A Literary History of the Arabs Part 18

THE SuRA OF THE SIGNS (Lx.x.xV).

(1) By the Heaven in which Signs are set, (2) By the Day that is promised, (3) By the Witness and the Witnessed:-- (4) Cursed be the Fellows of the Pit, they that spread (5) The fire with fuel fed, (6) When they sate by its head (7) And saw how their contrivance against the Believers sped;[318]

(8) And they punished them not save that they believed on G.o.d, the Almighty, the Glorified, (9) To whom is the Kingdom of Heaven and Earth, and He seeth every thing beside.

(10) Verily, for those who afflict believing men and women and repent not, the torment of Gehenna and the torment of burning is prepared.

(11) Verily, for those who believe and work righteousness are Gardens beneath which rivers flow: this is the great Reward.

(12) Stern is the vengeance of thy Lord.

(13) He createth the living and reviveth the dead: (14) He doth pardon and kindly entreat: (15) The majestic Throne is His seat: (16) That he willeth He doeth indeed.

(17) Hath not word come to thee of the mult.i.tude (18) Of Pharaoh, and of Thamud?[319]

(19) Nay, the infidels cease not from falsehood, (20) But G.o.d encompa.s.seth them about.

(21) Surely, it is a Sublime Koran that ye read, (22) On a Table inviolate.[320]

THE SuRA OF THE SMITING (CI).

(1) The Smiting! What is the Smiting?

(2) And how shalt thou be made to understand what is the Smiting?

(3) The Day when Men shall be as flies scattered, (4) And the Mountains shall be as shreds of wool tattered.

(5) One whose Scales are heavy, a pleasing life he shall spend, (6) But one whose Scales are light, to the Abyss he shall descend.

(7) What that is, how shalt thou be made to comprehend?

(8) Scorching Fire without end!

THE SuRA OF THE UNBELIEVERS (CIX).

(1) Say: 'O Unbelievers, (2) I worship not that which ye worship, (3) And ye worship not that which I worship.

(4) Neither will I worship that which ye worship, (5) Nor will ye worship that which I worship.

(6) Ye have your religion and I have my religion.'

[Sidenote: The teaching of Mu?ammad at Mecca.]

To summarise the cardinal doctrines preached by Mu?ammad during the Meccan period:--

1. There is no G.o.d but G.o.d.

2. Mu?ammad is the Apostle of G.o.d, and the Koran is the Word of G.o.d revealed to His Apostle.

3. The dead shall be raised to life at the Last Judgment, when every one shall be judged by his actions in the present life.

4. The pious shall enter Paradise and the wicked shall go down to h.e.l.l.

Taking these doctrines separately, let us consider a little more in detail how each of them is stated and by what arguments it is enforced.

The time had not yet come for drawing the sword: Mu?ammad repeats again and again that he is only a warner (_nadhir_) invested with no authority to compel where he cannot persuade.

[Sidenote: The Unity of G.o.d.]

1. The Meccans acknowledged the supreme position of Allah, but in ordinary circ.u.mstances neglected him in favour of their idols, so that, as Mu?ammad complains, "_When danger befalls you on the sea, the G.o.ds whom ye invoke are forgotten except Him alone; yet when He brought you safe to land, ye turned your backs on Him, for Man is ungrateful._"[321]

They were strongly attached to the cult of the Ka'ba, not only by self-interest, but also by the more respectable motives of piety towards their ancestors and pride in their traditions. Mu?ammad himself regarded Allah as Lord of the Ka'ba, and called upon the Quraysh to worship him as such (Kor. cvi, 3). When they refused to do so on the ground that they were afraid lest the Arabs should rise against them and drive them forth from the land, he a.s.sured them that Allah was the author of all their prosperity (Kor. xxviii, 57). His main argument, however, is drawn from the weakness of the idols, which cannot create even a fly, contrasted with the wondrous manifestations of Divine power and providence in the creation of the heavens and the earth and all living things.[322]

It was probably towards the close of the Meccan period that Mu?ammad summarised his Unitarian ideas in the following emphatic formula:--

THE SuRA OF PURIFICATION (CXII).[323]

(1) Say: 'G.o.d is One; (2) G.o.d who liveth on; (3) Without father and without son; (4) And like to Him there is none!'

[Sidenote: Mu?ammad, the Apostle of G.o.d.]

2. We have seen that when Mu?ammad first appeared as a prophet he was thought by all except a very few to be _majnun_, _i.e._, possessed by a _jinni_, or genie, if I may use a word which will send the reader back to his _Arabian Nights_. The heathen Arabs regarded such persons--soothsayers, diviners, and poets--with a certain respect; and if Mu?ammad's 'madness' had taken a normal course, his claim to inspiration would have pa.s.sed unchallenged. What moved the Quraysh to oppose him was not disbelief in his inspiration--it mattered little to them whether he was under the spell of Allah or one of the _Jinn_--but the fact that he preached doctrines which wounded their sentiments, threatened their inst.i.tutions, and subverted the most cherished traditions of old Arabian life. But in order successfully to resist the propaganda for which he alleged a Divine warrant, they were obliged to meet him on his own ground and to maintain that he was no prophet at all, no Apostle of Allah, as he a.s.serted, but "an insolent liar," "a schooled madman," "an infatuated poet," and so forth; and that his Koran, which he gave out to be the Word of Allah, was merely "old folks'

tales" (_asa?iru 'l-awwalin_), or the invention of a poet or a sorcerer.

"Is not he," they cried, "a man like ourselves, who wishes to domineer over us? Let him show us a miracle, that we may believe." Mu?ammad could only reiterate his former a.s.sertions and warn the infidels that a terrible punishment was in store for them either in this world or the next. Time after time he compares himself to the ancient prophets--Noah, Abraham, Moses, and their successors--who are represented as employing exactly the same arguments and receiving the same answers as Mu?ammad; and bids his people hearken to him lest they utterly perish like the unG.o.dly before them. The truth of the Koran is proved, he says, by the Pentateuch and the Gospel, all being Revelations of the One G.o.d, and therefore identical in substance. He is no mercenary soothsayer, he seeks no personal advantage: his mission is solely to preach. The demand for a miracle he could not satisfy except by pointing to his visions of the Angel and especially to the Koran itself, every verse of which was a distinct sign or miracle (_ayat_).[324] If he has forged it, why are his adversaries unable to produce anything similar? "_Say: 'If men and genies united to bring the like of this Koran, they could not bring the like although they should back each other up'_" (Kor. xvii, 90).

[Sidenote: Resurrection and Retribution.]

3. Such notions of a future life as were current in Pre-islamic Arabia never rose beyond vague and barbarous superst.i.tion, _e.g._, the fancy that the dead man's tomb was haunted by his spirit in the shape of a screeching owl.[325] No wonder, then, that the ideas of Resurrection and Retribution, which are enforced by threats and arguments on almost every page of the Koran, appeared to the Meccan idolaters absurdly ridiculous and incredible. "_Does Ibn Kabsha promise us that we shall live?_" said one of their poets. "_How can there be life for the ?ada and the hama?

Dost thou omit to ward me from death, and wilt thou revive me when my bones are rotten?_"[326] G.o.d provided His Apostle with a ready answer to these gibes: "_Say: 'He shall revive them who produced them at first, for He knoweth every creation_" (Kor. x.x.xvi, 79). This topic is eloquently ill.u.s.trated, but Mu?ammad's hearers were probably less impressed by the creative power of G.o.d as exhibited in Nature and in Man than by the awful examples, to which reference has been made, of His destructive power as manifested in History. To Mu?ammad himself, at the outset of his mission, it seemed an appalling certainty that he must one day stand before G.o.d and render an account; the overmastering sense of his own responsibility goaded him to preach in the hope of saving his countrymen, and supplied him, weak and timorous as he was, with strength to endure calumny and persecution. As Noldeke has remarked, the grandest Suras of the whole Koran are those in which Mu?ammad describes how all Nature trembles and quakes at the approach of the Last Judgment. "It is as though one actually saw the earth heaving, the mountains crumbling to dust, and the stars hurled hither and thither in wild confusion."[327]

Suras lx.x.xii and ci, which have been translated above, are specimens of the true prophetic style.[328]

[Sidenote: The Mu?ammadan Paradise.]

4. There is nothing spiritual in Mu?ammad's pictures of Heaven and h.e.l.l.

His Paradise is simply a glorified pleasure-garden, where the pious repose in cool shades, quaffing spicy wine and diverting themselves with the Houris (_?ur_), lovely dark-eyed damsels like pearls hidden in their sh.e.l.ls.[329] This was admirably calculated to allure his hearers by reminding them of one of their chief enjoyments--the gay drinking parties which occasionally broke the monotony of Arabian life, and which are often described in Pre-islamic poetry; indeed, it is highly probable that Mu?ammad drew a good deal of his Paradise from this source. The gross and sensual character of the Mu?ammadan Afterworld is commonly thought to betray a particular weakness of the Prophet or is charged to the Arabs in general, but as Professor Bevan has pointed out, "the real explanation seems to be that at first the idea of a future retribution was absolutely new both to Mu?ammad himself and to the public which he addressed. Paradise and h.e.l.l had no traditional a.s.sociations, and the Arabic language furnished no religious terminology for the expression of such ideas; if they were to be made comprehensible at all, it could only be done by means of precise descriptions, of imagery borrowed from earthly affairs."[330]

[Sidenote: Prayer.]

Mu?ammad was no mere visionary. Ritual observances, vigils, and other austerities entered largely into his religion, endowing it with the formal and ascetic character which it retains to the present day. Prayer was introduced soon after the first Revelations: in one of the oldest (Sura lx.x.xvii, 14-15) we read, "_Prosperous is he who purifies himself (or gives alms) and repeats the name of his Lord and prays._" Although the five daily prayers obligatory upon every true believer are nowhere mentioned in the Koran, the opening chapter (_Suratu 'l-Fati?a_), which answers to our Lord's Prayer, is constantly recited on these occasions, and is seldom omitted from any act of public or private devotion. Since the _Fati?a_ probably belongs to the latest Meccan period, it may find a place here.

THE OPENING SuRA (I).

(1) In the name of G.o.d, the Merciful, who forgiveth aye!

(2) Praise to G.o.d, the Lord of all that be, (3) The Merciful, who forgiveth aye, (4) The King of Judgment Day!

(5) Thee we worship and for Thine aid we pray.

(6) Lead us in the right way, (7) The way of those to whom thou hast been gracious, against whom thou hast not waxed wroth, and who go not astray!

[Sidenote: The Night journey and Ascension of Mu?ammad.]

About the same time, shortly before the Migration, Mu?ammad dreamed that he was transported from the Ka'ba to the Temple at Jerusalem, and thence up to the seventh heaven. The former part of the vision is indicated in the Koran (xvii, 1): "_Glory to him who took His servant a journey by night from the Sacred Mosque to the Farthest Mosque, the precinct whereof we have blessed, to show him of our signs!_" Tradition has wondrously embellished the _Mi'raj_, by which name the Ascension of the Prophet is generally known throughout the East; while in Persia and Turkey it has long been a favourite theme for the mystic and the poet.

According to the popular belief, which is also held by the majority of Moslem divines, Mu?ammad was transported in the body to his journey's end, but he himself never countenanced this literal interpretation, though it seems to have been current in Mecca, and we are told that it caused some of his incredulous followers to abandon their faith.

[Sidenote: Mu?ammad at Medina.]

Possessed and inspired by the highest idea of which man is capable, fearlessly preaching the truth revealed to him, leading almost alone what long seemed to be a forlorn hope against the impregnable stronghold of superst.i.tion, yet facing these tremendous odds with a calm resolution which yielded nothing to ridicule or danger, but defied his enemies to do their worst--Mu?ammad in the early part of his career presents a spectacle of grandeur which cannot fail to win our sympathy and admiration. At Medina, whither we must now return, he appears in a less favourable light: the days of pure religious enthusiasm have pa.s.sed away for ever, and the Prophet is overshadowed by the Statesman. The Migration was undoubtedly essential to the establishment of Islam. It was necessary that Mu?ammad should cut himself off from his own people in order that he might found a community in which not blood but religion formed the sole bond that was recognised. This task he accomplished with consummate sagacity and skill, though some of the methods which he employed can only be excused by his conviction that whatever he did was done in the name of Allah. As the supreme head of the Moslem theocracy both in spiritual and temporal matters--for Islam allows no distinction between Church and State--he exercised absolute authority, and he did not hesitate to justify by Divine mandate acts of which the heathen Arabs, cruel and treacherous as they were, might have been ashamed to be guilty. We need not inquire how much was due to belief in his inspiration and how much to deliberate policy. If it revolts us to see G.o.d Almighty introduced in the role of special pleader, we ought to remember that Mu?ammad, being what he was, could scarcely have considered the question from that point of view.

[Sidenote: Medina predisposed to welcome Mu?ammad as Legislator and Prophet.]

The conditions prevailing at Medina were singularly adapted to his design. Ever since the famous battle of Bu'ath (about 615 A.D.), in which the Banu Aws, with the help of their Jewish allies, the Banu Quray?a and the Banu Na?ir, inflicted a crushing defeat upon the Banu Khazraj, the city had been divided into two hostile camps; and if peace had hitherto been preserved, it was only because both factions were too exhausted to renew the struggle. Wearied and distracted by earthly calamities, men's minds willingly admit the consolations of religion. We find examples of this tendency at Medina even before the Migration. Abu 'amir, whose ascetic life gained for him the t.i.tle of 'The Monk'

(_al-Rahib_), is numbered among the _?anifs_.[331] He fought in the ranks of the Quraysh at U?ud, and finally went to Syria, where he died an outlaw. Another Pre-islamic monotheist of Medina, Abu Qays b. Abi Anas, is said to have turned Moslem in his old age.[332]

"The inhabitants of Medina had no material interest in idol-worship and no sanctuary to guard. Through uninterrupted contact with the Jews of the city and neighbourhood, as also with the Christian tribes settled in the extreme north of Arabia on the confines of the Byzantine Empire, they had learned, as it were instinctively, to despise their inherited belief in idols and to respect the far n.o.bler and purer faith in a single G.o.d; and lastly, they had become accustomed to the idea of a Divine revelation by means of a special scripture of supernatural origin, like the Pentateuch and the Gospel. From a religious standpoint paganism in Medina offered no resistance to Islam: as a faith, it was dead before it was attacked; none defended it, none mourned its disappearance. The pagan opposition to Mu?ammad's work as a reformer was entirely political, and proceeded from those who wished to preserve the anarchy of the old heathen life, and who disliked the dictatorial rule of Mu?ammad."[333]