centuries of\nIsl\u00e2m no one could have dreamt of any other way of gaining acceptance for a\ndoctrine or a precept than by circulating a tradition, according to which\nMohammed had preached the doctrine or dictated it or had lived according to\nthe precept. The whole individual, domestic, social, and political life\nas it developed in the three centuries during which the simple Arabian\nreligion was adjusted to the complicated civilization of the great nations\nof that time, that all life was theoretically justified by representing\nit as the application of minute laws supposed to have been elaborated by\nMohammed by precept and example.\n\nThus tradition gives invaluable material for the knowledge of the conflict\nof opinions in the first centuries, a strife the sharpness of which has\nbeen blunted in later times by a most resourceful harmonistic method. But,\nit is vain to endeavour to construct the life and teaching of Mohammed from\nsuch spurious accounts; they cannot even afford us a reliable illustration\nof his life in the form of \"table talk,\" as an English scholar rather\nna\u00efvely tried to derive from them. In a collection of this sort, supported\nby good external evidence, there would be attributed to the Prophet of\nMecca sayings from the Old and New Testament, wise saws from classical and\nArabian antiquity, prescriptions of Roman law and many other things, each\ntext of which was as authentic as its fellows.\n\nAnyone who, warned by Goldziher and others, has realized how matters stand\nin this respect, will be careful not to take the legislative tradition as\na direct instrument for the explanation of the Qor\u00e2n. When, after a most\ncareful investigation of thousands of traditions which all appear equally\nold, we have selected the oldest, then we shall see that we have before us\nonly witnesses of the first century of the Hijrah. The connecting threads\nwith the time of Mohammed must be supplied for a great part by imagination.\n\nThe historical or biographical tradition in the proper sense of the word\nhas only lately been submitted to a keener examination. It was known for a\nlong time that here too, besides theological and legendary elements,\nthere were traditions originating from party motive, intended to give an\nappearance of historical foundation to the particular interests of certain\npersons or families; but it was thought that after some sifting there yet\nremained enough to enable us to form a much clearer sketch of Mohammed's\nlife than that of any other of the founders of a universal religion.\n\nIt is especially Prince Caetani and Father Lammens who have disturbed this\nillusion. According to them, even the data which had been pretty generally\nregarded as objective, rest chiefly upon tendentious fiction. The\ngenerations that worked at the biography of the Prophet were too far\nremoved from his time to have true data or notions; and, moreover, it was\nnot their aim to know the past as it was, but to construct a picture of it\nas it ought to have been according to their opinion. Upon the bare canvass\nof verses of the Qor\u00e2n that need explanation, the traditionists have\nembroidered with great boldness scenes suitable to the desires or ideals of\ntheir particular group; or, to use a favourite metaphor of Lammens, they\nfill the empty spaces by a process of stereotyping which permits the\ncritical observer to recognize the origin of each picture. In the S\u00eerah\n(biography), the distance of the first describers from their object is the\nsame as in the Had\u00eeth (legislative tradition); in both we get images of\nvery distant things, perceived by means of fancy rather than by sight and\ntaking different shapes according to the inclinations of each circle of\ndescribers.\n\nNow, it may be true that the latest judges have here and there examined the\nMohammedan traditions too sceptically and too suspiciously; nevertheless,\nit remains certain that in the light of their research, the method of\nexamination cannot remain unchanged. We must endeavour to make our\nexplanations of the Qor\u00e2n independent of tradition, and in respect to\nportions where this is impossible, we must be suspicious of explanations,\nhowever apparently plausible.\n\nDuring the last few years the accessible sources of information have\nconsiderably increased, the study of them has become much deeper and more\nmethodical, and the result is that we can tell much less about the teaching\nand the life of Mohammed than could our predecessors half a century ago.\nThis apparent loss is of course in reality nothing but gain.\n\nThose who do not take part in new discoveries, nevertheless, wish to know\nnow and then the results of the observations made with constantly improved\ninstruments. Let me endeavour, very briefly, to satisfy this curiosity.\nThat the report of the bookkeeping might make a somewhat different\nimpression if another accountant had examined it, goes without saying, and\nsometimes I shall draw particular attention to my personal responsibility\nin this respect.\n\nOf Mohammed's life before his appearance as the messenger of God, we know\nextremely little; compared to the legendary biography as treasured by the\nFaithful, practically nothing. Not to mention his pre-existence as a Light,\nwhich was with God, and for the sake of which God created the world, the\nLight, which as the principle of revelation, lived in all prophets from\nAdam onwards, and the final revelation of which in Mohammed was prophesied\nin the Scriptures of the Jews and the Christians; not to mention the\nwonderful and mysterious signs which announced the birth of the Seal of the\nProphets, and many other features which the later S\u00eerahs (biographies) and\nMaulids (pious histories of his birth, most in rhymed prose or in poetic\nmetre) produce in imitation of the Gospels; even the elaborate discourses\nof the older biographies on occurrences, which in themselves might quite\nwell come within the limits of sub-lunary possibility, do not belong to\nhistory. Fiction plays such a great part in these stories, that we are\nnever sure of being on historical ground unless the Qor\u00e2n gives us a firm\nfooting.\n\nThe question, whether the family to which Mohammed belonged, was regarded\nas noble amongst the Qoraishites, the ruling tribe in Mecca, is answered\nin the affirmative by many; but by others this answer is questioned not\nwithout good grounds. The matter is not of prime importance, as there is no\ndoubt that Mohammed grew up as a poor orphan and belonged to the needy and\nthe neglected. Even a long time after his first appearance the unbelievers\nreproached him, according to the Qor\u00e2n, with his insignificant worldly\nposition, which fitted ill with a heavenly message; the same scornful\nreproach according to the Qor\u00e2n was hurled at Mohammed's predecessors by\nsceptics of earlier generations; and it is well known that the stories\nof older times in the Qor\u00e2n are principally reflections of what Mohammed\nhimself experienced. The legends of Mohammed's relations to various members\nof his family are too closely connected with the pretensions of their\ndescendants to have any value for biographic purposes. He married late an\nelderly woman, who, it is said, was able to lighten his material cares; she\ngave him the only daughter by whom he had descendants; descendants, who,\nfrom the Arabian point of view, do not count as such, as according to their\ngenealogical theories the line of descent cannot pass through a woman.\nThey have made an exception for the Prophet, as male offspring, the only\nblessing of marriage appreciated by Arabs, was withheld from him.\n\nIn the materialistic commercial town of Mecca, where lust of gain and usury\nreigned supreme, where women, wine, and gambling filled up the leisure\ntime, where might was right, and widows, orphans, and the feeble were\ntreated as superfluous ballast, an unfortunate being like Mohammed, if his\nconstitution were sensitive, must have experienced most painful emotions.\nIn the intellectual advantages that the place offered he could find\nno solace; the highly developed Arabian art of words, poetry with its\nfictitious amourettes, its polished descriptions of portions of Arabian\nnature, its venal vain praise and satire, might serve as dessert to a\nwell-filled dish; they were unable to compensate for the lack of material\nprosperity. Mohammed felt his misery as a pain too great to be endured; in\nsome way or other he must be delivered from it. He desired to be more than\nthe greatest in his surroundings, and he knew that in that which they\ncounted for happiness he could never even equal them. Rather than envy them\nregretfully, he preferred to despise their values of life, but on that very\naccount he had to oppose these values with better ones.\n\nIt was not unknown in Mecca that elsewhere communities existed acquainted\nwith such high ideals of life, spiritual goods accessible to the poor, even\nto them in particular. Apart from commerce, which brought the inhabitants\nof Mecca into contact with Abyssinians, Syrians, and others, there were far\nto the south and less far to the north and north-east of Mecca, Arabian\ntribes who had embraced the Jewish or the Christian religion. Perhaps this\ncircumstance had helped to make the inhabitants of Mecca familiar with the\nidea of a creator, Allah, but this had little significance in their lives,\nas in the Maker of the Universe they did not see their Lawgiver and judge,\nbut held themselves dependent for their good and evil fortune upon all\nmanner of beings, which they rendered favourable or harmless by animistic\npractices. Thoroughly conservative, they did not take great interest in\nthe conceptions of the \"People of the Scripture,\" as they called the Jews,\nChristians, and perhaps some other sects arisen from these communities.\n\nBut Mohammed's deeply felt misery awakened his interest in them. Whether\nthis had been the case with a few others before him in the milieu of Mecca,\nwe need not consider, as it does not help to explain his actions. If wide\ncircles had been anxious to know more about the contents of the \"Scripture\"\nMohammed would not have felt in the dark in the way that he did. We shall\nprobably never know, by intercourse with whom it really was that Mohammed\nat last gained some knowledge of the contents of the sacred books of\nJudaism and Christianity; probably through various people, and over a\nconsiderable length of time. It was not lettered men who satisfied his\nawakened curiosity; otherwise the quite confused ideas, especially in the\nbeginning of the revelation, concerning the mutual relations between Jews\nand Christians could not be explained. Confusions between Miryam, the\nsister of Moses, and Mary, the mother of Jesus, between Saul and Gideon,\nmistakes about the relationship of Abraham to Isaac, Ishmael, and Jacob,\nmight be put down to misconceptions of Mohammed himself, who could not all\nat once master the strange material. But his representation of Judaism and\nChristianity and a number of other forms of revelation, as almost identical\nin their contents, differing only in the place where, the time wherein, and\nthe messenger of God by whom they came to man; this idea, which runs like\na crimson thread through all the revelations of the first twelve years\nof Mohammed's prophecy, could not have existed if he had had an intimate\nacquaintance with Jewish or Christian men of letters. Moreover, the many\npost-biblical features and stories which the Qor\u00e2n contains concerning the\npast of mankind, indicate a vulgar origin, and especially as regards\nthe Christian legends, communications from people who lived outside the\ncommunion of the great Christian churches; this is sufficiently proved by\nthe docetical representation of the death of Jesus and the many stories\nabout his life, taken from apocryphal sources or from popular oral legends.\n\nMohammed's unlearned imagination worked all such material together into\na religious history of mankind, in which Adam's descendants had become\ndivided into innumerable groups of peoples differing in speech and place\nof abode, whose aim in life at one period or another came to resemble\nwonderfully that of the inhabitants of West- and Central-Arabia in the\nseventh century A.D. Hereby they strayed from the true path, in strife with\nthe commands given by Allah. The whole of history, therefore, was for him\na long series of repetitions of the antithesis between the foolishness of\nmen, as this was now embodied in the social state of Mecca, and the wisdom\nof God, as known to the \"People of the Scripture.\" To bring the erring ones\nback to the true path, it was Allah's plan to send them messengers from out\nof their midst, who delivered His ritual and His moral directions to them\nin His own words, who demanded the acknowledgment of Allah's omnipotence,\nand if they refused to follow the true guidance, threatened them with\nAllah's temporary or, even more, with His eternal punishment.\n\nThe antithesis is always the same, from Adam to Jesus, and the enumeration\nof the scenes is therefore rather monotonous; the only variety is in the\ndetail, borrowed from biblical and apocryphal legends. In all the thousands\nof years the messengers of Allah play the same part as Mohammed finally saw\nhimself called upon to play towards his people.\n\nMohammed's account of the past contains more elements of Jewish than of\nChristian origin, and he ignores the principal dogmas of the Christian\nChurch. In spite of his supernatural birth, Jesus is only a prophet\nlike Moses and others; and although his miracles surpass those of other\nmessengers, Mohammed at a later period of his life is inclined to place\nAbraham above Jesus in certain respects. Yet the influence of Christianity\nupon Mohammed's vocation was very great; without the Christian idea of the\nfinal scene of human history, of the Resurrection of the dead and the Last\nJudgment, Mohammed's mission would have no meaning. It is true, monotheism,\nin the Jewish sense, and after the contrast had become clear to Mohammed,\naccompanied by an express rejection of the Son of God and of the Trinity,\nhas become one of the principal dogmas of Isl\u00e2m. But in Mohammed's first\npreaching, the announcement of the Day of judgment is much more prominent\nthan the Unity of God; and it was against his revelations concerning\nDoomsday that his opponents directed their satire during the first twelve\nyears. It was not love of their half-dead gods but anger at the wretch who\nwas never tired of telling them, in the name of Allah, that all their\nlife was idle and despicable, that in the other world they would be the\noutcasts, which opened the floodgates of irony and scorn against Mohammed.\nAnd it was Mohammed's anxiety for his own lot and that of those who were\ndear to him in that future life, that forced him to seek a solution of the\nquestion: who shall bring my people out of the darkness of antithesis into\nthe light of obedience to Allah?\n\nWe should, _a posteriori_, be inclined to imagine a simpler answer to the\nquestion than that which Mohammed found; he might have become a missionary\nof Judaism or of Christianity to the Meccans. However natural such\na conclusion may appear to us, from the premises with which we are\nacquainted, it did not occur to Mohammed. He began--the Qor\u00e2n tells us\nexpressly--by regarding the Arabs, or at all events _his_ Arabs, as\nheretofore destitute of divine message[1]: \"to whom We have sent no warner\nbefore you.\" Moses and Jesus--not to mention any others--had not been sent\nfor the Arabs; and as Allah would not leave any section of mankind without\na revelation, their prophet must still be to come. Apparently Mohammed\nregarded the Jewish and Christian tribes in Arabia as exceptions to the\nrule that an ethnical group (_ummah_) was at the same time a religious\nunity. He did not imagine that it could be in Allah's plan that the Arabs\nwere to conform to a revelation given in a foreign language. No; God must\nspeak to them in Arabic.[2] Through whose mouth?\n\n[Footnote 1: _Qor\u00e2n_, xxxii., 2; xxxiv., 43; xxxvi., 5, etc.]\n\n[Footnote 2: _Ibid_., xii., 2; xiii., 37; XX., 112; XXVI., 195; xli., 44,\netc.]\n\nA long and severe crisis preceded Mohammed's call. He was convinced that,\nif he were the man, mighty signs from Heaven must be revealed to him, for\nhis conception of revelation was mechanical; Allah Himself, or at least\nangels, must speak to him. The time of waiting, the process of objectifying\nthe subjective, lived through by the help of an overstrained imagination,\nall this laid great demands upon the psychical and physical constitution of\nMohammed. At length he saw and heard that which he thought he ought to hear\nand see. In feverish dreams he found the form for the revelation, and he\ndid not in the least realize that the contents of his inspiration from\nHeaven were nothing but the result of what he had himself absorbed. He\nrealized it so little, that the identity of what was revealed to him with\nwhat he held to be the contents of the Scriptures of Jews and Christians\nwas a miracle to him, the only miracle upon which he relied for the support\nof his mission.\n\nIn the course of the twenty-three years of Mohammed's work as God's\nmessenger, the over-excited state, or inspiration, or whatever we may\ncall the peculiar spiritual condition in which his revelation was born,\ngradually gave place to quiet reflection. Especially after the Hijrah, when\nthe prophet had to provide the state established by him at Medina with\ninspired regulations, the words of God became in almost every respect\ndifferent from what they had been at first. Only the form was retained. In\nconnection with this evolution, some of our biographers of Mohammed, even\nwhere they do not deny the obvious honesty of his first visions, represent\nhim in the second half of his work, as a sort of actor, who played with\nthat which had been most sacred to him. This accusation is, in my opinion,\nunjust.\n\nMohammed, who twelve years long, in spite of derision and contempt,\ncontinued to inveigh in the name of Allah against the frivolous\nconservatism of the heathens in Mecca, to preach Allah's omnipotence to\nthem, to hold up to them Allah's commands and His promises and threats\nregarding the future life, \"without asking any reward\" for such exhausting\nwork, is really not another man than the acknowledged \"Messenger of\nAllah\" in Medina, who saw his power gradually increase, who was taught by\nexperience the value and the use of the material means of extending it,\nand who finally, by the force of arms compelled all Arabs to \"obedience to\nAllah and His messenger.\"\n\nIn our own society, real enthusiasm in the propagation of an idea generally\nconsidered as absurd, if crowned by success may, in the course of time, end\nin cold, prosaic calculation without a trace of hypocrisy. Nowhere in\nthe life of Mohammed can a point of turning be shown; there is a gradual\nchanging of aims and a readjustment of the means of attaining them. From\nthe first the outcast felt himself superior to the well-to-do people who\nlooked down upon him; and with all his power he sought for a position from\nwhich he could force them to acknowledge his superiority. This he found in\nthe next and better world, of which the Jews and Christians knew. After a\ncrisis, which some consider as psychopathologic, he knew himself to be sent\nby Allah to call the materialistic community, which he hated and despised,\nto the alternative, either in following him to find eternal blessedness, or\nin denying him to be doomed to eternal fire.\n\nPowerless against the scepticism of his hearers, after twelve years of\npreaching followed only by a few dozen, most of them outcasts like himself,\nhe hoped now and then that Allah would strike the recalcitrant multitude\nwith an earthly doom, as he knew from revelations had happened before. This\nhope was also unfulfilled. As other messengers of God had done in similar\ncircumstances, he sought for a more fruitful field than that of his\nbirthplace; he set out on the Hijrah, _i.e._, emigration to Medina. Here\ncircumstances were more favourable to him: in a short time he became the\nhead of a considerable community.\n\nAllah, who had given him power, soon allowed him to use it for the\nprotection of the interests of the Faithful against the unbelievers.\nOnce become militant, Mohammed turned from the purely defensive to the\naggressive attitude, with such success that a great part of the Arab tribes\nwere compelled to accept Isl\u00e2m, \"obedience to Allah and His Messenger.\" The\nrule formerly insisted upon: \"No compulsion in religion,\" was sacrificed,\nsince experience taught him, that the truth was more easily forced upon\nmen by violence than by threats which would be fulfilled only after the\nresurrection. Naturally, the religious value of the conversions sank in\nproportion as their number increased. The Prophet of world renouncement\nin Mecca wished to win souls for his faith; the Prophet-Prince in Medina\nneeded subjects and fighters for his army. Yet he was still the same\nMohammed.\n\nParallel with his altered position towards the heathen Arabs went a\nreadjustment of his point of view towards the followers of Scripture.\nMohammed never pretended to preach a new religion; he demanded in the name\nof Allah the same Isl\u00e2m (submission) that Moses, Jesus, and former prophets\nhad demanded of their nations. In his earlier revelations he always points\nout the identity of his \"Qor\u00e2ns\" with the contents of the sacred books of\nJews and Christians, in the sure conviction that these will confirm his\nassertion if asked. In Medina he was disillusioned by finding neither Jews\nnor Christians prepared to acknowledge an Arabian prophet, not even for the\nArabs only; so he was led to distinguish between the _true_ contents of the\nBible and that which had been made of it by the falsification of later\nJews and Christians. He preferred now to connect his own revelations more\nimmediately with those of Abraham, no books of whom could be cited against\nhim, and who was acknowledged by Jews and Christians without being himself\neither a Jew or a Christian.\n\nThis turn, this particular connection of Isl\u00e2m with Abraham, made it\npossible for him, by means of an adaptation of the biblical legends\nconcerning Abraham, Hagar, and Ishmael, to include in his religion a set of\nreligious customs of the Meccans, especially the hajj.[1] Thus Isl\u00e2m became\nmore Arabian, and at the same time more independent of the other revealed\nreligions, whose degeneracy was demonstrated by their refusal to\nacknowledge Mohammed.\n\n[Footnote 1: A complete explanation of the gradual development of the\nAbraham legend in the Qor\u00e2n can be found in my book _Het Mekkaansche Feest_\n(The Feast of Mecca), Leiden, 1880.]\n\nAll this is to be explained without the supposition of conscious trickery\nor dishonesty on the part of Mohammed. There was no other way for the\nunlettered Prophet, whose belief in his mission was unshaken, to overcome\nthe difficulties entailed by his closer acquaintance with the tenets of\nother religions.\n\nHow, then, are we to explain the starting-point of it all--Mohammed's sense\nof vocation? Was it a disease of the spirit, a kind of madness? At all\nevents, the data are insufficient upon which to form a serious diagnosis.\nSome have called it epilepsy. Sprenger, with an exaggerated display of\ncertainty based upon his former medical studies, gave Mohammed's disorder\nthe name of hysteria. Others try to find a connection between Mohammed's\nextraordinary interest in the fair sex and his prophetic consciousness.\nBut, after all, is it explaining the spiritual life of a man, who was\ncertainly unique, if we put a label upon him, and thus class him with\nothers, who at the most shared with him certain abnormalities? A normal man\nMohammed certainly was not. But as soon as we try to give a positive name\nto this negative quality, then we do the same as the heathens of Mecca, who\nwere violently awakened by his thundering prophecies: \"He is nothing but\none possessed, a poet, a soothsayer, a sorcerer,\" they said. Whether we say\nwith the old European biographers \"impostor,\" or with the modern ones put\n\"epileptic,\" or \"hysteric\" in its place, makes little difference. The\nMeccans ended by submitting to him, and conquering a world under the banner\nof his faith. We, with the diffidence which true science implies, feel\nobliged merely to call him Mohammed, and to seek in the Qor\u00e2n, and with\ngreat cautiousness in the Tradition, a few principal points of his life and\nwork, in order to see how in his mind the intense feeling of discontent\nduring the misery of his youth, together with a great self-reliance, a\nfeeling of spiritual superiority to his surroundings, developed into\na call, the form of which was largely decided by Jewish and Christian\ninfluence.\n\nWhile being struck by various weaknesses which disfigured this great\npersonality and which he himself freely confessed, we must admire the\nperseverance with which he retained his faith in his divine mission, not\ndiscouraged by twelve years of humiliation, nor by the repudiation of the\n\"People of Scripture,\" upon whom he had relied as his principal witnesses,\nnor yet by numbers of temporary rebuffs during his struggle for the\ndominion of Allah and His Messenger, which he carried on through the whole\nof Arabia.\n\nWas Mohammed conscious of the universality of his mission? In the beginning\nhe certainly conceived his work as merely the Arabian part of a universal\ntask, which, for other parts of the world, was laid upon other messengers.\nIn the Medina period he ever more decidedly chose the direction of \"forcing\nto comply.\" He was content only when the heathens perceived that further\nresistance to Allah's hosts was useless; their understanding of his \"clear\nArabic Qor\u00e2n\" was no longer the principal object of his striving. _Such_\nan Isl\u00e2m could equally well be forced upon _non-Arabian_ heathens. And,\nas regards the \"People of Scripture,\" since Mohammed's endeavour to be\nrecognized by them had failed, he had taken up his position opposed to\nthem, even above them. With the rise of his power he became hard and cruel\nto the Jews in North-Arabia, and from Jews and Christians alike in Arabia\nhe demanded submission to his authority, since it had proved impossible to\nmake them recognize his divine mission. This demand could quite logically\nbe extended to all Christians; in the first place to those of the Byzantine\nEmpire. But did Mohammed himself come to these conclusions in the last part\nof his life? Are the words in which Allah spoke to him: \"We have sent thee\nto men in general,\"[1] and a few expressions of the same sort, to be taken\nin that sense, or does \"humanity\" here, as in many other places in the\nQor\u00e2n, mean those with whom Mohammed had especially to do? N\u00f4ldeke is\nstrongly of opinion that the principal lines of the program of conquest\ncarried out after Mohammed's death, had been drawn by the Prophet himself.\nLammens and others deny with equal vigour, that Mohammed ever looked upon\nthe whole world as the field of his mission. This shows that the solution\nis not evident.[2]\n\n[Footnote 1: _Qor\u00e2n_, xxxiv., 27. The translation of this verse has\nalways been a subject of great difference of opinion. At the time of its\nrevelation--as fixed by Mohammedan as well as by western authorities--the\nuniversal conception of Mohammed's mission was quite out of question.]\n\n[Footnote 2: Professor T.W. Arnold in the 2d edition (London, 1913) of\nhis valuable work _The Preaching of Isl\u00e2m_ (especially pp. 28-31), warmly\nendeavours to prove that Mohammed from the beginning considered his mission\nas universal. He weakens his argument more than is necessary by placing the\nTradition upon an almost equal footing with the Qor\u00e2n as a source, and by\nignoring the historical development which is obvious in the Qor\u00e2n itself.\nIn this way he does not perceive the great importance of the history of the\nAbraham legend in Mohammed's conception. Moreover, the translation of\nthe verses of the Qor\u00e2n on p. 29 sometimes says more than the original.\n_Lil-n\u00e2s_ is not \"_to mankind_\" but \"_to men_,\" in the sense of \"_to\neverybody_.\" _Qor\u00e2n_, xvi., 86, does not say: \"One day we will raise up\na witness out of every nation,\" but: \"On the day (_i.e._, the day of\nresurrection) when we will raise up, etc.,\" which would seem to refer to\nthe theme so constantly repeated in the Qor\u00e2n, that each nation will be\nconfronted on the Day of Judgment with the prophet sent to it. When the\nQor\u00e2n is called an \"admonition to the world (_'\u00e2lam\u00een_)\" and Mohammed's\nmission a \"mercy to the world (_'\u00e2lam\u00een_),\" then we must remember that\n'\u00e2lam\u00een is one of the most misused rhymewords in the Qor\u00e2n (e.g., _Qor\u00e2n_,\nxv., 70); and we should not therefore translate it emphatically as \"all\ncreated beings,\" unless the universality of Mohammed's mission is firmly\nestablished by other proofs. And this is far from being the case.]\n\nIn our valuation of Mohammed's sayings we cannot lay too much stress upon\nhis incapability of looking far ahead. The final aims which Mohammed set\nhimself were considered by sane persons as unattainable. His firm belief in\nthe realization of the vague picture of the future which he had conceived,\nnay, which Allah held before him, drove him to the uttermost exertion of\nhis mental power in order to surmount the innumerable unexpected obstacles\nwhich he encountered. Hence the variability of the practical directions\ncontained in the Qor\u00e2n; they are constantly altered according to\ncircumstances. Allah's words during the last part of Mohammed's life:\n\"This day have I perfected your religion for you, and have I filled up\nthe measure of my favours towards you, and chosen Isl\u00e2m for you as your\nreligion,\" have in no way the meaning of the exclamation: \"It is finished,\"\nof the dying Christ. They are only a cry of jubilation over the degradation\nof the heathen Arabs by the triumph of Allah's weapons. At Mohammed's death\neverything was still unstable; and the vital questions for Isl\u00e2m were\nsubjects of contention between the leaders even before the Prophet had been\nburied.\n\nThe expedient of new revelations completing, altering, or abrogating former\nones had played an important part in the legislative work of Mohammed. Now,\nhe had never considered that by his death the spring would be stopped,\nalthough completion was wanted in every respect. For, without doubt,\nMohammed felt his weakness in systematizing and his absence of clearness\nof vision into the future, and therefore he postponed the promulgation of\ndivine decrees as long as possible, and he solved only such questions\nof law as frequently recurred, when further hesitation would have been\ndangerous to his authority and to the peace of the community.\n\nAt Mohammed's death, all Arabs were not yet subdued to his authority.\nThe expeditions which he had undertaken or arranged beyond the northern\nboundaries of Arabia, were directed against Arabs, although they were\nlikely to rouse conflict with the Byzantine and Persian empires. It would\nhave been contrary to Mohammed's usual methods if this had led him to form\na general definition of his attitude towards the world outside Arabia.\n\nAs little as Mohammed, when he invoked the Meccans in wild poetic\ninspirations to array themselves behind him to seek the blessedness of\nfuture life, had dreamt of the possibility that twenty years later the\nwhole of Arabia would acknowledge his authority in this world, as little,\nnay, much less, could he at the close of his life have had the faintest\npremonition of the fabulous development which his state would reach half\na century later. The subjugation of the mighty Persia and of some of the\nrichest provinces of the Byzantine Empire, only to mention these, was never\na part of his program, although legend has it that he sent out written\nchallenges to the six princes of the world best known to him. Yet we\nmay say that Mohammed's successors in the guidance of his community, by\ncontinuing their expansion towards the north, after the suppression of the\napostasy that followed his death, remained in Mohammed's line of action.\nThere is even more evident continuity in the development of the empire of\nthe Omayyads out of the state of Mohammed, than in the series of events\nby which we see the dreaded Prince-Prophet of Medina grew out of the\n\"possessed one\" of Mecca. But if Mohammed had been able to foresee how the\nunity of Arabia, which he nearly accomplished, was to bring into being a\nformidable international empire, we should expect some indubitable traces\nof this in the Qor\u00e2n; not a few verses of dubious interpretation, but\nsome certain sign that the Revelation, which had repeatedly, and with the\ngreatest emphasis, called itself a \"plain Arabic Qor\u00e2n\" intended for those\n\"to whom no warner had yet been sent,\" should in future be valid for the\n'Ajam, the Barbarians, as well as for the Arabs.\n\nEven if we ascribe to Mohammed something of the universal program, which\nthe later tradition makes him to have drawn up, he certainly could not\nforesee the success of it. For this, in the first place, the economic and\npolitical factors to which some scholars of our day would attribute the\nentire explanation of the Isl\u00e2m movement, must be taken into consideration.\nMohammed did to some extent prepare the universality of his religion and\nmake it possible. But that Isl\u00e2m, which came into the world as the Arabian\nform of the one, true religion, has actually become a universal religion,\nis due to circumstances which had little to do with its origin.[1] This\nextension of the domain to be subdued to its spiritual rule entailed\nupon Isl\u00e2m about three centuries of development and accommodation, of a\ndifferent sort, to be sure, but not less drastic in character than that of\nthe Christian Church.\n\n[Footnote 1: Sir William Muir was not wrong when he said: \"From first to\nlast the summons was to Arabs and to none other... The seed of a universal\ncreed had indeed been sown; but that it ever germinated was due to\ncircumstances rather than design.\"]\n\n\n\nII\n\nTHE RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENT OF ISL\u00c2M\n\n\nWe can hardly imagine a poorer, more miserable population than that of the\nSouth-Arabian country Hadramaut. All moral and social progress is there\nimpeded by the continuance of the worst elements of J\u00e2hiliyyah (Arabian\npaganism), side by side with those of Isl\u00e2m. A secular nobility is formed\nby groups of people, who grudge each other their very lives and fight each\nother according to the rules of retaliation unmitigated by any more humane\nfeelings. The religious nobility is represented by descendants of the\nProphet, arduous patrons of a most narrow-minded orthodoxy and of most\nbigoted fanaticism. In a well-ordered society, making the most of all the\nmeans offered by modern technical science, the dry barren soil might be\nmade to yield sufficient harvests to satisfy the wants of its members; but\namong these inhabitants, paralysed by anarchy, chronic famine prevails.\nForeigners wisely avoid this miserable country, and if they did visit\nit, would not be hospitably received. Hunger forces many Hadramites to\nemigrate; throughout the centuries we find them in all the countries of\nIsl\u00e2m, in the sacred cities of Western-Arabia, in Syria, Egypt, India,\nIndonesia, where they often occupy important positions.\n\nIn the Dutch Indies, for instance, they live in the most important\ncommercial towns, and though the Government has never favoured them, and\nthough they have had to compete with Chinese and with Europeans, they have\nsucceeded in making their position sufficiently strong. Before European\ninfluence prevailed, they even founded states in some of the larger islands\nor they obtained political influence in existing native states. Under a\nstrong European government they are among the quietest, most industrious\nsubjects, all earning their own living and saving something for their poor\nrelations at home. They come penniless, and without any of that theoretical\nknowledge or practical skill which we are apt to consider as indispensable\nfor a man who wishes to try his fortune in a complicated modern colonial\nworld. Yet I have known some who in twenty years' time have become\ncommercial potentates, and even millionaires.\n\nThe strange spectacle of these latent talents and of the suppressed energy\nof the people of Hadramaut that seem to be waiting only for transplantation\ninto a more favourable soil to develop with amazing rapidity, helps us\nto understand the enormous consequences of the Arabian migration in the\nseventh century.\n\nThe spiritual goods, with which Isl\u00e2m set out into the world, were far from\nimposing. It preached a most simple monotheism: Allah, the Almighty Creator\nand Ruler of heaven and earth, entirely self-sufficient, so that it were\nridiculous to suppose Him to have partners or sons and daughters to support\nHim; who has created the angels that they might form His retinue, and\nmen and genii (jinn) that they might obediently serve Him; who decides\neverything according to His incalculable will and is responsible to nobody,\nas the Universe is His; of whom His creatures, if their minds be not led\nastray, must therefore stand in respectful fear and awe. He has made His\nwill known to mankind, beginning at Adam, but the spreading of mankind over\nthe surface of the earth, its seduction by Satan and his emissaries have\ncaused most nations to become totally estranged from Him and His service.\nNow and then, when He considered that the time was come, He caused a\nprophet to arise from among a nation to be His messenger to summon people\nto conversion, and to tell them what blessedness awaited them as a reward\nof obedience, what punishments would be inflicted if they did not believe\nhis message.\n\nSometimes the disobedient had been struck by earthly judgment (the flood,\nthe drowning of the Egyptians, etc.), and the faithful had been rescued\nin a miraculous way and led to victory; but such things merely served\nas indications of Allah's greatness. One day the whole world will be\noverthrown and destroyed. Then the dead will be awakened and led before\nAllah's tribunal. The faithful will have abodes appointed them in\nwell-watered, shady gardens, with fruit-trees richly laden, with luxurious\ncouches upon which they may lie and enjoy the delicious food, served by the\nministrants of Paradise. They may also freely indulge in sparkling wine\nthat does not intoxicate, and in intercourse with women, whose youth and\nvirginity do not fade. The unbelievers end their lives in Hell-fire; or,\nrather, there is no end, for the punishment as well as the reward are\neverlasting.\n\nAllah gives to each one his due. The actions of His creatures are all\naccurately written down, and when judgment comes, the book is opened;\nmoreover, every creature carries the list of his own deeds and misdeeds;\nthe debit and credit sides are carefully weighed against each other in the\ndivine scales, and many witnesses are heard before judgment is pronounced.\nAllah, however, is clement and merciful; He gladly forgives those sinners\nwho have believed in Him, who have sincerely accepted Isl\u00e2m, that is to\nsay: who have acknowledged His absolute authority and have believed the\nmessage of the prophet sent to them. These prophets have the privilege\nof acting as mediators on behalf of their followers, not in the sense of\nredeemers, but as advocates who receive gracious hearing.\n\nNaturally, Isl\u00e2m, submission to the Lord of the Universe, ought to express\nitself in deeds. Allah desires the homage of formal worship, which must be\nperformed several times a day by every individual, and on special occasions\nby the assembled faithful, led by one of them. This. service, [s.]al\u00e2t,\nacquired its strictly binding rules only after Mohammed's time, but already\nin his lifetime it consisted chiefly of the same elements as now: the\nrecital of sacred texts, especially taken from the Revelation, certain\npostures of the body (standing, inclination, kneeling, prostration) with\nthe face towards Mecca. This last particular and the language of the\nRevelation are the Arabian elements of the service, which is for the rest\nan imitation of Jewish and Christian rituals, so far as Mohammed knew them.\nThere was no sacrament, consequently no priest to administer it; Isl\u00e2m has\nalways been the lay religion _par excellence_. Teaching and exhortation are\nthe only spiritual help that the pious Mohammedan wants, and this simple\ncare of souls is exercised without any ordination or consecration.\n\nFasting, for a month if possible, and longer if desired, was also an\nintegral part of religious life and, by showing disregard of earthly joys,\na proof of faith in Allah's promises for the world to come. Almsgiving,\nrecommended above all other virtues, was not only to be practised in\nobedience to Allah's law and in faith in retribution, but it was to testify\ncontempt of all earthly possessions which might impede the striving after\neternal happiness. Later, Mohammed was compelled, by the need of a public\nfund and the waning zeal of the faithful as their numbers increased, to\nregulate the practice of this virtue and to exact certain minima as taxes\n(_zak\u00e2t_).\n\nWhen Mohammed, taking his stand as opposed to Judaism and Christianity,\nhad accentuated the Arabian character of his religion, the Meccan rites of\npagan origin were incorporated into Isl\u00e2m; but only after the purification\nrequired by monotheism. From that time forward the yearly celebration of\nthe Hajj was among the ritual duties of the Moslim community.\n\nIn the first years of the strife yet another duty was most emphatically\nimpressed on the Faithful; _jih\u00e2d, i.e._, readiness to sacrifice life and\npossessions for the defence of Isl\u00e2m, understood, since the conquest of\nMecca in 630, as the extension by force of arms of the authority of the\nMoslim state, first over the whole of Arabia, and soon after Mohammed's\ndeath over the whole world, so far as Allah granted His hosts the victory.\n\nFor the rest, the legislative revelations regulated only such points as had\nbecome subjects of argument or contest in Mohammed's lifetime, or such as\nwere particularly suggested by that antithesis of paganism and revelation,\nwhich had determined Mohammed's prophetical career. Gambling and wine were\nforbidden, the latter after some hesitation between the inculcation of\ntemperance and that of abstinence. Usury, taken in the sense of requiring\nany interest at all upon loans, was also forbidden. All tribal feuds with\ntheir consequences had henceforward to be considered as non-existent, and\nretaliation, provided that the offended party would not agree to accept\ncompensation, was put under the control of the head of the community.\nPolygamy and intercourse of master and female slave were restricted; the\nobligations arising from blood-relationship or ownership were regulated.\nThese points suffice to remind us of the nature of the Qor\u00e2nic regulations.\nReference to certain subjects in this revealed law while others were\nignored, did not depend on their respective importance to the life of the\ncommunity, but rather on what happened to have been suggested by the events\nin Mohammed's lifetime. For Mohammed knew too well how little qualified he\nwas for legislative work to undertake it unless absolutely necessary.\n\nThis rough sketch of what Isl\u00e2m meant when it set out to conquer the world,\nis not very likely to create the impression that its incredibly rapid\nextension was due to its superiority over the forms of civilization which\nit supplanted. Lammens's assertion, that Isl\u00e2m was the Jewish religion\nsimplified according to Arabic wants and amplified by some Christian and\nArabic traditions, contains a great deal of truth, if only we recognize the\ncentral importance for Mohammed's vocation and preaching of the Christian\ndoctrine of Resurrection and judgment. This explains the large number of\nweak points that the book of Mohammed's revelations, written down by his\nfirst followers, offered to Jewish and Christian polemics. It was easy for\nthe theologians of those religions to point out numberless mistakes in the\nwork of the illiterate Arabian prophet, especially where he maintained that\nhe was repeating and confirming the contents of their Bible. The Qor\u00e2nic\nrevelations about Allah's intercourse with men, taken from apocryphal\nsources, from profane legends like that of Alexander the Great, sometimes\neven created by Mohammed's own fancy--such as the story of the prophet\nS\u00e2lih, said to have lived in the north of Arabia, and that of the prophet\nH\u00fbd, supposed to have lived in the south; all this could not but give them\nthe impression of a clumsy caricature of true tradition. The principal\ndoctrines of Synagogue and Church had apparently been misunderstood, or\nthey were simply denied as corruptions.\n\nThe conversion to Isl\u00e2m, within a hundred years, of such nations as the\nEgyptian, the Syrian, and the Persian, can hardly be attributed to anything\nbut the latent talents, the formerly suppressed energy of the Arabian race\nhaving found a favourable soil for its development; talents and energy,\nhowever, not of a missionary kind. If Isl\u00e2m is said to have been from its\nbeginning down to the present day, a missionary religion,[1] then \"mission\"\nis to be taken here in a quite peculiar sense, and special attention must\nbe given to the preparation of the missionary field by the Moslim armies,\nrelated by history and considered as most important by the Mohammedans\nthemselves.\n\n[Footnote 1: With extraordinary talent this thesis has been defended by\nProfessor T.W. Arnold in the above quoted work, _The Preaching of Islam_,\nwhich fully deserves the attention also of those who do not agree with the\nwriter's argument. Among the many objections that may be raised against\nProf. Arnold's conclusion, we point to the undeniable fact, that the Moslim\nscholars of all ages hardly speak of \"mission\" at all, and always treat the\nextension of the true faith by holy war as one of the principal duties of\nthe Moslim community.]\n\nCertainly, the nations conquered by the Arabs under the first khal\u00eefs were\nnot obliged to choose between living as Moslims or dying as unbelievers.\nThe conquerors treated them as Mohammed had treated Jews and Christians in\nArabia towards the end of his life, and only exacted from them submission\nto Moslim authority. They were allowed to adhere to their religion,\nprovided they helped with their taxes to fill the Moslim exchequer. This\nrule was even extended to such religions as that of the Pars\u00ees, although\nthey could not be considered as belonging to the \"People of Scripture\"\nexpressly recognized in the Qor\u00e2n. But the social condition of these\nsubjects was gradually made so oppressive by the Mohammedan masters, that\nrapid conversions in masses were a natural consequence; the more natural\nbecause among the conquered nations intellectual culture was restricted to\na small circle, so that after the conquest their spiritual leaders lacked\nfreedom of movement. Besides, practically very little was required from the\nnew converts, so that it was very tempting to take the step that led to\nfull citizenship.\n\nNo, those who in a short time subjected millions of non-Arabs to the state\nfounded by Mohammed, and thus prepared their conversion, were no apostles.\nThey were generals whose strategic talents would have remained hidden but\nfor Mohammed, political geniuses, especially from Mecca and Taif, who,\nbefore Isl\u00e2m, would have excelled only in the organization of commercial\noperations or in establishing harmony between hostile families. Now they\nproved capable of uniting the Arabs commanded by Allah, a unity still many\na time endangered during the first century by the old party spirit; and of\ndevising a division of labour between the rulers and the conquered which\nmade it possible for them to control the function of complicated machines\nof state without any technical knowledge.\n\nMoreover, several circumstances favoured their work; both the large realms\nwhich extended north of Arabia, were in a state of political decline;\nthe Christians inhabiting the provinces that were to be conquered first,\nbelonged, for the larger part, to heretical sects and were treated by the\northodox Byzantines in such a way that other masters, if tolerant, might be\nwelcome. The Arabian armies consisted of hardened Bedouins with few wants,\nwhose longing for the treasures of the civilized world made them more ready\nto endure the pressure of a discipline hitherto unknown to them.\n\nThe use that the leaders made of the occasion commands our admiration;\nalthough their plan was formed in the course and under the influence of\ngenerally unforeseen events. Circumstances had changed Mohammed the Prophet\ninto Mohammed the Conqueror; and the leaders, who continued the conqueror's\nwork, though not driven by fanaticism or religious zeal, still prepared the\nconversion of millions of men to Isl\u00e2m.\n\nIt was only natural that the new masters adopted, with certain\nmodifications, the administrative and fiscal systems of the conquered\ncountries. For similar reasons Isl\u00e2m had to complete its spiritual store\nfrom the well-ordered wealth of that of its new adherents. Recent research\nshows most clearly, that Isl\u00e2m, in after times so sharply opposed to other\nreligions and so strongly armed against foreign influence, in the first\ncentury borrowed freely and simply from the \"People of Scripture\" whatever\nwas not evidently in contradiction to the Qor\u00e2n. This was to be expected;\nhad not Mohammed from the very beginning referred to the \"people of the\nBook\" as \"those who know\"? When painful experience induced him afterwards\nto accuse them of corruption of their Scriptures, this attitude\nnecessitated a certain criticism but not rejection of their tradition.\nThe ritual, only provisionally regulated and continually liable to change\naccording to prophetic inspiration in Mohammed's lifetime, required\nunalterable rules after his death. Recent studies[1] have shown in an\nastounding way, that the Jewish ritual, together with the religious rites\nof the Christians, strongly influenced the definite shape given to that of\nIsl\u00e2m, while indirect influence of the Pars\u00ee religion is at least probable.\n\n[Footnote 1: The studies of Professors C.H. Becker, E. Mittwoch, and\nA.J. Wensinck, especially taken in connection with older ones of Ignaz\nGoldziher, have thrown much light upon this subject.]\n\nSo much for the rites of public worship and the ritual purity they require.\nThe method of fasting seems to follow the Jewish model, whereas the period\nof obligatory fasting depends on the Christian usage.\n\nMohammed's fragmentary and unsystematic accounts of sacred history were\nfreely drawn from Jewish and Christian sources and covered the whole period\nfrom the creation of the world until the first centuries of the Christian\nera. Of course, features shocking to the Moslim mind were dropped and the\nwhole adapted to the monotonous conception of the Qor\u00e2n. With ever greater\nboldness the story of Mohammed's own life was exalted to the sphere of\nthe supernatural; here the Gospel served as example. Though Mohammed had\nrepeatedly declared himself to be an ordinary man chosen by Allah as the\norgan of His revelation, and whose only miracle was the Qor\u00e2n, posterity\nascribed to him a whole series of wonders, evidently invented in emulation\nof the wonders of Christ. The reason for this seems to have been the idea\nthat none of the older prophets, not even Jesus, of whom the Qor\u00e2n tells\nthe greatest wonders, could have worked a miracle without Mohammed, the\nSeal of the prophets, having rivalled or surpassed him in this respect.\nOnly Jesus was the Messiah; but this title did not exceed in value\ndifferent titles of other prophets, and Mohammed's special epithets were\nof a higher order. A relative sinlessness Mohammed shared with Jesus; the\nacceptance of this doctrine, contradictory to the original spirit of the\nQor\u00e2n, had moreover a dogmatic motive: it was considered indispensable\nto raise the text of the Qor\u00e2n above all suspicion of corruption, which\nsuspicion would not be excluded if the organ of the Revelation were\nfallible.\n\nThis period of naively adopting institutions, doctrines, and traditions was\nsoon followed by an awakening to the consciousness that Isl\u00e2m could not\nwell absorb any more of such foreign elements without endangering its\nindependent character. Then a sorting began; and the assimilation of the\nvast amount of borrowed matter, that had already become an integral part of\nIsl\u00e2m, was completed by submitting the whole to a peculiar treatment. It\nwas carefully divested of all marks of origin and labelled _had\u00eeth_,[1]\nso that henceforth it was regarded as emanations from the wisdom of the\nArabian Prophet, for which his followers owed no thanks to foreigners.\n\n[Footnote 1: _Had\u00eeth_, the Arabic word for record, story, has assumed\nthe technical meaning of \"tradition\" concerning the words and deeds of\nMohammed. It is used as well in the sense of a single record of this sort\nas in that of the whole body of sacred traditions.]\n\nAt first, it was only at Medina that some pious people occupied themselves\nwith registering, putting in order, and systematizing the spiritual\nproperty of Isl\u00e2m; afterwards similar circles were formed in other centres,\nsuch as Mecca, Kufa, Basra, Misr (Cairo), and elsewhere. At the outset\nthe collection of divine sayings, the Qor\u00e2n, was the only guide, the only\nsource of decisive decrees, the only touchstone of what was true or false,\nallowed or forbidden. Reluctantly, but decidedly at last, it was conceded\nthat the foundations laid by Mohammed for the life of his community were\nby no means all to be found in the Holy Book; rather, that Mohammed's\nrevelations without his explanation and practice would have remained an\nenigma. It was understood now that the rules and laws of Isl\u00e2m were founded\non God's word and on the Sunnah, _i.e._, the \"way\" pointed out by the\nProphet's word and example. Thus it had been from the moment that Allah had\ncaused His light to shine over Arabia, and thus it must remain, if human\nerror was not to corrupt Isl\u00e2m.\n\nAt the moment when this conservative instinct began to assert itself among\nthe spiritual leaders, so much foreign matter had already been incorporated\ninto Isl\u00e2m, that the theory of the sufficiency of Qor\u00e2n and Sunnah could\nnot have been maintained without the labelling operation which we have\nalluded to. So it was assumed that as surely as Mohammed must have\nsurpassed his predecessors in perfection and in wonders, so surely must\nall the principles and precepts necessary for his community have been\nformulated by him. Thus, by a gigantic web of fiction, he became after his\ndeath the organ of opinions, ideas, and interests, whose lawfulness was\nrecognized by every influential section of the Faithful. All that could not\nbe identified as part of the Prophet's Sunnah, received no recognition; on\nthe other hand, all that was accepted had, somehow, to be incorporated into\nthe Sunnah.\n\nIt became a fundamental dogma of Isl\u00e2m, that the Sunnah was the\nindispensable completion of the Qor\u00e2n, and that both together formed the\nsource of Mohammedan law and doctrine; so much so that every party assumed\nthe name of \"People of the Sunnah\" to express its pretension to orthodoxy.\nThe _contents_ of the Sunnah, however, was the subject of a great deal of\ncontroversy; so that it came to be considered necessary to make the Prophet\npronounce his authoritative judgment on this difference of opinion. He\nwas said to have called it a proof of God's special mercy, that within\nreasonable limits difference of opinion was allowed in his community. Of\nthat privilege Mohammedans have always amply availed themselves.\n\nWhen the difference touched on political questions, especially on the\nsuccession of the Prophet in the government of the community, schism was\nthe inevitable consequence. Thus arose the party strifes of the first\ncentury, which led to the establishment of the sects of the Sh\u00ee'ites and\nthe Kh\u00e2rijites, separate communities, severed from the great whole, that\nled their own lives, and therefore followed paths different from those of\nthe majority in matters of doctrine and law as well as in politics. The\nsharpness of the political antithesis served to accentuate the importance\nof the other differences in such cases and to debar their acceptance as the\nlegal consequence of the difference of opinion that God's mercy allowed.\nThat the political factor was indeed the great motive of separation, is\nclearly shown in our own day, now that one Mohammedan state after the other\nsees its political independence disappearing and efforts are being made\nfrom all sides to re-establish the unity of the Mohammedan world by\nstimulating the feeling of religious brotherhood. Among the most cultivated\nMoslims of different countries an earnest endeavour is gaining ground to\nadmit Sh\u00ee'ites, Kh\u00e2rijites, and others, formerly abused as heretics, into\nthe great community, now threatened by common foes, and to regard their\nspecial tenets in the same way as the differences existing between the four\nlaw schools: Hanafites, M\u00e2likites, Sh\u00e2fi'ites and Hanbalites, which for\ncenturies have been considered equally orthodox.\n\nAlthough the differences that divide these schools at first caused great\nexcitement and gave rise to violent discussions, the strong catholic\ninstinct of Isl\u00e2m always knew how to prevent schism. Each new generation\neither found the golden mean between the extremes which had divided the\npreceding one, or it recognized the right of both opinions.\n\nThough the dogmatic differences were not necessarily so dangerous to\nunity as were political ones, yet they were more apt to cause schism than\ndiscussions about the law. It was essential to put an end to dissension\nconcerning the theological roots of the whole system of Isl\u00e2m. Mohammed had\nnever expressed any truth in dogmatic form; all systematic thinking was\nforeign to his nature. It was again the non-Arabic Moslims, especially\nthose of Christian origin, who suggested such doctrinal questions. At first\nthey met with a vehement opposition that condemned all dogmatic discussion\nas a novelty of the Devil. In the long run, however, the contest of the\nconservatives against specially objectionable features of the dogmatists'\ndiscussions forced them to borrow arms from the dogmatic arsenal. Hence a\nmethod with a peculiar terminology came in vogue, to which even the boldest\nimagination could not ascribe any connection with the Sunnah of Mohammed.\nYet some traditions ventured to put prophetic warnings on Mohammed's lips\nagainst dogmatic innovations that were sure to arise, and to make him\npronounce the names of a couple of future sects. But no one dared to make\nthe Prophet preach an orthodox system of dogmatics resulting from the\ncontroversies of several centuries, all the terms of which were foreign to\nthe Arabic speech of Mohammed's time.\n\nIndeed, all the subjects which had given rise to dogmatic controversy\nin the Christian Church, except some too specifically Christian, were\ndiscussed by the _mutakallims_, the dogmatists of Isl\u00e2m. Free will or\npredestination; God omnipotent, or first of all just and holy; God's word\ncreated by Him, or sharing His eternity; God one in this sense, that His\nbeing admitted of no plurality of qualities, or possessed of qualities,\nwhich in all eternity are inherent in His being; in the world to come only\nbliss and doom, or also an intermediate state for the neutral. We might\ncontinue the enumeration and always show to the Christian church-historian\nor theologian old acquaintances in Moslim garb. That is why Maracci and\nReland could understand Jews and Christians yielding to the temptation\nof joining Isl\u00e2m, and that also explains why Catholic and Protestant\ndogmatists could accuse each other of Crypto-mohammedanism.\n\nNot until the beginning of the tenth century A.D. did the orthodox\nMohammedan dogma begin to emerge from the clash of opinions into its\ndefinite shape. The Mu'tazilites had advocated man's free will; had given\nprominence to justice and holiness in their conception of God, had denied\ndistinct qualities in God and the eternity of God's Word; had accepted a\nplace for the neutral between Paradise and Hell; and for some time the\nfavour of the powers in authority seemed to assure the victory of their\nsystem. Al-Ash'ar\u00ee contradicted all these points, and his system has in the\nend been adopted by the great majority. The Mu'tazilite doctrines for a\nlong time still enthralled many minds, but they ended by taking refuge\nin the political heresy of Sh\u00ee'itism. In the most conservative circles,\nopponents to all speculation were never wanting; but they were obliged\nunconsciously to make large concessions to systematic thought; for in the\nMoslim world as elsewhere religious belief without dogma had become as\nimpossible as breathing is without air.\n\nThus, in Isl\u00e2m, a whole system, which could not even pretend to draw its\nauthority from the Sunnah, had come to be accepted. It was not difficult\nto justify this deviation from the orthodox abhorrence against novelties.\nIsl\u00e2m has always looked at the world in a pessimistic way, a view expressed\nin numberless prophetic sayings. The world is bad and will become worse and\nworse. Religion and morality will have to wage an ever more hopeless war\nagainst unbelief, against heresy and ungodly ways of living. While this\nis surely no reason for entering into any compromise with doctrines which\ndepart but a hair's breadth from Qor\u00e2n and Sunnah, it necessitates methods\nof defence against heresy as unknown in Mohammed's time as heresy itself.\n\"Necessity knows no law\" is a principle fully accepted in Islam; and heresy\nis an enemy of the faith that can only be defeated with dialectic weapons.\nSo the religious truths preached by Mohammed have not been altered in\nany way; but under the stress of necessity they have been clad in modern\narmour, which has somewhat changed their aspect.\n\nMoreover, Isl\u00e2m has a theory, which alone is sufficient to justify the\nwhole later development of doctrine as well as of law. This theory,\nwhose importance for the system can hardly be overestimated, and which,\nnevertheless, has until very recent times constantly been overlooked by\nWestern students of Isl\u00e2m, finds its classical expression in the following\nwords, put into the mouth of Mohammed: \"My community will never agree in an\nerror.\" In terms more familiar to us, this means that the Mohammedan Church\ntaken as a whole is infallible; that all the decisions on matters practical\nor theoretical, on which it is agreed, are binding upon its members.\nNowhere else is the catholic instinct of Isl\u00e2m more clearly expressed.\n\nA faithful Mohammedan student, after having struggled through a handbook of\nlaw, may be vexed by a doubt as to whether these endless casuistic precepts\nhave been rightly deduced from the Qor\u00e2n and the Sacred Tradition. His\ndoubt, however, will at once be silenced, if he bears in mind that Allah\nspeaks more plainly to him by this infallible Agreement (_Ijm\u00e2'_) of the\nCommunity than through Qor\u00e2n and Tradition; nay, that the contents of both\nthose sacred sources, without this perfect intermediary, would be to a\ngreat extent unintelligible to him. Even the differences between the\nschools of law may be based on this theory of the Ijm\u00e2'; for, does not the\ninfallible Agreement of the Community teach us that a certain diversity\nof opinion is a merciful gift of God? It was through the Agreement that\ndogmatic speculations as well as minute discussions about points of law\nbecame legitimate. The stamp of Ijm\u00e2' was essential to every rule of faith\nand life, to all manners and customs.\n\nAll sorts of religious ideas and practices, which could not possibly be\ndeduced from Mohammed's message, entered the Moslim world by the permission\nof Ijm\u00e2'. Here we need think only of mysticism and of the cult of saints.\n\nSome passages of the Qor\u00e2n may perhaps be interpreted in such a way that we\nhear the subtler strings of religious emotion vibrating in them. The chief\nimpression that Mohammed's Allah makes before the Hijrah is that of awful\nmajesty, at which men tremble from afar; they fear His punishment, dare\nhardly be sure of His reward, and hope much from His mercy. This impression\nis a lasting one; but, after the Hijrah, Allah is also heard quietly\nreasoning with His obedient servants, giving them advice and commands,\nwhich they have to follow in order to frustrate all resistance to His\nauthority and to deserve His satisfaction. He is always the Lord, the King\nof the world, who speaks to His humble servants. But the lamp which Allah\nhad caused Mohammed to hold up to guide mankind with its light, was raised\nhigher and higher after the Prophet's death, in order to shed its light\nover an ever increasing part of humanity. This was not possible, however,\nwithout its reservoir being replenished with all the different kinds of oil\nthat had from time immemorial given light to those different nations. The\noil of mysticism came from Christian circles, and its Neo-Platonic origin\nwas quite unmistakable; Persia and India also contributed to it. There were\nthose who, by asceticism, by different methods of mortifying the flesh,\nliberated the spirit that it might rise and become united with the origin\nof all being; to such an extent, that with some the profession of faith\nwas reduced to the blasphemous exclamation: \"I am Allah.\" Others tried to\nbecome free from the sphere of the material and the temporal by certain\nmethods of thought, combined or not combined with asceticism. Here the\nnecessity of guidance was felt, and congregations came into existence,\nwhose purpose it was to permit large groups of people under the leadership\nof their sheikhs, to participate simultaneously in the mystic union. The\ninfluence which spread most widely was that of leaders like Ghaz\u00e2l\u00ee, the\nFather of the later Mohammedan Church, who recommended moral purification\nof the soul as the only way by which men should come nearer to God. His\nmysticism wished to avoid the danger of pantheism, to which so many others\nwere led by their contemplations, and which so often engendered disregard\nof the revealed law, or even of morality. Some wanted to pass over the gap\nbetween the Creator and the created along a bridge of contemplation; and\nso, driven by the fire of sublime passion, precipitate themselves towards\nthe object of their love, in a kind of rapture, which poets compare with\nintoxication. The evil world said that the impossibility to accomplish this\nheavenly union often induced those people to imitate it for the time being\nwith the earthly means of wine and the indulgence in sensual love.\n\nCharacteristic of all these sorts of mysticism is their esoteric pride.\nAll those emotions are meant only for a small number of chosen ones. Even\nGhaz\u00e2l\u00ee's ethical mysticism is not for the multitude. The development of\nIsl\u00e2m as a whole, from the Hijrah on, has always been greater in breadth\nthan in depth; and, consequently, its pedagogics have remained defective.\nEven some of the noblest minds in Isl\u00e2m restrict true religious life to an\naristocracy, and accept the ignorance of the multitude as an irremediable\nevil.\n\nThroughout the centuries pantheistic and animistic forms of mysticism have\nfound many adherents among the Mohammedans; but the infallible Agreement\nhas persisted in calling that heresy. Ethical mysticism, since Ghaz\u00e2l\u00ee, has\nbeen fully recognized; and, with law and dogma, it forms the sacred trio of\nsciences of Isl\u00e2m, to the study of which the Arabic humanistic arts\nserve as preparatory instruments. All other sciences, however useful and\nnecessary, are of this world and have no value for the world to come. The\nunfaithful appreciate and study them as well as do the Mohammedans; but,\non Mohammedan soil they must be coloured with a Mohammedan hue, and their\nresults may never clash with the three religious sciences. Physics,\nastronomy, and philosophy have often found it difficult to observe this\nrestriction, and therefore they used to be at least slightly suspected in\npious circles.\n\nMysticism did not only owe to Ijm\u00e2' its place in the sacred trio, but it\nsucceeded, better than dogmatics, in confirming its right with words of\nAllah and His Prophet. In Isl\u00e2m mysticism and allegory are allied in the\nusual way; for the _illuminati_ the words had quite a different meaning\nthan for common, every-day people. So the Qor\u00e2n was made to speak the\nlanguage of mysticism; and mystic commentaries of the Holy Book exist,\nwhich, with total disregard for philological and historical objections,\nexplain the verses of the Revelation as expressions of the profoundest soul\nexperiences. Clear utterances in this spirit were put into the Prophet's\nmouth; and, like the canonists, the leaders on the mystic Way to God\nboasted of a spiritual genealogy which went back to Mohammed. Thus the\nProphet is said to have declared void all knowledge and fulfillment of the\nlaw which lacks mystic experience.\n\nOf course only \"true\" mysticism is justified by Ijm\u00e2' and confirmed by the\nevidence of Qor\u00e2n and Sunnah; but, about the bounds between \"true\" and\n\"false\" or heretical mysticism, there exists in a large measure the\nwell-known diversity of opinion allowed by God's grace. The ethical\nmysticism of al-Ghaz\u00e2l\u00ee is generally recognized as orthodox; and the\npossibility of attaining to a higher spiritual sphere by means of methodic\nasceticism and contemplation is doubted by few. The following opinion has\ncome to prevail in wide circles: the Law offers the bread of life to all\nthe faithful, the dogmatics are the arsenal from which the weapons must be\ntaken to defend the treasures of religion against unbelief and heresy, but\nmysticism shows the earthly pilgrim the way to Heaven.\n\nIt was a much lower need that assured the cult of saints a place in the\ndoctrine and practice of Isl\u00e2m. As strange as is Mohammed's transformation\nfrom an ordinary son of man, which he wanted to be, into the incarnation\nof Divine Light, as the later biographers represent him, it is still more\nastounding that the intercession of saints should have become indispensable\nto the community of Mohammed, who, according to Tradition, cursed the Jews\nand Christians because they worshipped the shrines of their prophets.\nAlmost every Moslim village has its patron saint; every country has its\nnational saints; every province of human life has its own human rulers,\nwho are intermediate between the Creator and common mortals. In no other\nparticular has Isl\u00e2m more fully accommodated itself to the religions it\nsupplanted. The popular practice, which is in many cases hardly to be\ndistinguished from polytheism, was, to a great extent, favoured by the\ntheory of the intercession of the pious dead, of whose friendly assistance\npeople might assure themselves by doing good deeds in their names and to\ntheir eternal advantage.\n\nThe ordinary Moslim visitor of the graves of saints does not trouble\nhimself with this ingenious compromise between the severe monotheism of his\nprophet and the polytheism of his ancestors. He is firmly convinced, that\nthe best way to obtain the satisfaction of his desire after earthly or\nheavenly goods is to give the saint whose special care these are what he\nlikes best; and he confidently leaves it to the venerated one to settle the\nmatter with Allah, who is far too high above the ordinary mortal to allow\nof direct contact.\n\nIn support even of this startling deviation from the original, traditions\nhave been devised. Moreover, the veneration of human beings was favoured\nby some forms of mysticism; for, like many saints, many mystics had their\neccentricities, and it was much to the advantage of mystic theologians if\nthe vulgar could be persuaded to accept their aberrations from normal\nrules of life as peculiarities of holy men. But Ijm\u00e2' did more even than\ntradition and mysticism to make the veneration of legions of saints\npossible in the temples of the very men who were obliged by their ritual\nlaw to say to Allah several time daily: \"Thee only do we worship and to\nThee alone do we cry for help.\"\n\nIn the tenth century of our era Isl\u00e2m's process of accommodation was\nfinished in all its essentials. From this time forward, if circumstances\nwere favourable, it could continue the execution of its world conquering\nplans without being compelled to assimilate any more foreign elements.\nAgainst each spiritual asset that another universal religion could boast,\nit could now put forward something of a similar nature, but which still\nshowed characteristics of its own, and the superiority of which it could\nsustain by arguments perfectly satisfactory to its followers. From that\ntime on, Isl\u00e2m strove to distinguish itself ever more sharply from its most\nimportant rivals. There was no absolute stagnation, the evolution was not\nentirely stopped; but it moved at a much quieter pace, and its direction\nwas governed by internal motives, not by influences from outside. Moslim\ncatholicism had attained its full growth.\n\nWe cannot within the small compass of these lectures consider the\nexcrescences of the normal Isl\u00e2m, the Sh\u00ee'itic ultras, who venerated\ncertain descendants of Mohammed as infallible rulers of the world,\nIshma'ilites, Qarmatians, Assassins; nor the modern bastards of Isl\u00e2m, such\nas the Sheikhites, the B\u00e2b\u00ee's, the Beh\u00e2'\u00ees--who have found some adherents\nin America--and other sects, which indeed sprang up on Moslim soil, but\ndeliberately turned to non-Mohammedan sources for their inspirations. We\nmust draw attention, however, to protests raised by certain minorities\nagainst some of the ideas and practices which had been definitely adopted\nby the majority.\n\nIn the midst of Mohammedan Catholicism there always lived and moved more or\nless freely \"protestant\" elements. The comparison may even be continued,\nwith certain qualifications, and we may speak also of a conservative and\nof a liberal protestantism in Isl\u00e2m. The conservative Protestantism\nis represented by the Hanbalitic school and kindred spirits, who most\nemphatically preached that the Agreement (Ijm\u00e2') of every period should be\nbased on that of the \"pious ancestors.\" They therefore tested every dogma\nand practice by the words and deeds of the Prophet, his contemporaries, and\nthe leaders of the Community in the first decades after Mohammed's death.\nIn their eyes the Church of later days had degenerated; and they declined\nto consider the agreement of its doctors as justifying the penetration\ninto Isl\u00e2m of ideas and usages of foreign origin. The cult of saints was\nrejected by them as altogether contradictory to the Qor\u00e2n and the genuine\ntradition. These protestants of Isl\u00e2m may be compared to those of\nChristianity also in this respect, that they accepted the results of the\nevolution and assimilation of the first three centuries of Isl\u00e2m, but\nrejected later additions as abuse and corruption. When on the verge of our\nnineteenth century, they tried, as true Moslims, to force by material means\ntheir religious conceptions on others, they were combated as heretics by\nthe authorities of catholic Isl\u00e2m. Central and Western Arabia formed the\nbattlefield on which these zealots, called Wahh\u00e2bites after their leader,\nwere defeated by Mohammed Ali, the first Khedive, and his Egyptian army.\nSince they have given up their efforts at violent reconstitution of what\nthey consider to be the original Isl\u00e2m, they are left alone, and their\nideas have found adherents far outside Arabia, _e.g._, in British India and\nin Northern and Central Africa.\n\nIn still quite another way many Moslims who found their freedom of thought\nor action impeded by the prevailing law and doctrine, have returned to the\norigin of their religion. Too much attached to the traditions of their\nfaith, deliberately to disregard these impediments, they tried to find in\nthe Qor\u00e2n and Tradition arguments in favour of what was dictated to them by\nReason; and they found those arguments as easily as former generations had\nfound the bases on which to erect their casuistry, their dogma, and their\nmysticism. This implied an interpretation of the oldest sources independent\nfrom the catholic development of Isl\u00e2m, and in contradiction with the\ngeneral opinion of the canonists, according to whom, since the fourth or\nfifth century of the Hijrah, no one is qualified for such free research. A\ncertain degree of independence of mind, together with a strong attachment\nto their spiritual past, has given rise in the Moslim world to this sort\nof liberal protestantism, which in our age has many adherents among the\nMohammedans who have come in contact with modern civilization.\n\nThat the partisans of all these different conceptions could remain together\nas the children of one spiritual family, is largely owing to the elastic\ncharacter of Ijm\u00e2', the importance of which is to some extent acknowledged\nby catholics and protestants, by moderns and conservatives. It has never\nbeen contested that the community, whose agreement was the test of truth,\nshould not consist of the faithful masses, but of the expert elect. In\na Christian church we should have spoken of the clergy, with a further\ndefinition of the organs through which it was to express itself synod,\ncouncil, or Pope. Isl\u00e2m has no clergy, as we have seen; the qualification\nof a man to have his own opinion depends entirely upon the scope of his\nknowledge or rather of his erudition. There is no lack of standards, fixed\nby Mohammedan authorities, in which the requirements for a scholar to\nqualify him for Ijm\u00e2' are detailed. The principal criterion is the\nknowledge of the canon law; quite what we should expect from the history\nof the evolution of Isl\u00e2m. But, of course, dogmatists and mystics had also\ntheir own \"agreements\" on the questions concerning them, and through the\ncompromise between Law, Dogma, and Mysticism, there could not fail to\ncome into existence a kind of mixed Ijm\u00e2'. Moreover, the standards and\ndefinitions could have only a certain theoretical value, as there never has\nexisted a body that could speak in the name of all. The decisions of Ijm\u00e2'\nwere therefore to be ascertained only in a vague and general way. The\nspeakers were individuals whose own authority depended on Ijm\u00e2', whereas\nIjm\u00e2' should have been their collective decision. Thus it was possible for\ninnumerable shades of Catholicism and protestantism to live under one roof;\nwith a good deal of friction, it is true, but without definite breach or\nschism, no one sect being able to eject another from the community.\n\nMoslim political authorities are bound not only to extend the domain of\nIsl\u00e2m, but also to keep the community in the right path in its life and\ndoctrine. This task they have always conceived in accordance with their\npolitical interests; Isl\u00e2m has had its religious persecutions but tolerance\nwas very usual, and even official favouring of heresy not quite exceptional\nwith Moslim rulers. Regular maintenance of religious discipline existed\nnowhere. Thus in the bond of political obedience elements which might\notherwise have been scattered were held together. The political decay of\nIsl\u00e2m in our a day has done away with what had been left of official power\nto settle religious differences and any organization of spiritual authority\nnever existed. Hence it is only natural that the diversity of opinion\nallowed by the grace of Allah now shows itself on a greater scale than ever\nbefore.\n\n\n\nIII\n\nTHE POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT OF ISL\u00c2M\n\n\nIn the first period of Isl\u00e2m, the functions of what we call Church and\nwhat we call State were exercised by the same authority. Its political\ndevelopment is therefore of great importance for the understanding of its\nreligious growth.\n\nThe Prophet, when he spoke in the name of God, was the lawgiver of his\ncommunity, and it was rightly understood by the later Faithful that his\nindispensable explanations of God's word had also legislative power. From\nthe time of the Hijrah the nature of the case made him the ruler, the\njudge, and the military commander of his theocratic state. Moreover, Allah\nexpressly demanded of the Moslims that they should obey \"the Messenger\nof God, and those amongst them who have authority.\"[1] We see by this\nexpression that Mohammed shared his temporal authority with others. His\nco-rulers were not appointed, their number was nowhere defined, they were\nnot a closed circle; they were the notables of the tribes or other groups\nwho had arrayed themselves under Mohammed's authority, and a few who had\ngained influence by their personality. In their councils Mohammed's word\nhad no decisive power, except when he spoke in the name of Allah; and we\nknow how careful he was to give oracles only in cases of extreme need.\n\n[Footnote 1: Qor\u00e2n, iv., 62.]\n\nIn the last years of Mohammed's life his authority became extended over a\nlarge part of Arabia; but he did very little in the way of centralization\nof government. He sent _'\u00e2mils, i.e._, agents, to the conquered tribes\nor villages, who had to see that, in the first place, the most important\nregulations of the Qor\u00e2n were followed, and, secondly, that the tax into\nwhich the duty of almsgiving had been converted was promptly paid, and\nthat the portion of it intended for the central fund at Medina was duly\ndelivered. After the great conquests, the governors of provinces of the\nMoslim Empire, who often exercised a despotic power, were called by the\nsame title of _'\u00e2mils_. The agents of Mohammed, however, did not possess\nsuch unlimited authority. It was only gradually that the Arabs learned the\nvalue of good discipline and submission to a strong guidance, and adopted\nthe forms of orderly government as they found them in the conquered lands.\n\nThrough the death of Mohammed everything became uncertain. The combination\nunder one leadership of such a heterogeneous mass as that of his Arabs\nwould have been unthinkable a few years before. It became quite natural,\nthough, as soon as the Prophet's mouth was recognized as the organ of\nAllah's voice. Must this monarchy be continued after Allah's mouthpiece had\nceased to exist? It was not at all certain. The force of circumstances and\nthe energy of some of Mohammed's counsellors soon led to the necessary\ndecisions. A number of the notables of the community succeeded in forcing\nupon the hesitating or unwilling members the acceptance of the monarchy as\na permanent institution. There must be a khal\u00eef, a deputy of the Prophet in\nall his functions (except that of messenger of God), who would be ruler\nand judge and leader of public worship, but above all _am\u00eer al-mu'min\u00een_,\n\"Commander of the Faithful,\" in the struggle both against the apostate\nArabs and against the hostile tribes on the northern border.\n\nBut for the military success of the first khalifs Isl\u00e2m would never have\nbecome a universal religion. Every exertion was made to keep the troops of\nthe Faithful complete. The leaders followed only Mohammed's example\nwhen they represented fighting for Allah's cause as the most enviable\noccupation. The duty of military service was constantly impressed upon the\nMoslims; the lust of booty and the desire for martyrdom, to which the Qor\u00e2n\nassigned the highest reward, were excited to the utmost. At a later period,\nit became necessary in the interests of order to temper the result of this\nexcitement by traditions in which those of the Faithful who died in the\nexercise of a peaceful, honest profession were declared to be witnesses to\nthe Faith as well as those who were slain in battle against the enemies of\nGod,--traditions in which the real and greater holy war was described as\nthe struggle against evil passions. The necessity of such a mitigating\nreaction, the spirit in which the chapters on holy war of Mohammedan\nlawbooks are conceived, and the galvanizing power which down to our own day\nis contained in a call to arms in the name of Allah, all this shows that\nin the beginning of Isl\u00e2m the love of battle had been instigated at the\nexpense of everything else.\n\nThe institution of the Khalifate had hardly been agreed upon when the\nquestion of who should occupy it became the subject of violent dissension.\nThe first four khal\u00eefs, whose reigns occupied the first thirty years after\nMohammed's death, were Qoraishites, tribesmen of the Prophet, and moreover\nmen who had been his intimate friends. The sacred tradition relates a\nsaying of Mohammed: \"The _im\u00e2ms_ are from Qoraish,\" intended to confine the\nKhalifate to men from that tribe. History, however, shows that this edict\nwas forged to give the stamp of legality to the results of a long political\nstruggle. For at Mohammed's death the Medinese began fiercely contesting\nthe claims of the Qoraishites; and during the reign of Al\u00ee, the fourth\nKhal\u00eef, the Kh\u00e2rijites rebelled, demanding, as democratic rigorists, the\nfree election of khal\u00eefs without restriction to the tribe of Qoraish or to\nany other descent. Their standard of requirements contained only religious\nand moral qualities; and they claimed for the community the continual\ncontrol of the chosen leader's behaviour and the right of deposing him\nas soon as they found him failing in the fulfilment of his duties. Their\nanarchistic revolutions, which during more than a century occasionally gave\nmuch trouble to the Khalifate, caused Isl\u00e2m to accentuate the aristocratic\ncharacter of its monarchy. They were overcome and reduced to a sect, the\nsurvivors of which still exist in South-Eastern Arabia, in Zanzibar, and in\nNorthern Africa; however, the actual life of these communities resembles\nthat of their spiritual forefathers to a very remote degree.\n\nAnother democratic doctrine, still more radical than that of the\nKh\u00e2rijites, makes even non-Arabs eligible for the Khalifate. It must have\nhad a considerable number of adherents, for the tradition which makes the\nProphet responsible for it is to be found in the canonic collections. Later\ngenerations, however, rendered it harmless by exegesis; they maintained\nthat in this text \"commander\" meant only subordinate chiefs, and not \"the\nCommander of the Faithful.\" It became a dogma in the orthodox Mohammedan\nworld, respected up to the sixteenth century, that only members of the\ntribe of Qoraish could take the place of the Messenger of God.\n\nThe chance of success was greater for the legitimists than for the\ndemocratic party. The former wished to make the Khalifate the privilege\nof Al\u00ee, the cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet, and his descendants. At\nfirst the community did not take much notice of that \"House of Mohammed\";\nand it did not occur to any one to give them a special part in the\ndirection of affairs. Al\u00ee and F\u00e2tima themselves asked to be placed in\npossession only of certain goods which had belonged to Mohammed, but which\nthe first khal\u00eefs would not allow to be regarded as his personal property;\nthey maintained that the Prophet had had the disposal of them not as owner,\nbut as head of the state. This narrow greed and absence of political\ninsight seemed to be hereditary in the descendants of Ali and F\u00e2tima; for\nthere was no lack of superstitious reverence for them in later times, and\nif one of them had possessed something of the political talent of the best\nOmayyads and Abbasids he would certainly have been able to supplant them.\n\nAfter the third Khal\u00eef, Othm\u00e2n, had been murdered by his political\nopponents, Ali became his successor; but he was more remote than any of his\npredecessors from enjoying general sympathy. At that time the Sh\u00ee'ah, the\n\"Party\" of the House of the Prophet, gradually arose, which maintained that\nAli should have been the first Khal\u00eef, and that his descendants should\nsucceed him. The veneration felt for those descendants increased in the\nsame proportion as that for the Prophet himself; and moreover, there\nwere at all times malcontents, whose advantage would be in joining any\nrevolution against the existing government. Yet the Alids never succeeded\nin accomplishing anything against the dynasties of the Omayyads, the\nAbbasids, and the Ottomans, except in a few cases of transitory importance\nonly.\n\nThe Fatimite dynasty, of rather doubtful descent, which ruled a part\nof Northern Africa and Egypt in the tenth century A.D., was completely\nsuppressed after some two and a half centuries. The Sher\u00eefs who have ruled\nMorocco for more than 950 years were not chiefs of a party that considered\nthe legality of their leadership a dogma; they owe their local Khalifate\nfar more to the out-of-the-way position of their country which prevented\nAbbasids and Turks from meddling with their affairs. Otherwise, they would\nhave been obliged at any rate to acknowledge the sovereignty of the Great\nLord of Constantinople. This was the case with the Sher\u00eefs of Mecca, who\never since the twelfth century have regarded the sacred territory as their\ndomain. Their principality arose out of the general political disturbance\nand the division of the Mohammedan empire into a number of kingdoms, whose\nmutual strife prevented them from undertaking military operations in the\ndesert. These Sher\u00eefs raised no claim to the Khalifate; and the Sh\u00ee'itic\ntendencies they displayed in the Middle Ages had no political significance,\nalthough they had intimate relations with the Zaidites of Southern Arabia.\nAs first Egypt and afterwards Turkey made their protectorate over the holy\ncities more effective, the princes of Mecca became orthodox.\n\nThe Zaidites, who settled in Yemen from the ninth century on, are really\nSh\u00ee'ites, although of the most moderate kind. Without striving after\nexpansion outside Arabia, they firmly refuse to give up their own Khalifate\nand to acknowledge the sovereignty of any non-Alid ruler; the efforts of\nthe Turks to subdue them or to make a compromise with them have had no\nlasting results. This is the principal obstacle against their being\nincluded in the orthodox community, although their admission is defended,\neven under present circumstances, by many non-political Moslim scholars.\nThe Zaidites are the remnant of the original Arabian Sh\u00ee'ah, which for\ncenturies has counted adherents in all parts of the Moslim world, and some\nof whose tenets have penetrated Mohammedan orthodoxy. The almost general\nveneration of the sayyids and sher\u00eefs, as the descendants of Mohammed are\nentitled, is due to this influence.\n\nThe Sh\u00ee'ah outside Arabia, whose adherents used to be persecuted by the\nofficial authorities, not without good cause, became the receptacle of all\nthe revolutionary and heterodox ideas maintained by the converted peoples.\nAlongside of the _visible_ political history of Isl\u00e2m of the first\ncenturies, these circles built up their evolution of the _unseen_\ncommunity, the only true one, guided by the Holy Family, and the reality\nwas to them a continuous denial of the postulates of religion. Their first\n_im\u00e2m_ or successor of the Prophet was Al\u00ee, whose divine right had been\nunjustly denied by the three usurpers, Abu Bakr, Omar, and Othm\u00e2n, and who\nhad exercised actual authority for a few years in constant strife with\nKh\u00e2rijites and Omayyads. The efforts of his legitimate successors to assert\ntheir authority were constantly drowned in blood; until, at last, there\nwere no more candidates for the dangerous office. This prosaic fact was\nconverted by the adherents of the House of Mohammed into the romance,\nthat the last _im\u00e2m_ of a line of _seven_ according to some, and _twelve_\naccording to others, had disappeared in a mysterious way, to return at the\nend of days as Mahd\u00ee, the Guided One, who should restore the political\norder which had been disturbed ever since Mohammed's death. Until his\nreappearance there is nothing left for the community to do but to await\nhis advent, under the guidance of their secular rulers (e.g., the sh\u00e2hs of\nPersia) and enlightened by their authoritative scholars (_mujtahids_), who\nexplain faith and law to them from the tradition of the Sacred Family.\nThe great majority of Mohammedans, as they do not accept this legitimist\ntheory, are counted by the Sh\u00ee'ah outside Arabia as unclean heretics, if\nnot as unbelievers.\n\nAt the beginning of the fifteenth century this Sh\u00ee'ah found its political\ncentre in Persia, and opposed itself fanatically to the Sultan of Turkey,\nwho at about the same time came to stand at the head of orthodox Isl\u00e2m.\nAll differences of doctrine were now sharpened and embittered by political\npassion, and the efforts of single enlightened princes or scholars to\ninduce the various peoples to extend to each other, across the political\nbarriers, the hand of brotherhood in the principles of faith, all failed.\nIt is only in the last few years that the general political distress of\nIsl\u00e2m has inclined the estranged relatives towards reconciliation.\n\nBesides the veneration of the Alids, orthodox Isl\u00e2m has adopted another\nSh\u00eeitic element, the expectation of the Mahd\u00ee, which we have just\nmentioned. Most Sunnites expect that at the end of the world there will\ncome from the House of Mohammed a successor to him, guided by Allah, who\nwill maintain the revealed law as faithfully as the first four khal\u00eefs did\naccording to the idealized history, and who will succeed with God's help in\nmaking Isl\u00e2m victorious over the whole world. That the chiliastic kingdom\nof the Mahd\u00ee must in the end be destroyed by Anti-Christ, in order that\nJesus may be able once more to re-establish the holy order before the\nResurrection, was a necessary consequence of the amalgamation of the\npolitical expectations formed under Sh\u00ee'itic influence, with eschatological\nconceptions formerly borrowed by Isl\u00e2m from Christianity.\n\nThe orthodox Mahd\u00ee differs from that of the Sh\u00ee'ah in many ways. He is not\nan _im\u00e2m_ returning after centuries of disappearance, but a descendant of\nMohammed, coming into the world in the ordinary way to fulfill the ideal of\nthe Khalifate. He does not re-establish the legitimate line of successors\nof the Prophet; but he renews the glorious tradition of the Khalifate,\nwhich after the first thirty years was dragged into the general\ndeterioration, common to all human things. The prophecies concerning his\nappearance are sometimes of an equally supernatural kind as those of the\nSh\u00eeites, so that the period of his coming has passed more and more\nfrom the political sphere to which it originally belonged, into that of\neschatology. Yet, naturally, it is easier for a popular leader to make\nhimself regarded as the orthodox Mahd\u00ee than to play the part of the\nreturned _im\u00e2m_. Mohammedan rulers have had more trouble than they cared\nfor with candidates for the dignity of the Mahd\u00ee; and it is not surprising\nthat in official Turkish circles there is a tendency to simplify the\nMessianic expectation by giving the fullest weight to this traditional\nsaying of Mohammed \"There is no mahd\u00ee but Jesus,\" seeing that Jesus must\ncome from the clouds, whereas other mahd\u00ees may arise from human society.\n\nIn the orthodox expectation of the Mahdi the Moslim theory has most sharply\nexpressed its condemnation of the later political history of Isl\u00e2m. In the\ncourse of the first century after the Hijrah the Qor\u00e2n scholars (_g\u00e2r\u00ees_)\narose; and these in turn were succeeded by the men of tradition (_ahl\nal-had\u00eeth_) and by the canonists (_faq\u00eehs_) of later times. These learned\nmen (_ulam\u00e2'_) would not endure any interference with their right to state\nwith authority what Isl\u00e2m demanded of its leaders. They laid claim to an\ninterpretative authority concerning the divine law, which bordered upon\nsupreme legislative power; their agreement (Ijm\u00e2') was that of the\ninfallible community. But just as beside this legislative agreement, a\ndogmatic and a mystic agreement grew up, in the same way there was a\nseparate Ijm\u00e2' regarding the political government, upon which the canonists\ncould exercise only an indirect influence. In other words since the\naccession of the Omayyad khal\u00eefs, the actual authority rested in the hands\nof dynasties, and under the Abbasids government assumed even a despotic\ncharacter. This relation between the governors and governed, originally\nalien to Isl\u00e2m, was not changed by the transference of the actual power\ninto the hands of _wez\u00eers_ and officers of the bodyguard; nor yet by\nthe disintegration of the empire into a number of small despotisms, the\ninvestiture of which by the khal\u00eef became a mere formality. Dynastic and\npolitical questions were settled in a comparatively small circle, by court\nintrigue, stratagems, and force; and the canonists, like the people, were\nbound to accept the results. Politically inclined interpreters of the law\nmight try to justify their compulsory assent to the facts by theories about\nthe Ijm\u00e2' of the notables residing in the capital, who took the urgent\ndecisions about the succession, which decisions were subsequently confirmed\nby general homage to the new prince; but they had no illusions about the\nreal influence of the community upon the choice of its leader. The most\nindependent scholars made no attempt to disguise the fact that the course\nwhich political affairs had taken was the clearest proof of the moral\ndegeneration which had set in, and they pronounced an equally bold and\nmerciless criticism upon the government in all its departments. It became\na matter of course that a pious scholar must keep himself free from all\nintercourse with state officials, on pain of losing his reputation.\n\nThe bridge across the gulf that separated the spiritual from the temporal\nauthorities was formed by those state officials who, for the practice\nof their office, needed a knowledge of the divine law, especially the\n_q\u00e2dh\u00ees_. It was originally the duty of these judges to decide all legal\ndifferences between Mohammedans, or men of other creeds under Mohammedan\nprotection, who called for their decision. The actual division between the\nrulers and the interpreters of the law caused an ever-increasing limitation\nof the authority of the _q\u00e2dh\u00ees_. The laws of marriage, family, and\ninheritance remained, however, their inalienable territory; and a number\nof other matters, in which too great a religious interest was involved to\nleave them to the caprice of the governors or to the customary law outside\nIsl\u00e2m, were usually included. But as the _q\u00e2dh\u00ees_ were appointed by the\ngovernors, they were obliged in the exercise of their office to give due\nconsideration to the wishes of their constituents; and moreover they were\noften tainted by what was regarded in Mohammedan countries as inseparable\nfrom government employment: bribery.\n\nOn this account, the canonists, although it was from their ranks that the\nofficials of the _q\u00e2dh\u00ee_ court were to be drawn, considered no words too\nstrong to express their contempt for the office of _q\u00e2dh\u00ee_. In handbooks\nof the Law of all times, the _q\u00e2dh\u00ees \"of our time\"_ are represented as\nunscrupulous beings, whose unreliable judgments were chiefly dictated by\ntheir greed. Such an opinion would not have acquired full force, if it\nhad not been ascribed to Mohammed; in fact, the Prophet, according to a\ntradition, had said that out of three _q\u00e2dh\u00ees_ two are destined to\nHell. Anecdotes of famous scholars who could not be prevailed upon\nby imprisonment or castigation to accept the office of _q\u00e2dh\u00ees_ are\ninnumerable. Those who succumbed to the temptation forfeited the respect of\nthe circle to which they had belonged.\n\nI once witnessed a case of this kind, and the former friends of the _q\u00e2dh\u00ee_\ndid not spare him their bitter reproaches. He remarked that the judge,\nwhose duty it was to maintain the divine law, verily held a noble office.\nThey refuted this by saying that this defence was admissible only for\nearlier and better times, but not for \"the _q\u00e2dh\u00ees_ of our time.\" To which\nhe cuttingly replied \"And ye, are ye canonists of the better, the ancient\ntime?\" In truth, the students of sacred science are just as much \"of our\ntime\" as the _q\u00e2dh\u00ees_. Even in the eleventh century the great theologian\nGhaz\u00e2l\u00ee counted them all equal.[1] Not a few of them give their\nauthoritative advice according to the wishes of the highest bidder or\nof him who has the greatest influence, hustle for income from pious\ninstitutions, and vie with each other in a revel of casuistic subtleties.\nBut among those scholars there are and always have been some who, in\npoverty and simplicity, devote their life to the study of Allah's law with\nthe sole object of pleasing him; among the _q\u00e2dh\u00ees_ such are not easily to\nbe found. Amongst the other state officials the title of _q\u00e2dh\u00ee_ may count\nas a spiritual one, and the public may to a certain extent share this\nreverence; but in the eyes of the pious and of the canonists such glory is\nonly reflected from the clerical robe, in which the worldling disguises\nhimself.\n\n[Footnote 1: Ghaz\u00e2l\u00ee, _Ihya_, book i., ch. 6, quotes the words of a pious\nscholar of the olden time: \"The 'ulam\u00e2' will (on the Day of judgment)\nbe gathered amongst the prophets, but the _q\u00e2dh\u00ees_ amongst the temporal\nrulers.\" Ghaz\u00e2li adds \"alike with these _q\u00e2dh\u00ees_ are all those canonists\nwho make use of their learning for worldly purposes.\"]\n\nTo the _muft\u00ee_ criticism is somewhat more favourable than to the _q\u00e2dh\u00ee_. A\nmuft\u00ee is not necessarily an official; every canonist who, at the request of\na layman, expounds to him the meaning of the law on any particular point\nand gives a _fatwa_, acts as a _muft\u00ee_. Be the question in reference to the\nbehaviour of the individual towards God or towards man, with regard to his\nposition in a matter of litigation, in criticism of a state regulation or\nof a sentence of a judge, or out of pure love of knowledge, the scholar is\nmorally obliged to the best of his knowledge to enlighten the enquirer. He\nought to do this for the love of God; but he must live, and the enquirer is\nexpected to give him a suitable present for his trouble. This again gives\nrise to the danger that he who offers most is attended to first; and that\nfor the liberal rich man a dish is prepared from the casuistic store, as\nfar as possible according to his taste. The temptation is by no means so\ngreat as that to which the _q\u00e2dh\u00ee_ is exposed; especially since the office\nof judge has become an article of commerce, so that the very first step\ntowards the possession of it is in the direction of Hell. Moreover in\n\"these degenerate times\"--which have existed for about ten centuries--the\nacceptance of an appointment to the function of _q\u00e2dh\u00ee_ is not regarded as\na duty, while a competent scholar may only refuse to give a _fatwa_ under\nexceptional circumstances. Still, an unusually strong character is needed\nby the _muft\u00ee_, if he is not to fall into the snares of the world.\n\nBesides _q\u00e2dh\u00ees_ who settle legal disputes of a certain kind according to\nthe revealed law, the state requires its own advisers who can explain\nthat law, i.e., official _muft\u00ees_. Firstly, the government itself may be\ninvolved in a litigation; moreover in some government regulations it may be\nnecessary to avoid giving offence to canonists and their strict disciples.\nIn such cases it is better to be armed beforehand with an expert opinion\nthan to be exposed to dangerous criticism which might find an echo in a\nwide circle. The official _muft\u00ee_ must therefore be somewhat pliable, to\nsay the least. Moreover, any private person has the right to put questions\nto the state _muft\u00ee_; and the _q\u00e2dh\u00ee_ court is bound to take his answers\ninto account in its decisions. In this way the _muft\u00ees_ have absorbed a\npart of the duties of the _q\u00e2dh\u00ees_, and so their office is dragged along in\nthe degradation that the unofficial canonists denounce unweariedly in their\nwritings and in their teaching.\n\nThe way in which the most important _muft\u00ee_ places are filled and above\nall the position which the head-_muft\u00ee_ of the Turkish Empire, the\nSheikh-ul-Isl\u00e2m, holds at any particular period, may well serve as a\ntouchstone of the influence of the canonists on public life. If this is\ngreat, then even the most powerful sultan has only the possibility of\nchoice between a few great scholars, put forward or at all events not\ndisapproved of by their own guild, strengthened by public opinion. If, on\nthe other hand, there is no keen interest felt in the Shar\u00ee'ah (Divine\nLaw), then the temporal rulers can do pretty much what they like with these\nrepresentatives of the canon law. Under the tyrannical sway of Sultan\nAbd-ul-Hamid, the Sheikh-ul-Isl\u00e2m was little more than a tool for him and\nhis palace clique, and for their own reasons, the members of the Committee\nof Union and Progress, who rule at Constantinople since 1908, made no\nchange in this: each new ministry had its own Sheikh-ul-Isl\u00e2m, who had to\nbe, above everything, a faithful upholder of the constitutional theory\nheld by the Committee. The time is past when the Sultan and the Porte,\nin framing even the most pressing reform, must first anxiously assure\nthemselves of the position that the _hojas, tolbas, softas_, the\ntheologians in a word, would take towards it, and of the influence that\nthe Sheikh-ul-Isl\u00e2m could use in opposition to their plans. The political\nauthority makes its deference to the canonists dependent upon their strict\nobedience.\n\nThis important change is a natural consequence of the modernization of\nMohammedan political life, a movement through which the expounders of a\nlaw which has endeavoured to remain stationary since the year 1000 must\nnecessarily get into straits. This explains also why the religious life of\nMohammedans is in some respects freer in countries under non-Mohammedan\nauthority, than under a Mohammedan government. Under English, Dutch, or\nFrench rule the 'ulam\u00e2s are less interfered with in their teaching, the\n_muft\u00ees_ in their recommendations, and the _q\u00e2dh\u00ees_ in their judgments of\nquestions of marriage and inheritance than in Turkey, where the life of\nIsl\u00e2m, as state religion, lies under official control. In indirectly\ngoverned \"native states\" the relation of Mohammedan \"Church and State\" may\nmuch more resemble that in Turkey, and this is sometimes to the advantage\nof the sovereign ruler. Under the direct government of a modern state, the\nMohammedan group is treated as a religious community, whose particular life\nhas just the same claim to independence as that of other denominations. The\nonly justifiable limitation is that the program of the forcible reduction\nof the world to Mohammedan authority be kept within the scholastic walls as\na point of eschatology, and not considered as a body of prescriptions, the\nexecution of which must be prepared.\n\nThe extensive political program of Isl\u00e2m, developed during the first\ncenturies of astounding expansion, has yet not prevented millions of\nMohammedans from resigning themselves to reversed conditions in which at\nthe present time many more Mohammedans live under foreign authority than\nunder their own. The acceptance of this change was facilitated by the\nhistorical pessimism of Isl\u00e2m, which makes the mind prepared for every\nsort of decay, and by the true Moslim habit of resignation to painful\nexperiences, not through fatalism, but through reverence for Allah's\ninscrutable will. At the same time, it would be a gross mistake to imagine\nthat the idea of universal conquest may be considered as obliterated. This\nis the case with the intellectuals and with many practical commercial or\nindustrial men; but the canonists and the vulgar still live in the illusion\nof the days of Isl\u00e2m's greatness.\n\nThe legists continue to ground their appreciation of every actual political\ncondition on the law of the holy war, which war ought never to be allowed\nto cease entirely until all mankind is reduced to the authority of\nIsl\u00e2m--the heathen by conversion, the adherents of acknowledged Scripture\nby submission. Even if they admit the improbability of this at present,\nthey are comforted and encouraged by the recollection of the lengthy period\nof humiliation that the Prophet himself had to suffer before Allah bestowed\nvictory upon his arms; and they fervently join with the Friday preacher,\nwhen he pronounces the prayer, taken from the Qor\u00e2n: \"And lay not on us, O\nour Lord, that for which we have not strength, but blot out our sins and\nforgive us and have pity upon us. Thou art our Master; grant us then to\nconquer the unbelievers!\" And the common people are willingly taught by the\ncanonists and feed their hope of better days upon the innumerable legends\nof the olden time and the equally innumerable apocalyptic prophecies about\nthe future. The political blows that fall upon Isl\u00e2m make less impression\nupon their simple minds than the senseless stories about the power of\nthe Sultan of Stambul, that would instantly be revealed if he were not\nsurrounded by treacherous servants, and the fantastic tidings of the\nmiracles that Allah works in the Holy Cities of Arabia which are\ninaccessible to the unfaithful.\n\nThe conception of the Khalifate still exercises a fascinating influence,\nregarded in the light of a central point of union against the unfaithful.\nApart from the _'\u00e2mils_, Mohammed's agents amongst the Arabian tribes,\nthe Khalifate was the only political institution which arose out of the\nnecessity of the Moslim community, without foreign influence. It rescued\nIsl\u00e2m from threatening destruction, and it led the Faithful to conquest. No\nwonder that in historic legend the first four occupiers of that leadership,\nwho, from Medina, accomplished such great things, have been glorified into\nsaints, and are held up to all the following generations as examples to put\nthem to shame. In the Omayyads the ancient aristocracy of Mecca came to the\nhelm, and under them, the Mohammedan state was above all, as Wellhausen\nstyled it, \"the Arabian Empire.\" The best khal\u00eefs of this house had\nthe political wisdom to give the governors of the provinces sufficient\nindependence to prevent schism, and to secure to themselves the authority\nin important matters. The reaction of the non-Arabian converts against the\nsuppression of their own culture by the Arabian conquerors found support in\nthe opposition parties, above all with the Sh\u00ee'ah. The Abbasids, cleverer\npoliticians than the notoriously unskillful Alids, made use of the Alid\npropaganda to secure the booty to themselves at the right moment. The means\nwhich served the Alids for the establishment only of an invisible dynasty\nof princes who died as martyrs, enabled the descendants of Mohammed's\nuncle Abbas to overthrow the Omayyads, and to found their own Khalifate at\nBagdad, shining with the brilliance of an Eastern despotism.\n\nWhen it is said that the Abbasid Khalifate maintained itself from 750 till\nthe Mongol storm in the middle of the thirteenth century, that only refers\nto external appearance. After a brief success, the actual power of these\nkhal\u00eefs was transferred to the hands, first, of the captains of their\nbodyguard, then of sultan-dynasties, whose forcibly acquired powers, were\nlegalized by a formal investiture. In the same way the large provinces\ndeveloped into independent kingdoms, whose rulers considered the\nnomination-diplomas from Bagdad in the light of mere ornaments. Compared to\nthis irreparable disintegration of the empire, temporary schisms such as\nthe Omayyad Khalifate in Spain, the Fatimid Khalifate in Egypt, and here\nand there an independent organization of the Kh\u00e2rijites were of little\nsignificance.\n\nIt seems strange that the Moslim peoples, although the theory of Isl\u00e2m\nnever attributed an hereditary character to the Khalifate, attached so high\na value to the Abbasid name, that they continued unanimously to acknowledge\nthe Khalifate of Bagdad for centuries during which it possessed no\ninfluence. But the idea of hereditary rulers was deeply rooted in most\nof the peoples converted to Isl\u00e2m, and the glorious period of the first\nAbbasids so strongly impressed itself on the mind of the vulgar, that the\n_appearance_ of continuation was easily taken for _reality_. Its voidness\nwould sooner have been realized, if lack of energy had not prevented the\nlater Abbasids from trying to recover the lost power by the sword, or if\namongst their rivals who could also boast of a popular tradition--e.g.,\nthe Omayyads, or still more the Alids--a political genius had succeeded in\nforming a powerful opposition. But the sultans who ruled the various states\ndid not want to place all that they possessed in the balance on the chance\nof gaining the title of Khal\u00eef. The Moslim world became accustomed to the\nidea that the honoured House of the Prophet's uncle Abbas existed for the\npurpose of lending an additional glory to Mohammedan princes by a diploma.\nEven after the destruction of Bagdad by the Mongols in 1258, from which\nonly a few Abbasids escaped alive, Indian princes continued to value visits\nor deeds of appointment granted them by some begging descendant of the\n\"Glorious House.\" The sultans of Egypt secured this luxury permanently for\nthemselves by taking a branch of the family under their protection, who\ngave the glamour of their approval to every new result of the never-ending\nquarrels of succession, until in the beginning of the sixteenth century\nEgypt, together with so many other lands, was swallowed up by the Turkish\nconqueror.\n\nThese new rulers, who added the Byzantine Empire to Isl\u00e2m, who with Egypt\nbrought Southern and Western Arabia with the Holy Cities also under their\nauthority, and caused all the neighbouring princes, Moslim and Christian\nalike, to tremble on their thrones, thought it was time to abolish the\nsenseless survival of the Abbasid glory. The prestige of the Ottomans was\nas great as that of the Khalifate in its most palmy days had been; and they\nwould not be withheld from the assumption of the title. There is a doubtful\ntale of the abdication of the Abbasids in their favour, but the question\nis of no importance. The Ottomans owed their Khalifate to their sword; and\nthis was the only argument used by such canonists as thought it worth their\nwhile to bring such an incontestable fact into reconciliation with the law.\nThis was not strictly necessary, as they had been accustomed for eight\ncenturies to acquiesce in all sorts of unlawful acts which history\ndemonstrated to be the will of Allah.\n\nThe sense of the tradition that established descent from the tribe of\nQoraish as necessary for the highest dignity in the community was capable\nof being weakened by explanation; and, even without that, the leadership of\nthe irresistible Ottomans was of more value to Isl\u00e2m than the chimerical\nauthority of a powerless Qoraishite. In our own time, you can hear\nQoraishites, and even Alids, warmly defend the claims of the Turkish\nsultans to the Khalifate, as they regard these as the only Moslim princes\ncapable of championing the threatened rights of Isl\u00e2m.\n\nEven the sultans of Stambul could not think of restoring the authority of\nthe Khal\u00eef over the whole Mohammedan world. This was prevented not only\nby the schismatic kingdoms, khalifates, or im\u00e2mates like Sh\u00ee'itic Persia,\nwhich was consolidated just in the sixteenth century, by the unceasing\nopposition of the Im\u00e2ms of Yemen, and Kh\u00e2rijite principalities at the\nextremities of the Mohammedan world. Besides these, there were numerous\nprinces in Central Asia, in India, and in Central Africa, whom either the\nKhalifate had always been obliged to leave to themselves, or who had become\nso estranged from it that, unless they felt the power of the Turkish arms,\nthey preferred to remain as they were. Moreover, Isl\u00e2m had extended itself\nnot only by political means, but also by trade and colonization into\ncountries even the existence of which was hardly known in the political\ncentres of Isl\u00e2m, e.g., into Central Africa or the Far East of Asia.\nWithout thinking of rivalling the Abbasids or their successors, some of the\nprinces of such remote kingdoms, e.g., the sher\u00eefs of Morocco, assumed the\ntitle of Commander of the Faithful, bestowed upon them by their flatterers.\nToday, there are petty princes in East India under Dutch sovereignty who\ndecorate themselves with the title of Khal\u00eef, without suspecting that they\nare thereby guilty of a sort of arrogant blasphemy.\n\nSuch exaggeration is not supported by the canonists; but these have devised\na theory, which gives a foundation to the authority of Mohammedan princes,\nwho never had a real or fictitious connection with a real or fictitious\nKhalifate. Authority there must be, everywhere and under all circumstances;\nfar from the centre this should be exercised, according to them, by the\none who has been able to gain it and who knows how to hold it; and all the\nduties are laid upon him, which, in a normal condition, would be discharged\nby the Khal\u00eef or his representative. For this kind of authority the\nlegists have even invented a special name: \"_shaukah,_\" which means actual\ninfluence, the authority which has spontaneously arisen in default of a\nchief who in one form or another can be considered as a mandatary of the\nKhalifate.\n\nNow, it is significant that many of those Mohammedan governors, who owe\ntheir existence to wild growth in this way, seek, especially in our day,\nfor connection with the Khalifate, or, at least, wish to be regarded as\nnaturally connected with the centre. The same is true of such whose former\nindependence or adhesion to the Turkish Empire has been replaced by the\nsovereignty of a Western state. Even amongst the Moslim peoples placed\nunder the direct government of European states a tendency prevails to be\nconsidered in some way or another subjects of the Sultan-Khal\u00eef. Some\nscholars explain this phenomenon by the spiritual character which the\ndignity of Khal\u00eef is supposed to have acquired under the later Abbasids,\nand retained since that time, until the Ottoman princes combined it again\nwith the temporal dignity of sultan. According to this view the later\nAbbasids were a sort of popes of Isl\u00e2m; while the temporal authority, in\nthe central districts as well as in the subordinate kingdoms, was in the\nhands of various sultans. The sultans of Constantinople govern, then, under\nthis name, as much territory as the political vicissitudes allow them to\ngovern--_i.e._, the Turkish Empire; as khal\u00eefs, they are the spiritual\nheads of the whole of Sunnite Isl\u00e2m.\n\nThough this view, through the ignorance of European statesmen and\ndiplomatists, may have found acceptance even by some of the great powers,\nit is nevertheless entirely untrue; unless by \"spiritual authority\" we are\nto understand the empty appearance of worldly authority. This appearance\nwas all that the later Abbasids retained after the loss of their temporal\npower; spiritual authority of any kind they never possessed.\n\nThe spiritual authority in catholic Isl\u00e2m reposes in the legists, who in\nthis respect are called in a tradition the _\"heirs of the prophets.\"_ Since\nthey could no longer regard the khal\u00eefs as their leaders, because they\nwalked in worldly ways, they have constituted themselves independently\nbeside and even above them; and the rulers have been obliged to conclude a\nsilent contract with them, each party binding itself to remain within its\nown limits.[1] If this contract be observed, the legists not only are ready\nto acknowledge the bad rulers of the world, but even to preach loyalty\ntowards them to the laity.\n\nThe most supremely popular part of the ideal of Isl\u00e2m, the reduction of\nthe whole world to Moslim authority, can only be attempted by a political\npower. Notwithstanding the destructive criticism of all Moslim princes and\nstate officials by the canonists, it was only from them that they could\nexpect measures to uphold and extend the power of Isl\u00e2m; and on this\naccount they continually cherished the ideal of the Khalifate.\n\n[Footnote 1: That the Khalifate is in no way to be compared with the\nPapacy, that Isl\u00e2m has never regarded the Khalif as its spiritual head, I\nhave repeatedly explained since 1882 (in \"Nieuwe Bijdragen tot de kennis\nvan den Islam,\" in _Bijdr. tot de Taal, Landen Volkenkunde van Nederl.\nIndi\u00eb_, Volgr. 4, Deel vi, in an article, \"De Islam,\" in _De Gids_, May,\n1886, in _Questions Diplomatiques et Coloniales_, 5me ann\u00e9e, No. 106,\netc.). I am pleased to find the same views expressed by Prof. M. Hartmann\nin _Die Welt des Islams_, Bd. i., pp. 147-8.]\n\nIn the first centuries it was the duty of Mohammedans who had become\nisolated, and who had for instance been conquered by \"unbelievers,\" to do\n_\"hijrah,\" i.e._, emigration for Allah's sake, as the converted Arabs had\ndone in Mohammed's time by emigrating to Medina to strengthen the ranks of\nthe Faithful. This soon became impracticable, so that the legists relaxed\nthe prescription by concessions to \"the force of necessity.\" Resignation\nwas thus permitted, even recommended; but the submission to non-Musulmans\nwas always to be regarded as temporary and abnormal. Although the _partes\ninfidelium_ have grown larger and larger, the eye must be kept fixed upon\nthe centre, the Khalifate, where every movement towards improvement must\nbegin. A Western state that admits any authority of a khal\u00eef over its\nMohammedan subjects, thus acknowledges, _not_ the authority of a pope of\nthe Moslim Church, but in simple ignorance is feeding political programs,\nwhich, however vain, always have the power of stirring Mohammedan masses to\nconfusion and excitement.\n\nOf late years Mohammedan statesmen in their intercourse with their Western\ncolleagues are glad to take the latter's point of view; and, in discussion,\naccept the comparison of the Khalifate with the Papacy, because they are\naware that only in this form the Khalifate can be made acceptable to powers\nwho have Mohammedan subjects. But for these subjects the Khalif is then\ntheir true prince, who is temporarily hindered in the exercise of his\ngovernment, but whose right is acknowledged even by their unbelieving\nmasters.\n\nIn yet another respect the canonists need the aid of the temporal rulers.\nAn alert police is counted by them amongst the indispensable means of\nsecuring purity of doctrine and life. They count it to the credit of\nprinces and governors that they enforced by violent measures seclusion and\nveiling of the women, abstinence from drinking, and that they punished by\nflogging the negligent with regard to fasting or attending public worship.\nThe political decay of Isl\u00e2m, the increasing number of Mohammedans under\nforeign rule, appears to them, therefore, doubly dangerous, as they have\nlittle faith in the proof of Islam's spiritual goods against life in a\nfreedom which to them means license.\n\nThey find that every political change, in these terrible times, is to the\nprejudice of Isl\u00e2m, one Moslim people after another losing its independent\nexistence; and they regard it as equally dangerous that Moslim princes are\ninduced to accommodate their policy and government to new international\nideas of individual freedom, which threaten the very life of Isl\u00e2m. They\nsee the antagonism to all foreign ideas, formerly considered as a virtue\nby every true Moslim, daily losing ground, and they are filled with\nconsternation by observing in their own ranks the contamination of\nmodernist ideas. The brilliant development of the system of Isl\u00e2m followed\nthe establishment of its material power; so the rapid decline of that\npolitical power which we are witnessing makes the question urgent, whether\nIsl\u00e2m has a spiritual essence able to survive the fall of such a material\nsupport. It is certainly not the canonists who will detect the kernel;\n\"verily we are God's and verily to Him do we return,\" they cry in helpless\namazement, and their consolation is in the old prayer: \"And lay not on us,\nO our Lord, that for which we have no strength, but blot out our sins and\nforgive us and have mercy upon us. Thou art our Master; grant us then to\nconquer the Unbelievers!\"\n\n\n\nIV\n\nISL\u00c2M AND MODERN THOUGHT\n\n\nOne of the most powerful factors of religious life in its higher forms is\nthe need of man to find in this world of changing things an imperishable\nessence, to separate the eternal from the temporal and then to attach\nhimself to the former. Where the possibility of this operation is despaired\nof, there may arise a pessimism, which finds no path of liberation from the\npainful vicissitudes of life other than the annihilation of individuality.\nA firm belief in a sphere of life freed from the category of time, together\nwith the conviction that the poetic images of that superior world current\namong mankind are images and nothing else, is likely to give rise to\ndefinitions of the Absolute by purely negative attributes and to mental\nefforts having for their object the absorption of individual existence\nin the indescribable infinite. Generally speaking, a high development of\nintellectual life, especially an intimate acquaintance with different\nreligious systems, is not favourable to the continuance of elaborate\nconceptions of things eternal; it will rather increase the tendency to\ndeprive the idea of the Transcendent of all colour and definiteness.\n\nThe na\u00efve ideas concerning the other world in the clear-cut form outlined\nfor them by previous generations are most likely to remain unchanged in a\nreligious community where intellectual intercourse is chiefly limited to\nthat between members of the community. There the belief is fostered that\nthings most appreciated and cherished in this fading world by mankind will\nhave an enduring existence in a world to come, and that the best of the\nchanging phenomena of life are eternal and will continue free from that\nchange, which is the principal cause of human misery. Material death will\nbe followed by awakening to a purer life, the idealized continuation of\nlife on earth, and for this reason already during this life the faithful\nwill find their delight in those things which they know to be everlasting.\n\nThe less faith is submitted to the control of intellect, the more numerous\nthe objects will be to which durable value is attributed. This is true for\ndifferent individuals as well as for one religious community as compared to\nanother. There are Christians attached only to the spirit of the Gospel,\nMohammedans attached only to the spirit of the Qor\u00e2n. Others give a place\nin their world of imperishable things to a particular translation of the\nBible in its old-fashioned orthography or to a written Qor\u00e2n in preference\nto a printed one. Orthodox Judaism and orthodox Isl\u00e2m have marked with the\nstamp of eternity codes of law, whose influence has worked as an impediment\nto the life of the adherents of those religions and to the free intercourse\nof other people with them as well. So the Roman Catholic and many\nProtestant Churches have in their organizations and in their dogmatic\nsystems eternalized institutions and ideas whose unchangeableness has come\nto retard spiritual progress.\n\nAmong all conservative factors of human life religion must necessarily be\nthe most conservative, were it only because its aim is precisely to store\nup and keep under its guardianship the treasures destined for eternity to\nwhich we have alluded. Now, every new period in the history of civilization\nobliges a religious community to undertake a general revision of the\ncontents of its treasury. It is unavoidable that the guardians on such\noccasions should be in a certain measure disappointed, for they find that\nsome of, the goods under their care have given way to the wasting influence\nof time, whilst others are in a state which gives rise to serious doubt as\nto their right of being classified with lasting treasures. In reality the\nloss is only an apparent one; far from impoverishing the community, it\nenhances the solidity of its possessions. What remains after the sifting\nprocess may be less imposing to the inexperienced mind; gradually the\nconsideration gains ground that what has been rejected was nothing but\nuseless rubbish which had been wrongly valued.\n\nSometimes it may happen that the general movement of spiritual progress\ngoes almost too fast, so that one revision of the stores of religion is\nimmediately followed by another. Then dissension is likely to arise among\nthe adherents of a religion; some of them come to the conclusion that there\nmust be an end of sifting and think it better to lock up the treasuries\nonce for all and to stop the dangerous enquiries; whereas others begin to\nentertain doubt concerning the value even of such goods as do not yet show\nany trace of decay.\n\nThe treasuries of Isl\u00e2m are excessively full of rubbish that has become\nentirely useless; and for nine or ten centuries they have not been\nsubmitted to a revision deserving that name. If we wish to understand the\nwhole or any important part of the system of Isl\u00e2m, we must always begin by\ntransporting ourselves into the third or fourth century of the Hijrah, and\nwe must constantly bear in mind that from the Medina period downwards Isl\u00e2m\nhas always been considered by its adherents as bound to regulate all the\ndetails of their life by means of prescriptions emanating directly or\nindirectly from God, and therefore incapable of being reformed. At the\ntime when these prescriptions acquired their definite form, Isl\u00e2m ruled an\nimportant portion of the world; it considered the conquest of the rest\nas being only a question of time; and, therefore, felt itself quite\nindependent in the development of its law. There was little reason indeed\nfor the Moslim canonists to take into serious account the interests of men\nnot subject to Mohammedan authority or to care for the opinion of devotees\nof other religions. Isl\u00e2m might act, and did almost act, as if it were the\nonly power in the world; it did so in the way of a grand seigneur, showing\na great amount of generosity towards its subjugated enemies. The adherents\nof other religions were or would become subjects of the Commander of the\nFaithful; those subjects were given a full claim on Mohammedan protection\nand justice; while the independent unbelievers were in general to be\ntreated as enemies until in submission. Their spiritual life deserved not\neven so much attention as that of Isl\u00e2m received from Abb\u00e9 Maracci or\nDoctor Prideaux. The false doctrines of other peoples were of no interest\nwhatever in themselves; and, since there was no fear of Mohammedans being\ntainted by them, polemics against the abrogated religions were more of a\npastime than an indispensable part of theology. The Mohammedan community\nbeing in a sense Allah's army, with the conquest of the world as its\nobject, apostasy deserved the punishment of death in no lesser degree than\ndesertion in the holy war, nay more so; for the latter might be the effect\nof cowardice, whereas the former was an act of inexcusable treachery.\n\nIn the attitude of Isl\u00e2m towards other religions there is hardly one\nfeature that has not its counterpart in the practice of Christian states\nduring the Middle Ages. The great difference is that the Mohammedan\ncommunity erected this medieval custom into a system unalterable like all\nprescriptions based on its infallible \"Agreement\" (Ijm\u00e2'). Here lay the\ngreat difficulty when the nineteenth and twentieth centuries placed the\nMoslim world face to face with a civilization that had sprung up outside\nits borders and without its collaboration, that was from a spiritual point\nof view by far its superior and at the same time possessed of sufficient\nmaterial power to thrust the Mohammedans aside wherever they seemed to be\nan impediment in its way. A long series of the most painful experiences,\nmeaning as many encroachments upon the political independence of Mohammedan\nterritories, ended by teaching Isl\u00e2m that it had definitely to change its\nlines of conduct. The times were gone when relations with the non-Musulman\nworld quite different from those foreseen by the mediaeval theory might\nbe considered as exceptions to the rule, as temporary concessions to\ntransitory necessities. In ever wider circles a thorough revision of the\nsystem came to be considered as a requirement of the time. The fact that\nthe number of Mohammedans subject to foreign rule increased enormously, and\nby far surpassed those of the citizens of independent Mohammedan states,\nmade the problem almost as interesting to Western nations as to the\nMohammedans themselves. Both parties are almost equally concerned in the\nquestion, whether a way will be found to associate the Moslim world to\nmodern civilization, without obliging it to empty its spiritual treasury\naltogether. Nobody can in earnest advocate the idea of leaving the solution\nof the problem to rude force. The Moslim of yore, going through the world\nwith the Qor\u00e2n in one hand, the sword in the other, giving unbelievers the\nchoice between conversion or death, is a creation of legendary fancy. We\ncan but hope that modern civilization will not be so fanatical against\nMoslims, as the latter were unjustly said to have been during the period\nof their power. If the modern world were only to offer the Mohammedans the\nchoice between giving up at once the traditions of their ancestors or being\ntreated as barbarians, there would be sure to ensue a struggle as bloody as\nhas ever been witnessed in the world. It is worth while indeed to examine\nthe system of Isl\u00e2m from this special point of view, and to try to find the\nterms on which a durable _modus vivendi_ might be established between Isl\u00e2m\nand modern thought.\n\nThe purely dogmatic part is not of great importance. Some of us may admire\nthe tenets of the Mohammedan doctrine, others may as heartily despise them;\nto the participation of Mohammedans in the civilized life of our days they\nare as innoxious as any other mediaeval dogmatic system that counts its\nmillions of adherents among ourselves. The details of Mohammedan dogmatics\nhave long ceased to interest other circles than those of professional\ntheologians; the chief points arouse no discussion and the deviations in\npopular superstition as well as in philosophical thought which in practice\nmeet with toleration are almost unlimited. The Mohammedan Hell claims\nthe souls of all heterodox people, it is true; but this does not prevent\nbenevolent intercourse in this world, and more enlightened Moslims are\ninclined to enlarge their definition of the word \"faithful\" so as to\ninclude their non-Mohammedan friends. The faith in a Mahd\u00ee, who will come\nto regenerate the world, is apt to give rise to revolutionary movements led\nby skilful demagogues pretending to act as the \"Guided One,\" or, at least,\nto prepare the way for his coming. Most of the European powers having\nMohammedan subjects have had their disagreeable experiences in this\nrespect. But Moslim chiefs of states have their obvious good reasons for\nnot liking such movements either; and even the majority of ordinary Moslims\nlook upon candidates for Mahdi-ship with suspicion. A contented prosperous\npopulation offers such candidates little chance of success.\n\nThe ritual laws of Isl\u00e2m are a heavy burden to those who strictly observe\nthem; a man who has to perform worship five times a day in a state of\nritual purity and during a whole month in a year has to abstain from\nfood and drink and other enjoyments from daybreak until sunset, is at a\ndisadvantage when he has to enter into competition with non-Musulmans\nfor getting work of any kind. But since most of the Moslims have become\nsubjects of foreign powers and religious police has been practically\nabolished in Mohammedan states, there is no external compulsion. The ever\nsmaller minority of strict practisers make use of a right which nobody can\ncontest.\n\nDrinking wine or other intoxicating drinks, taking interest on money,\ngambling--including even insurance contracts according to the stricter\ninterpretation--are things which a Moslim may abstain from without\nhindering non-Mohammedans; or which in our days he may do, notwithstanding\nthe prohibition of divine law, even without losing his good name.\n\nThose who want to accentuate the antithesis between Isl\u00e2m and modern\ncivilization point rightly to the personal law; here is indeed a great\nstumbling-block. The allowance of polygamy up to a maximum of four wives\nis represented by Mohammedan authors as a progress if compared with the\nirregularity of pagan Arabia and even with the acknowledgment of unlimited\npolygamy during certain periods of Biblical history. The following subtle\nargument is to be found in some schoolbooks on Mohammedan law: The law of\nMoses was exceedingly benevolent to males by permitting them to have an\nunlimited number of wives; then came the law of Jesus, extreme on the other\nside by prescribing monogamy; at last Mohammed restored the equilibrium by\nconceding one wife to each of the four humours which make up the male's\nconstitution. This theory, which leaves the question what the woman is\nto do with three of her four humours undecided, will hardly find fervent\nadvocates among the present canonists. At the same time, very few of them\nwould venture to pronounce their preference for monogamy in a general way,\npolygamy forming a part of the law that is to prevail, according to the\ninfallible Agreement of the Community, until the Day of Resurrection.\n\nOn the other side polygamy, although _allowed_, is far from being\n_recommended_ by the majority of theologians. Many of them even dissuade\nmen capable of mastering their passion from marriage in general, and\ncensure a man who takes two wives if he can live honestly with one. In some\nMohammedan countries social circumstances enforce practical monogamy. The\nwhole question lies in the education of women; when this has been raised to\na higher level, polygamy will necessarily come to an end. It is therefore\nmost satisfactory that among male Mohammedans the persuasion of the\nnecessity of a solid education for girls is daily gaining ground. This year\n(1913), a young Egyptian took his doctor's degree at the Paris University\nby sustaining a dissertation on the position of women in the Moslim world,\nin which he told his co-religionists the full truth concerning this rather\ndelicate subject[1]. If social evolution takes the right course, the\npractice of polygamy will be abolished; and the maintenance of its\nlawfulness in canonical works will mainly be a survival of a bygone phase\nof development.\n\n[Footnote 1: Mansour Fahmy, _La condition de la femme dans la tradition\net l'\u00e9volution de l'Islamisme_, Paris, F\u00e9lix Alcan, 1913. The sometimes\nimprudent form in which the young reformer enounced his ideas caused him to\nbe very badly treated by his compatriots at his return from Europe.]\n\nThe facility with which a man can divorce his wife at his pleasure,\ncontrasted with her rights against him, is a still more serious impediment\nto the development of family life than the institution of polygamy; more\nserious, also, than veiling and seclusion of women. Where the general\nopinion is favourable to the improvement of the position of women in\nsociety, there is always found a way to secure it to them without\nconflicting with the divine law; but a radical reform will remain most\ndifficult so long as that law which allows the man to repudiate his wife\nwithout any reason, whereas it delivers the woman almost unarmed into the\npower of her husband, is considered to be one of the permanent treasures of\nIsl\u00e2m.\n\nIt is a pity indeed that thus far women vigorously striving for liberation\nfrom those mediaeval institutions are rare exceptions in Mohammedan\ncountries. Were Mohammedan women capable of the violent tactics of\nsuffragettes, they would rather try to blow up the houses of feminists than\nthose of the patrons of the old r\u00e9gime. The ordinary Mohammedan woman looks\nupon the endeavour of her husband to induce her to partake freely in public\nlife as a want of consideration; it makes on her about the same impression\nas that which a respectable woman in our society would receive from her\nhusband encouraging her to visit places generally frequented by people of\nbad reputation. It is the girls' school that will awaken those sleeping\nones and so, slowly and gradually, prepare a better future, when the Moslim\nwoman will be the worthy companion of her husband and the intelligent\neducator of her children. This will be due, then, neither to the Prophet's\nSunnah nor to the infallible Agreement of the Community of the first\ncenturies of Isl\u00e2m, but to the irresistible power of the evolution of human\nsociety, which is merciless to laws even of divine origin and transfers\nthem, when their time is come, from the treasury of everlasting goods to a\nmuseum of antiquities.\n\nSlavery, and in its consequence free intercourse of a man with his own\nfemale slaves without any limitation as to their number, has also been\nincorporated into the sacred law, and therefore has been placed on the\nwrong side of the border that is to divide eternal things from temporal\nones. This should not be called a mediaeval institution; the most civilized\nnations not having given it up before the middle of the nineteenth century.\nThe law of Isl\u00e2m regulated the position of slaves with much equity, and\nthere is a great body of testimony from people who have spent a part of\ntheir lives among Mohammedan nations which does justice to the benevolent\ntreatment which bondmen generally receive from their masters there. Besides\nthat, we are bound to state that in many Western countries or countries\nunder Western domination whole groups of the population live under\ncircumstances with which those of Mohammedan slavery may be compared to\nadvantage.\n\nThe only legal cause of slavery in Isl\u00e2m is prisonership of war or birth\nfrom slave parents. The captivity of enemies of Isl\u00e2m has not at all\nnecessarily the effect of enslaving them; for the competent authorities\nmay dispose of them in any other way, also in the way prescribed by modern\ninternational law or custom. In proportion to the realization of the\npolitical ideal of Isl\u00e2m the number of its enemies must diminish and the\npossibilities of enslaving men must consequently decrease. Setting slaves\nfree is one of the most meritorious pious works, and, at the same time,\nthe regular atonement for certain transgressions of the sacred law. So,\naccording to Mohammedan principles, slavery is an institution destined\nto disappear. When, in the last century, Mohammedan princes signed\ninternational treaties for the suppression of slavery, from their point of\nview this was a premature anticipation of a future political and social\ndevelopment--a step which they felt obliged to take out of consideration\nfor the great powers. In Arabia, every effort of the Turkish Government to\nput such international agreements into execution has thus far given rise to\npopular sedition against the Ottoman authority. Therefore, the promulgation\nof decrees of abolition was stopped; and slavery continued to exist. The\nimport of slaves from Africa has, in fact, considerably diminished; but I\nam not quite sure of the proportional increase of the liberty which the\nnatives of that continent enjoy at home.\n\nSlavery as well as polygamy is in a certain sense to Mohammedans a sacred\ninstitution, being incorporated in their Holy Law; but the practice of\nneither of the two institutions is indispensable to the integrity of Isl\u00e2m.\n\nAll those antiquated institutions, if considered from the point of view of\nmodern international intercourse, are only a trifle in comparison with the\nlegal prescriptions of Isl\u00e2m concerning the attitude of the Mohammedan\ncommunity against the parts of the world not yet subject to its authority,\n\"the Abode of War\" as they are technically called. It is a principal duty\nof the Khalif, or of the chiefs considered as his substitutes in different\ncountries, to avail themselves of every opportunity to extend by force the\ndominion of Allah and His Messenger. With unsubdued unbelievers _peace_\nis not _allowed_; a _truce_ for a period not exceeding ten years may be\nconcluded if the interest of Isl\u00e2m requires it.\n\nThe chapters of the Mohammedan law on holy war and on the conditions on\nwhich the submission of the adherents of tolerated religions is to be\naccepted seem to be a foolish pretension if we consider them by the light\nof the actual division of political power in the world. But here, too, to\nunderstand is better than to ridicule. In the centuries in which the system\nof Isl\u00e2m acquired its maturity, such an aspiration after universal dominion\nwas not at all ridiculous; and many Christian states of the time were\nfar from reaching the Mohammedan standard of tolerance against heterodox\ncreeds. The delicate point is this, that the petrification or at least the\nprocess of stiffening that has attacked the whole spiritual life of Isl\u00e2m\nsince about 1000 A.D. makes its accommodation to the requirements of modern\nintercourse a most difficult problem.\n\nBut it is not only the Mohammedan community that needed misfortune and\nhumiliation before it was able to appreciate liberty of conscience; or that\ntook a long time to digest those painful lessons of history. There\nare still Christian Churches which accept religious liberty only in\ncircumstances that make supreme authority unattainable to them; and which,\nelsewhere, would not disdain the use of material means to subdue spirits to\nwhat they consider the absolute truth.\n\nTo judge such things with equity, we must remember that every man possessed\nof a firm conviction of any kind is more or less a missionary; and the\nbelief in the possibility of winning souls by violence has many adherents\neverywhere. One of my friends among the young-Turkish state officials,\nwho wished to persuade me of the perfect religious tolerance of Turkey of\ntoday, concluded his argument by the following reflection: \"Formerly men\nused to behead each other for difference of opinion about the Hereafter.\nNowadays, praise be to Allah, we are permitted to believe what we like; but\npeople continue to kill each other for political or social dissension. That\nis most pitiful indeed; for the weapons in use being more terrible and more\ncostly than before, mankind lacks the peace necessary to enjoy the liberty\nof conscience it has acquired.\"\n\nThe truthful irony of these words need not prevent us from considering the\nindependence of spiritual life and the liberation of its development from\nmaterial compulsion as one of the greatest blessings of our civilization.\nWe feel urged by missionary zeal of the better kind to make the Mohammedan\nworld partake in its enjoyment. In the Turkish Empire, in Egypt, in many\nMohammedan countries under Western control, the progressive elements of\nMoslim society spontaneously meet us half-way. But behind them are the\nmillions who firmly adhere to the old superstition and are supported by\nthe canonists, those faithful guardians of what the infallible Community\ndeclared almost one thousand years ago to be the doctrine and rule of life\nfor all centuries to come. Will it ever prove possible to move in one\ndirection a body composed of such different elements, or will this body be\ntorn in pieces when the movement has become irresistible?\n\nWe have more than once pointed to the catholic character of orthodox Isl\u00e2m.\nIn fact, the diversity of spiritual tendencies is not less in the Moslim\nworld than within the sphere of Christian influence; but in Isl\u00e2m, apart\nfrom the political schisms of the first centuries, that diversity has not\ngiven rise to anything like the division of Christianity into sects. There\nis a prophetic saying, related by Tradition, which later generations have\ngenerally misunderstood to mean that the Mohammedan community would be\nsplit into seventy-three different sects. Moslim heresiologists have been\ninduced by this prediction to fill up their lists of seventy-three numbers\nwith all sorts of names, many of which represent nothing but individual\nopinions of more or less famous scholars on subordinate points of doctrine\nor law. Almost ninety-five per cent. of all Mohammedans are indeed bound\ntogether by a spiritual unity that may be compared with that of the Roman\nCatholic Church, within whose walls there is also room for religious and\nintellectual life of very different origin and tendency. In the sense of\nbroadness, Isl\u00e2m has this advantage, that there is no generally recognized\npalpable authority able to stop now and then the progress of modernism or\nsimilar deviations from the trodden path with an imperative \"Halt!\" There\nis no lack indeed of mutual accusation of heresy; but this remains without\nserious consequences because of the absence of a high ecclesiastical\ncouncil competent to decide once for all. The political authorities, who\nmight be induced by fanatical theologians to settle disputes by violent\ninquisitorial means, have been prevented for a long time from such\ninterference by more pressing affairs.\n\nA knowledge alone of the orthodox system of Isl\u00e2m, however complete, would\ngive us an even more inadequate idea of the actual world of catholic Isl\u00e2m\nthan the notion we should acquire of the spiritual currents moving the\nRoman Catholic world by merely studying the dogma and the canonical law of\nthe Church of Rome.\n\nNevertheless, the unity of Islamic thought is by no means a word void of\nsense. The ideas of Mohammedan philosophers, borrowed for a great part from\nNeoplatonism, the pantheism and the emanation theory of Mohammedan mystics\nare certainly still further distant from the simplicity of Qor\u00e2nic\nreligion than the orthodox dogmatics; but all those conceptions alike show\nindubitable marks of having grown up on Mohammedan soil. In the works even\nof those mystics who efface the limits between things human and divine,\nwho put Judaism, Christianity, and Paganism on the same line with the\nrevelation of Mohammed, and who are therefore duly anathematized by the\nwhole orthodox world, almost every page testifies to the relation of the\nideas enounced with Mohammedan civilization. Most of the treatises on\nscience, arts, or law written by Egyptian students for their doctor's\ndegree at European universities make no exception to this rule; the manner\nin which these authors conceive the problems and strive for their solution\nis, in a certain sense, in the broadest sense of course, Mohammedan. Thus,\nif we speak of Mohammedan thought, civilization, spirit, we have to bear in\nmind the great importance of the system which, almost unchanged, has been\ndelivered for about one thousand years by one generation of doctors of\nIsl\u00e2m to the other, although it has become ever more unfit to meet the\nneeds of the Community, on whose infallible Agreement it rests. But, at the\nsame time, we ought to consider that beside the agreement of canonists,\nof dogmatists, and of mystics, there are a dozen more agreements, social,\npolitical, popular, philosophical, and so on, and that however great may be\nthe influence of the doctors, who pretend to monopolize infallibility for\nthe opinions on which they agree, the real Agreement of Isl\u00e2m is the least\ncommon measure of all the agreements of the groups which make up the\nCommunity.\n\nIt would require a large volume to review the principal currents of thought\npervading the Moslim world in our day; but a general notion may be acquired\nby a rapid glance at two centres, geographically not far distant from each\nother, but situated at the opposite poles of spiritual life: Mecca and\nCairo.\n\nIn Mecca yearly two or three hundred thousand Moslims from all parts of the\nworld come together to celebrate the hajj, that curious set of ceremonies\nof pagan Arabian origin which Mohammed has incorporated into his religion,\na durable survival that in Isl\u00e2m makes an impression as singular as that\nof jumping processions in Christianity. Mohammed never could have foreseen\nthat the consequence of his concession to deeply rooted Arabic custom\nwould be that in future centuries Chinese, Malays, Indians, Tatars, Turks,\nEgyptians, Berbers, and negroes would meet on this barren desert soil and\ncarry home profound impressions of the international significance of Isl\u00e2m.\nStill more important is the fact that from all those countries young people\nsettle here for years to devote themselves to the study of the sacred\nscience. From the second to the tenth month of the Mohammedan lunar year,\nthe Haram, _i.e._, the mosque, which is an open place with the Ka'bah in\nits midst and surrounded by large roofed galleries, has free room enough\nbetween the hours of public service to allow of a dozen or more circles of\nstudents sitting down around their professors to listen to as many lectures\non different subjects, generally delivered in a very loud voice. Arabic\ngrammar and style, prosody, logic, and other preparatory branches, the\nsacred trivium; canonic law, dogmatics, and mysticism, and, for the more\nadvanced, exegesis of Qor\u00e2n and Tradition and some other branches of\nsupererogation, are taught here in the mediaeval way from mediaeval\ntext-books or from more modern compilations reproducing their contents and\ncompleting them more or less by treating modern questions according to the\nsame methods.\n\nIt is now almost thirty years since I lived the life of a Meccan student\nduring one university year, after having become familiar with the matter\ntaught by the professors of the temple of Mecca, the Haram, by privately\nstudying it, so that I could freely use all my time in observing the\nmentality of people learning those things not for curiosity, but in order\nto acquire the only true direction for their life in this world and the\nsalvation of their souls in the world to come. For a modern man there could\nhardly be a better opportunity imagined for getting a true vision of the\nMiddle Ages than is offered to the Orientalist by a few months' stay in\nthe Holy City of Isl\u00e2m. In countries like China, Tibet, or India there\nare spheres of spiritual life which present to us still more interesting\nmaterial for comparative study of religions than that of Mecca, because\nthey are so much more distant from our own; but, just on that account,\nthe Western student would not be able to adapt his mind to their mental\natmospheres as he may do in Mecca. No one would think for one moment of\nconsidering Confucianism, Hinduism, or Buddhism as specially akin to\nChristianity, whereas Isl\u00e2m has been treated by some historians of the\nChristian Church as belonging to the heretical offspring of the Christian\nreligion. In fact, if we are able to abstract ourselves for a moment from\nall dogmatic prejudice and to become a Meccan with the Meccans, one of the\n\"neighbours of Allah,\" as they call themselves, we feel in their temple,\nthe Haram, as if we were conversing with our ancestors of five or six\ncenturies ago. Here scholasticism with a rabbinical tint forms the great\nattraction to the minds of thousands of intellectually highly gifted men of\nall ages.\n\nThe most important lectures are delivered during the forenoon and in the\nevening. A walk, at one of those hours, through the square and under the\ncolonnades of the mosque, with ears opened to all sides, will enable you to\nget a general idea of the objects of mental exercise of this international\nassembly. Here you may find a sheikh of pure Arab descent explaining to his\naudience, composed of white Syrians or Circassians, of brown and yellow\nAbyssinians and Egyptians, of negroes, Chinese, and Malays, the probable\nand improbable legal consequences of marriage contracts, not excepting\nthose between men and genii; there a negro scholar is explaining the\nontological evidence of the existence of a Creator and the logical\nnecessity of His having twenty qualities, inseparable from, but not\nidentical with, His essence; in the midst of another circle a learned\n_muft\u00ee_ of indeterminably mixed extraction demonstrates to his pupils from\nthe standard work of al-Ghaz\u00e2l\u00ed the absolute vanity of law and doctrine to\nthose whose hearts are not purified from every attachment to the world.\nMost of the branches of Mohammedan learning are represented within the\nwalls of this temple by more or less famous scholars; and still there are a\ngreat number of private lectures delivered at home by professors who do not\nlike to be disturbed by the unavoidable noise in the mosque, which during\nthe whole day serves as a meeting place for friends or business men, as an\nexercise hall for Qor\u00e2n reciters, and even as a passage for people going\nfrom one part of the town to the other.\n\nIn order to complete your mediaeval dream with a scene from daily life, you\nhave only to leave the mosque by the B\u00e2b Dereybah, one of its twenty-two\ngates, where you may see human merchandise exhibited for sale by the\nslave-brokers, and then to have a glance, outside the wall, at a camel\ncaravan, bringing firewood and vegetables into the town, led by Beduins\nwhose outward appearance has as little changed as their minds since the day\nwhen Mohammed began here to preach the Word of Allah.\n\nTo the greater part of the world represented by this international\nexhibition of Isl\u00e2m, as a modern Musulman writer calls it, our modern\nworld, with all its problems, its emotions, its learning and science,\nhardly exists. On the other hand, the average modern man does not\nunderstand much more of the mental life of the two hundred millions to whom\nthe barren Mecca has become the great centre. In former days, other centres\nwere much more important, although Mecca has always been the goal of\npilgrimage and the cherished abode of many learned men. Many capitals of\nIsl\u00e2m offered the students an easier life and better accommodations for\ntheir studies; while in Mecca four months of the year are devoted to the\nforeign guests of Allah, by attending to whose various needs all Meccans\ngain their livelihood. For centuries Cairo has stood unrivalled as a seat\nof Mohammedan learning of every kind; and even now the Uaram of Mecca is\nnot to be compared to the Azhar-mosque as regards the number and the fame\nof its professors and the variety of branches cultivated.\n\nIn the last half-century, however, the ancient repute of the Egyptian\nmetropolis has suffered a good deal from the enormous increase of European\ninfluence in the land of the Pharaohs; the effects of which have made\nthemselves felt even in the Azhar. Modern programs and methods of\ninstruction have been adopted; and, what is still worse, modernism itself,\nfavoured by the late Muft\u00ee Muhammed Abduh, has made its entrance into the\nsacred lecture-halls, which until a few years ago seemed inaccessible to\nthe slightest deviation from the decrees of the Infallible Agreement of the\nCommunity. Strenuous efforts have been made by eminent scholars to liberate\nIsl\u00e2m from the chains of the authority of the past ages on the basis of\nindependent interpretation of the Qor\u00e2n; not in the way of the Wahh\u00e2b\u00ee\nreformers, who tried a century before to restore the institutions of\nMohammed's time in their original purity, but on the contrary with the\nobject of adapting Isl\u00e2m by all means in their power to the requirements of\nmodern life.\n\nOfficial protection of the bold innovators prevented their conservative\nopponents from casting them out of the Azhar, but the assent to their\ndoctrines was more enthusiastic outside its walls than inside. The ever\nmore numerous adherents of modern thought in Egypt do not generally proceed\nfrom the ranks of the Azhar students, nor do they generally care very much\nin their later life for reforming the methods prevailing there, although\nthey may be inclined to applaud the efforts of the modernists. To the\nintellectuals of the higher classes the Azhar has ceased to offer great\nattraction; if it were not for the important funds (_wagf_) for the\nbenefit of professors and students, the numbers of both classes would have\ndiminished much more than is already the case, and the faithful cultivators\nof mediaeval Mohammedan science would prefer to live in Mecca, free from\nWestern influence and control. Even as it is, the predilection of foreign\nstudents of law and theology is turning more and more towards Mecca.\n\nAs one of the numerous interesting specimens of the mental development\neffected in Egypt in the last years, I may mention a book that appeared in\nCairo two years ago[1], containing a description of the present Khedive's\npilgrimage to Mecca and Medina, performed two years before. The author\nevidently possesses a good deal of the scholastic learning to be gathered\nin the Azhar and no European erudition in the stricter sense of the word.\nIn an introductory chapter he gives a summary of the geography and history\nof the Arabian peninsula, describes the Hij\u00e2z in a more detailed manner,\nand in his very elaborate account of the journey, on which he accompanied\nhis princely master, the topography of the holy cities, the peculiarities\nof their inhabitants and of the foreign visitors, the political\ninstitutions, and the social conditions are treated almost as fully and\naccurately as we could desire from the hand of the most accomplished\nEuropean scholar. The work is illustrated by good maps and plans and by a\ngreat number of excellent photographs expressly taken for this purpose by\nthe Khedive's order. The author intersperses his account with many witty\nremarks as well as serious reflections on religious and political topics,\nthus making it very readable to those of us who are familiar with the\nArabic language. He adorns his description of the holy places and of the\npilgrimage-rites with the unctuous phrases used in handbooks for the hajji,\nand he does not disturb the mind of the pious reader by any historical\ncriticism of the traditions connected with the House of Allah, the Black\nStone, and the other sanctuaries, but he loses no opportunity to show his\ndislike of all superstition; sometimes, as if to prevent Western readers\nfrom indulging in mockery, he compares Meccan rites or customs with\nsuperstitious practices current amongst Jews or Christians of today.\n\n[Footnote 1: _Ar-rihlah al-Hijaziyyah_, by Muhammed Labib al-Batanunf, 2d\nedition, Cairo, 1329 Hijrah.]\n\nThis book, at whose contents many a Meccan scholar of the old style will\nshake his head and exclaim: \"We seek refuge near Allah from Satan, the\ncursed!\" has been adopted by the Egyptian Department of Public Instruction\nas a reading-book for the schools.\n\nWhat surprised me more than anything else was the author's quoting as his\npredecessors in the description of Mecca and Medina, Burckhardt, Burton,\nand myself, and his sending me, although personally unacquainted with him,\na presentation copy with a flattering dedication. This author and his book\nwould have been impossible in the Moslim world not more than thirty years\nago. In Egypt such a man is nowadays already considered as one of those\nmore conservative moderns, who prefer the rationalistic explanation of the\nAzhar lore to putting it aside altogether. Within the Azhar, his book is\nsure to meet with hearty approval from the followers of Muhammed Abduh, but\nnot less hearty disapproval from the opponents of modernism who make up the\nmajority of the professors as well as of the students.\n\nIn these very last years a new progress of modern thought has manifested\nitself in Cairo in the foundation, under the auspices of Fu'\u00e2d Pasha, an\nuncle of the present Khedive, of the Egyptian University. Cairo has had for\na long time its schools of medicine and law, which could be turned easily\ninto university faculties; therefore, the founders of the university\nthought it urgent to establish a faculty of arts, and, if this proved a\nsuccess, to add a faculty of science. In the meantime, gifted young men\nwere granted subsidies to learn at European universities what they needed\nto know to be the professors of a coming generation, and, for the present,\nChristian as well as Mohammedan natives of Egypt and European scholars\nliving in the country were appointed as lecturers; professors being\nborrowed from the universities of Europe to deliver lectures in Arabic on\ndifferent subjects chosen more or less at random before an audience little\nprepared to digest the lessons offered to them.\n\nThe rather hasty start and the lack of a well-defined scheme have made\nthe Egyptian University a subject of severe criticism. Nevertheless, its\nfoundation is an unmistakable expression of the desire of intellectual\nEgypt to translate modern thought into its own language, to adapt modern\nhigher instruction to its own needs. This same aim is pursued in a perhaps\nmore efficacious manner by the hundreds of Egyptian students of law,\nscience, and medicine at French, English, and some other European\nuniversities. The Turks could not freely follow such examples before\nthe revolution of 1908; but they have shown since that time that their\nabstention was not voluntary. England, France, Holland, and other countries\ngoverning Mohammedan populations are all endeavouring to find the right way\nto incorporate their Mohammedan subjects into their own civilization. Fully\nrecognizing that it was the material covetousness of past generations\nthat submitted those nations to their rule, the so-called colonial powers\nconsider it their duty now to secure for them in international intercourse\nthe place which their natural talent enables them to occupy. The question\nwhether it is better simply to leave the Moslims to Isl\u00e2m as it was for\ncenturies is no longer an object of serious discussion, the reforming\nprocess being at work everywhere--in some parts with surprising rapidity.\nWe can only try to prognosticate the solution which the near future\nreserves for the problem, how the Moslim world is to be associated with\nmodern thought.\n\nIn this problem the whole civilized world and the whole world of Isl\u00e2m are\nconcerned. The ethnic difference between Indians, North-Africans, Malays,\netc., may necessitate a difference of method in detail; the Isl\u00e2m problem\nlies at the basis of the question for all of them. On the other hand,\nthe future development of Isl\u00e2m does not only interest countries with\nMohammedan dominions, it claims as well the attention of all the nations\npartaking in the international exchange of material and spiritual goods.\nThis would be more generally recognized if some knowledge of Isl\u00e2m were\nmore widely spread amongst ourselves; if it were better realized that Isl\u00e2m\nis next akin to Christianity.\n\nIt is the Christian mission that shows the deepest consciousness of this\nstate of things, and the greatest activity in promoting an association\nof Mohammedan thought with that of Western nations. The solid mass of\nexperience due to the efforts of numerous missionaries is not of an\nencouraging nature. There is no reasonable hope of the conversion\nof important numbers of Mohammedans to any Christian denomination.\nBroad-minded missionary societies have therefore given up the old fruitless\nproselytizing methods and have turned to social improvement in the way of\neducation, medical treatment, and the like. It cannot be denied, that\nwhat they want above all to bring to Mohammedans is just what these most\nenergetically decline to accept. On the other hand the advocates of a\npurely civilizing mission are bound to acknowledge that, but for rare\nexceptions, the desire of incorporating Mohammedan nations into our world\nof thought does not rouse the devoted, self-denying enthusiasm inspired by\nthe vocation of propagating a religious belief. The ardour displayed by\nsome missionaries in establishing in the D\u00e2r al-Isl\u00e2m Christian centres\nfrom which they distribute to the Mohammedans those elements of our\ncivilization which are acceptable to them deserves cordial praise; the more\nso because they themselves entertain but little hope of attaining\ntheir ultimate aim of conversion. Mohammedans who take any interest in\nChristianity are taught by their own teachers that the revelation of Jesus,\nafter having suffered serious corruption by the Christians themselves, has\nbeen purified and restored to its original simplicity by Mohammed, and are\ntherefore inaccessible to missionary arguments; nay, amongst uncivilized\npagans the lay mission of Isl\u00e2m is the most formidable competitor of\nclerical propagation of the Christian faith.\n\nPeople who take no active part in missionary work are not competent to\ndissuade Christian missionaries from continuing their seemingly hopeless\nlabour among Mohammedans, nor to prescribe to them the methods they are\nto adopt; their full autonomy is to be respected. But all agree that\nMohammedans, disinclined as they are to reject their own traditions of\nthirteen centuries and to adopt a new religious faith, become ever better\ndisposed to associate their intellectual, social, and political life with\nthat of the modern world. Here lies the starting point for two divisions of\nmankind which for centuries have lived their own lives separately in mutual\nmisunderstanding, from which to pursue their way arm in arm to the greater\nadvantage of both. We must leave it to the Mohammedans themselves to\nreconcile the new ideas which they want with the old ones with which they\ncannot dispense; but we can help them in adapting their educational system\nto modern requirements and give them a good example by rejecting the\ndetestable identification of power and right in politics which lies at the\nbasis of their own canonical law on holy war as well as at the basis of the\npolitical practice of modern Western states. This is a work in which we\nall may collaborate, whatever our own religious conviction may be. The\nprincipal condition for a fruitful friendly intercourse of this kind is\nthat we make the Moslim world an object of continual serious investigation\nin our intellectual centres.\n\nHaving spent a good deal of my life in seeking for the right method of\nassociating with modern thought the thirty-five millions of Mohammedans\nwhom history has placed under the guardianship of my own country, I could\nnot help drawing some practical conclusions from the lessons of history\nwhich I have tried to reduce to their most abridged form. There is no lack\nof pessimists, whose wisdom has found its poetic form in the words of\nKipling:\n\n  East is East and West is West,\n  And never the twain shall meet.\n\nTo me, with regard to the Moslim world, these words seem almost a\nblasphemy. The experience acquired by adapting myself to the peculiarities\nof Mohammedans, and by daily conversation with them for about twenty years,\nhas impressed me with the firm conviction that between Isl\u00e2m and the modern\nworld an understanding _is_ to be attained, and that no period has offered\na better chance of furthering it than the time in which we are living. To\nKipling's poetical despair I think we have a right to prefer the words of\na broad-minded modern Hindu writer: \"The pity is that men, led astray by\nadventitious differences, miss the essential resemblances[1].\"\n\n[Footnote 1: S.M. Mitra, _Anglo-Indian Studies_, London, Longmans, Green &\nCo., 1913, P. 232.]\n\nIt would be a great satisfaction to me if my lectures might cause some of\nmy hearers to consider the problem of Isl\u00e2m as one of the most important of\nour time, and its solution worthy of their interest and of a claim on their\nexertion.\n\n\n\nINDEX\n\n\nA\n\nAbbas (Mohammed's uncle)\nAbbasids\n government\n Khalifate\nAbd-ul-Hamid, Sultan\nAbduh, Muft\u00ee Muhammed\nAbraham\nAbu Bakr\nAbyssinians\nAfrica\nAfricans\nAgreement of the Community, _see_ 'Ijm\u00e2'\nAhl al-had\u00eeth (men of tradition)\n'Ajam\nAl-Ash'ar\u00ee\nAlexander the Great\nAl\u00ee, the fourth Khal\u00eef\nAli, Mohammed, the first Khedive\nAlids\n'\u00e2mils (agents)\nAnti-Christ\nArabia\nArabian, view in regard to the line of descent through a woman\n tribes\n prophet\n heathens\n migration\n race\n armies\n Shi'ah\n conquerors\n origin of hajj\n peninsula\nArabic, traditions\n speech\n arts\n custom\n grammar\n language\nArabs\n the nations conquered by the\n of Christian origin\nArnold, Professor T.W.\nAsia\nAssassins\nAugustin\nAzhar-mosque\n\n\nB\n\nB\u00e2b Dereybah\nB\u00e2b\u00ees\nBagdad\nBarbarians\nBasra\nBeduins\nBeh\u00e2'\u00ees\nBellarminius\nBerber\nBible\n _See_ Scriptures\nBibliander\nBlack Stone\nBoulainvilliers, Count de\nBreitinger\nBuddhism\nBurckhardt\nBurton\nByzantine Empire\nByzantines\n\n\nC\n\nCaetani, Prince\nCairo\nCasanova, Professor of Paris\nCaussin de Perceval\nChina\nChinese\nChristian\n religion\n influence\n rituals\n traditions\n model of obligatory fasting\n princes\n states\n natives of Egypt\n missions\n demonstrations\n centres in Dar al-Islam\n faith and missionaries\nChristian Church\n Roman Catholic\n Protestant\nChristianity\nChristians\n religious rites of\nCircassians\nCoderc\nCommander of the Faithful\nCommittee of Union and Progress\nConfucianism\nConstantinople\nCrypto-Mohammedanism\n\n\nD\n\nDar al-Isl\u00e2m\nDay of judgment\nDoomsday\nDutch, Indies\n\n\nE\n\nEgypt\nEgyptian, nation\n students\n Department of Public Instruction\n university\nEgyptians\nEngland\nEnglish\n university\n\n\nF\n\nFaqihs (canonists)\nFaithful\nF\u00e2tima\nF\u00e2timite, dynasty\n Khalifate\nFatwa\nFrench\n university\nFu'\u00e2d Pasha\n\n\nG\n\nGhazal\u00ed\nGideon\nGoldziher\nGospels\n _See_ Scriptures\n\n\nH\n\nHadith (legislative tradition)\nHadramaut\nHadramites\nHagar\nHajj (pilgrimage)\nHanafites\nHanbalites\nHaram (mosque)\nHell\nHij\u00e2z\nHijrah,\nHinduism\nHoly Cities\n _See_ Mecca and Medina\nHoly Family (Ali and Fatimah)\nHottinger\nH\u00fbd, the prophet\n\n\nI\n\n'Ijm\u00e2' (Agreement of the Community)\nIm\u00e2ms\n of Yemen\nIndia\nIndians,\nIndonesia\nIsaac\nIshmael\nIshma'ilites\nIsl\u00e2m\n\n\nJ\n\nJacob\nJ\u00e2hiliyyah (Arabian paganism)\nJesus Christ\n as Mehdi\nJewish, religion\n influence\n rituals\n model of fasting\nJews\nJih\u00e2d\nJudaism\n\n\nK\n\nKa'bah\nKhal\u00eef, the first\nKhalifate\nKhal\u00eefs, the first four\nKh\u00e2rijites,\nKhedive\nKipling\nKufa\n\n\nL\n\nLammens, Father\n\n\nM\n\nMahd\u00ee\nMalays\nM\u00e2likites\nMaracci, Abb\u00e9\nMary (mother of Jesus)\nMaulid\nMecca\nMeccans\nMedina\nMedinese\nMessiah\nMiddle Ages\nMisr, _see_ Cairo\nMohammedan, religion\n masters\n state\n orthodox dogma\n authorities\n law books\n countries\n political life\n church\n princes\n world\n governors\n subjects\n masses\n statesmen\n protection\n community\n territories\n dogmatics\n Hell\n authors\n law\n women\n nations\n slavery\n principles\n standard of tolerance\n philosophers\n mystics\n thought\n lunar year\n learning\n science\n populations\n dominions\nMohammedans\n natives of Egypt\nMongols\nMorocco\nMoses\nMoslim\n princes\n people\n authority\n church\n canonists\n world\n chiefs of states\n woman\n society\n heresiologists\nMuft\u00ee\nMuir\nMujtahids\nMutakallim\nMu'tazilites\n\n\nN\n\nNeo-Platonic origin of mysticism\nNeo-Platonism\nN\u00f6ldeke\nNon-Alids\nNon-Arabian converts\nNon-Arabic Moslims\n\n\nO\n\nOmar\nOmayyads\nOthm\u00e2n\n authority\nOttoman princes\nOttomans\n\n\nP\n\nPaganism\nPapacy\nParadise\nPars\u00ees\nPersia\nPersian Empire\nPorte, the\nPrideaux, Dr.\nProtestantism\n\n\nQ\n\nQ\u00e2dh\u00ees\nQ\u00e2r\u00ees (Qoran scholars)\nQarmatians\nQoraish\nQor\u00e2n\n scolars\n reciters\nQor\u00e2nic, revelations\n religion\n\n\nR\n\nReland, H.\nResurrection\nRoman Catholics\n\n\nS\n\nSal\u00e2t\nSale\nS\u00e2lih, the prophet\nSasanids\nSaul\nSayyids\nScriptures\n people of the\nSh\u00e2fi'ites\nSh\u00e2hs of Persia\nShar\u00ee'ah (Divine Law)\nShaukah (actual influence)\nSheikhites\nSheikh-ul-Isl\u00e2m\nSher\u00eefs\nSher\u00eefs of Mecca\nSher\u00eefs, rulers of Morocco\nSh\u00ee'ah (the Party of the House)\nSh\u00ee'ites\nS\u00eerah (biography)\nSpain\nSprenger\nStambul\nSultan\nSunnah\nSunnites\nSyria\nSyrians\n\n\nT\n\nTaif\nTatars\nTestament, _see_ Scriptures\nTibet\nTradition, _see_ Hadith\nTrinity\nTurkey\n Sultan of\nTurkish, Empire\n circles\n conqueror\n Sultan\n arms\n government\n state officials\nTurks\n\n\nU\n\n'Ulam\u00e2' (learned men)\n\n\nV\n\nVoltaire\n\n\nW\n\nWahh\u00e2b\u00ee reformers\nWeil\nWellhausen\nWez\u00eers\n\n\nY\n\nYemen\n Im\u00e2ms of\n\n\nZ\n\nZaidites\nZak\u00e2t (taxes)\nZanzibar","title":"Mohammedanism: Lectures on Its Origin, Its Religious and Political Growth, and Its Present State","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":33461}