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E. DENISON ROSS.

Sir Edward Denison Ross
C.I.E., Ph.D., ETC.

[Written apparently sometime after 1877]

TO THE READER.

_______

I IMAGINE it almost needless either to make an apology for publishing the
following translation, or to go about to prove it a work of use as well as
curiosity. They must have a mean opinion of the Christian religion, or be but
ill grounded therein, who can apprehend any danger from so manifest a
forgery: and if the religious and civil institutions of foreign nations are worth
our knowledge, those of Mohammed, the lawgiver of the Arabians, and founder
of an empire which in less than a century spread itself over a greater part of
the world than the Romans were ever masters of, must needs be so; whether
we consider their extensive obtaining, or our frequent intercourse with those
who are governed thereby. I shall not here inquire into the reasons why the
law of Mohammed has met with so unexampled a reception in the world (for
they are greatly deceived who imagine it to have been propagated by the
sword alone), or by what means it came to be embraced by nations which
never felt the force of the Mohammedan arms, and even by those which
stripped the Arabians of their conquests, and put an end to the sovereignty
and very being of their Khalifs: yet it seems as if there was something more
than what is vulgarly imagined in a religion which has made so surprising a
progress. But whatever use an impartial version of the Koran may be of in
other respects, it is absolutely necessary to undeceive those who, from the
ignorant or unfair translations which have appeared, have entertained too
favourable an opinion of the original, and also to enable us effectually to
expose the imposture; none of those who have hitherto undertaken that
province, not excepting Dr. Prideaux himself, having succeeded to the
satisfaction of the judicious, for want of being complete masters of the
controversy. The writers of the Romish communion, in particular, are so
far from having done any service in their refutations of Mohammedism, that
by endeavouring to defend their idolatry and other superstitions, they have
rather contributed to the increase of that aversion which the Mohammedans
in general have to the Christian religion, and given them great advantages in
the dispute. The Protestants alone are able to attack the Koran with
success; and for them, I trust, Providence has reserved the glory of its
overthrow. In the meantime, if I might presume to lay down rules to be
observed by those who attempt the conversion of the Mohammedans, they
should be the same which the learned and worthy Bishop Kidder[1] has
prescribed for the conversion of the Jews, and which may, mutatis mutandis,
be equally applied to the former, notwithstanding the despicable opinion that
writer, for want of being better acquainted with them, entertained of those
people, judging them scarce fit to be argued with. The first of these rules is,
To avoid compulsion; which, though it be not in our power to employ at
present, I hope will not be made use of when it is. The second is, To avoid
teaching doctrines against common sense; the Mohammedans not being such
fools (whatever we may think of them) as to be gained over in this case.
The worshipping of images and the doctrine of transubstantiation are great
stumbling-blocks to the Mohammedans, and the Church which teacheth them
is very unfit to bring those people over. The third is, To avoid weak
arguments: for the Mohammedans are not to be converted with these, or hard
words. We must use them with humanity, and dispute against them with
arguments that are proper and cogent. It is certain that many Christians,
who have written against them, have been very defective this way: many have
used arguments that have no force, and advanced propositions that are void
of truth. This method is so far from convincing, that it rather serves to
harden them. The Mohammedans will be apt to conclude we have little to say,
when we urge them with arguments that are trifling or untrue. We do but lose
ground when we do this; and instead of gaining them, we expose ourselves and
our cause also. We must not give them ill words neither; but must avoid all
reproachful language, all that is sarcastical and biting: this never did good
from pulpit or press. The softest words will make the deepest impression;
and if we think it a fault in them to give ill language, we cannot be excused
when we imitate them. The fourth rule is, Not to quit any article of the
Christian faith to gain the Mohammedans. It is a fond conceit of the
Socinians, that we shall upon their principles be most like to prevail upon the
Mohammedans: it is not true in matter of fact. We must not give up any
article to gain them: but then the Church of Rome ought to part with many
practices and some doctrines. We are not to design to gain the Mohammedans
over to a system of dogma, but to the ancient and primitive faith. I believe
nobody will deny but that the rules here laid down are just: the latter part of
the third, which alone my design has given me occasion to practise, I think so
reasonable, that I have not, in speaking of Mohammed or his Koran, allowed
myself to use those opprobrious appellations, and unmannerly expressions,
which seem to be the strongest arguments of several who have written against
them. On the contrary, I have thought myself to treat both with common
decency, and even to approve suchparticulars as seemed to me to deserve
approbation: for how criminal soever Mohammed may have been in imposing
a false religion on mankind, the praises due to his real virtues ought not to be
denied him; nor can I do otherwise than applaud the candour of the pious and
learned Spanhemius, who, though he owned him to have been a wicked impostor,
yet acknowledged him to have been richly furnished with natural endowments,
beautiful in his person, of a subtle wit, agreeable behaviour, showing liberality
to the poor, courtesy to every one, fortitude against his enemies, and above
all a high reverence for the name of GOD; severe against the perjured,
adulterers, murderers, slanderers, prodigals, covetous, false witnesses, &c.,
a great preacher of patience, charity, mercy, beneficence, gratitude, honouring
of parents and superiors, and a frequent celebrator of the divine praises.[2]

[1] In his Demonstr. of the Messias, Part III. chap. 2.

[2] Id certum, naturalibus egregie dotibus instructum Muhammedera, forma
praestanti, ingenio calido, moribus facetis, ac prae se ferentem liberalitatem
in egenos. comitatem in singulos, fortitudinem in hostes, ac prae caeteris
reverentiam divini nominis.--Severus fuit in perjuros, adulteros, homicidas,
obtrectatores, prodigos, avaros, falsos testes, &c. Magnus idem patientiae,
charitatis, misericordiae, beneficentiae, gratitudinis, honoris in parentes ac
superiores praeco, ut et divinarum laudum. Hist. Eccles. Sec. VII. c. 7,
lem. 5 and 7.

Of the several translations of the Koran now extant, there is but one
which tolerably represents the sense of the original; and that being in Latin,
a new version became necessary, at least to an English reader. What
Bibliander published for a Latin translation of that book deserves not the
name of a translation; the unaccountable liberties therein taken and the
numberless faults, both of omission and commission, leaving scarce any
resemblance of the original. It was made near six hundred years ago, being
finished in 1143, by Robertus Retenensis, an Englishman, with the assistance
of Hermannus Dalmata, at the request of Peter, Abbot of Clugny, who paid
them well for their pains.
From this Latin version was taken the Italian of Andrea Arrivabene,
notwithstanding the pretences in his dedication of its being done immediately
from the Arabic;[3] wherefore it is no wonder if the transcript be yet more
faulty and absurd than the copy.[4]

[3] His words are: Questo libro, che gia havevo a commune utilita di molti
fatto dal proprio testo Arabo tradurre nella nostra volgar lingua Italiana, &c.
And afterwards; Questo e l'Alcorano di Macometto, il quale, come ho gia
detto, ho fatto dal suo idioma tradurre, &c.

[4] Vide Jos. Scalig. Epist. 361 et 362; et Selden. de Success. ad Leges
Ebraeor. p. 9.

About the end of the fifteenth century, Johannes Andreas, a native of
Xativa in the kingdom of Valencia, who from a Mohammedan doctor became a
Christian priest, translated not only the Koran, but also its glosses, and the
seven books of the Sonna, out of Arabic into the Arragonian tongue, at the
command of Martin Garcia[5], Bishop of Barcelona and Inquisitor of Arragon.
Whether this translation were ever published or not I am wholly ignorant: but
it may be presumed to have been the better done for being the work of one
bred up in the Mohammedan religion and learning; though his refutation of that
religion, which has had several editions, gives no great idea of his abilities.

[5] J. Andreas, in Praef. ad Tractat. suum de Confusione Sectae
Mahometanae.

Some years within the last century, Andrew du Ryer, who had been consul
of the French nation in Egypt, and was tolerably skilled in the Turkish and
Arabic languages, took the pains to translate the Koran into his own tongue:
but his performance, though it be beyond comparison preferable to that of
Retenensis, is far from being a just translation; there being mistakes in every
page, besides frequent transpositions, omissions, and additions,[6] faults
unpardonable in a work of this nature. And what renders it still more
incomplete is, the want of Notes to explain a vast number of passages, some
of which are difficult, and others impossible to be understood, without proper
explications, were they translated ever so exactly; which the author is so
sensible of that he often refers his reader to the Arabic commentators.

[6] Vide Windet. de Vitâ Functorum statu, Sect. IX.

The English version is no other than a translation of Du Ryer's, and that a
very bad one; for Alexander Ross, who did it, being utterly unacquainted with
the Arabic, and no great master of the French, has added a number of fresh
mistakes of his own to those of Du Ryer; not to mention the meanness of his
language, which would make a better book ridiculous.
In 1698, a Latin translation of the Koran, made by Father Lewis Marracci,
who had been confessor to Pope Innocent XI., was published at Padua,
together with the original text, accompanied by explanatory notes and a
refutation. This translation of Marracci's, generally speaking, is very exact;
but adheres to the Arabic idiom too literally to be easily understood, unless
I am much deceived, by those who are not versed in the Mohammedan
learning. The notes he has added are indeed of great use; but his
refutations, which swell the work to a large volume, are of little or none at
all, being often unsatisfactory, and sometimes impertinent. The work,
however, with all its faults, is very valuable, and I should be guilty of
ingratitude, did I not acknowledge myself much obliged thereto; but still,
being in Latin, it can be of no use to those who understand not that tongue.
Having therefore undertaken a new translation, I have endeavoured to do
the original impartial justice; not having, to the best of my knowledge,
represented it, in any one instance, either better or worse than it really is.
I have thought myself obliged, indeed, in a piece which pretends to be the
Word of GOD, to keep somewhat scrupulously close to the text; by which
means the language may, in some places, seem to express the Arabic a little
too literally to be elegant English: but this, I hope, has not happened often;
and I flatter myself that the style I have made use of will not only give a more
genuine idea of the original than if I had taken more liberty (which would have
been much more for my ease), but will soon become familiar: for we must
not expect to read a version of so extraordinary a book with the same
ease and pleasure as a modern composition.
In the Notes my view has been briefly to explain the text, and especially
the difficult and obscure passages, from the most approved commentators,
and that generally in their own words, for whose opinions or expressions,
where liable to censure, I am not answerable; my province being only fairly
to represent their expositions, and the little I have added of my own, or
from European writers, being easily discernible. Where I met with any
circumstance which I imagined might be curious or entertaining, I have
not failed to produce it.
The Preliminary Discourse will acquaint the reader with the most material
particulars proper to be known previously to the entering on the Koran itself,
and which could not so conveniently have been thrown into the Notes. And
I have taken care, both in the Preliminary Discourse and the Notes,
constantly to quote my authorities and the writers to whom I have been
beholden; but to none have I been more so than to the learned Dr. Pocock,
whose Specimen Historiae Arabum is the most useful and accurate work
that has been hitherto published concerning the antiquities of that nation,
and ought to be read by every curious inquirer into them.
As I have had no opportunity of consulting public libraries, the manuscripts
of which I have made use throughout the whole work have been such as I had
in my own study, except only the Commentary of al Beidâwi and the Gospel of
St. Barnabas. The first belongs to the library of the Dutch church in Austin
Friars, and for the use of it I have been chiefly indebted to the Reverend
Dr. Bolten, one of the ministers of that church: the other was very obligingly
lent me by the Reverend Dr. Holme, Rector of Hedley in Hampshire; and I take
this opportunity of returning both those gentlemen my thanks for their
favours. The merit of al Beidâwi's commentary will appear from the frequent
quotations I have made thence; but of the Gospel of St. Barnabas (which I had
not seen when the little I have said of it in the Preliminary Discourse,[7] and
the extract I had borrowed from M. de la Monnoye and M. Toland,[8] were
printed off), I must beg leave to give some further account.

[7] Sect. IV. p. 58.

[8] In not. ad cap. 3, p. 38

The book is a moderate quarto, in Spanish, written in a very legible hand,
but a little damaged towards the latter end. It contains two hundred and
twenty-two chapters of unequal length, and four hundred and twenty pages;
and is said, in the front, to be translated from the Italian, by an Arragonian
Moslem, named Mostafa de Aranda. There is a preface prefixed to it, wherein
the discoverer of the original MS., who was a Christian monk, called Fra
Marino, tells us that having accidentally met with a writing of Irenaeus (among
others), wherein he speaks against St. Paul, alleging, for his authority, the
Gospel of St. Barnabas, he became exceeding desirous to find this gospel;
and that GOD, of His mercy, having made him very intimate with Pope
Sixtus V., one day, as they were together in that Pope's library, his Holiness
fell asleep, and he, to employ himself, reaching down a book to read, the first
he laid his hand on proved to be the very gospel he wanted: overjoyed at the
discovery, he scrupled not to hide his prize in his sleeve, and on the Pope's
awaking, took leave of him, carrying with him that celestial treasure, by
reading of which he became a convert to Mohammedism.
This Gospel of Barnabas contains a complete history of Jesus Christ from
His birth to His ascension; and most of the circumstances in the four real
Gospels are to be found therein, but many of them turned, and some artfully
enough, to favour the Mohammedan system. From the design of the whole,
and the frequent interpolations of stories and passages wherein Mohammed
is spoken of and foretold by name, as the messenger of God, and the great
prophet who was to perfect the dispensation of Jesus, it appears to be a
most barefaced forgery. One particular I observe therein induces me to
believe it to have been dressed up by a renegade Christian, slightly instructed
in his new religion, and not educated a Mohammedan (unless the fault be
imputed to the Spanish, or perhaps the Italian translator, and not to the
original compiler); I mean the giving to Mohammed the title of Messiah, and
that not once or twice only, but in several places; whereas the title of the
Messiah, or, as the Arabs write it, al Masih, i.e., Christ, is appropriated to
Jesus in the Koran, and is constantly applied by the Mohammedans to Him,
and never to their own prophet. The passages produced from the Italian
MS. by M. de la Monnoye are to be seen in this Spanish version almost word
for word.
But to return to the following work. Though I have freely censured the
former translations of the Koran, I would not therefore be suspected of a
design to make my own pass as free from faults: I am very sensible it is not;
and I make no doubt that the few who are able to discern them, and know the
difficulty of the undertaking, will give me fair quarter. I likewise flatter
myself that they, and all considerate persons, will excuse the delay which has
happened in the publication of this work, when they are informed that it was
carried on at leisure times only, and amidst the necessary avocations of a
troublesome profession.

CONTENTS.

_________

A TABLE

OF THE

SECTIONS OF THE PRELIMINARY DISCOURSE

_________

SECTION
I. Of the Arabs before Mohammed; or, as they express it, in the Time of
Ignorance; their History, Religion, Learning, and Customs

II. Of the State of Christianity, particularly of the Eastern Churches, and of
Judaism, at time of Mohammed's appearance; and of the methods taken
by him for the establishing his Religion, and the circumstances which
concurred thereto

III. Of the Koran itself, the Peculiarities of that Book; the manner of its
being written and published, and the General Design of it

IV. Of the Doctrines and positive Precepts of the Koran which relate to
Faith and Religious Duties

V. Of certain Negative Precepts in the Koran

VI. Of the Institutions of the Koran in Civil Affairs

VII. Of the Months commanded by the Koran to be kept Sacred; and of the
setting apart of Friday for the especial service of God

VIII. Of the principal Sects among the Mohammedans; and of those who have
pretended to Prophecy among the Arabs, in or since the time of
Mohammed

A TABLE OF THE CHAPTERS

OF

THE KORAN.

______________

CHAPTER
1. Entitled, The Preface, or Introduction; containing 7 verses
2. Entitled, The Cow; containing 286 verses
3. Entitled, The Family of Imrân; containing 200 verses
4. Entitled, Women; containing 176 verses
5. Entitled, The Table; containing 120 verses
6. Entitled, Cattle; containing 165 verses
7. Entitled, Al Araf; containing 206 verses
8. Entitled, The Spoils; containing 75 verses
9. Entitled, The Declaration of Immunity; containing 129 verses
10. Entitled, Jonas; containing 109 verses
11. Entitled, Hud; containing 123 verses
12. Entitled, Joseph; containing 111 verses
13. Entitled, Thunder; containing 43 verses
14. Entitled, Abraham; containing 52 verses
15. Entitled, Al Hejr; containing 99 verses
16. Entitled, The Bee; containing 128 verses
17. Entitled, The Night Journey; contianing 111 verses
18. Entitled, The Cave; containing 110 verses
19. Entitled, Mary; containing 98 verses
20. Entitled, T. H.; containing 134 verses
21. Entitled, The Prophets; containing 112 verses
22. Entitled, The Pilgrimage; containing 78 verses
23. Entitled, The True Believers; containing 118 verses
24. Entitled, Light; containing 64 verses
25. Entitled, Al Forkan; containing 77 verses
26. Entitled, The Poets; containing 227 verses
27. Entitled, The Ant; containing 93 verses
28. Entitled, The Story; containing 88 verses
29. Entitled, The Spider; containing 69 verses
30. Entitled, The Greeks; containing 60 verses
31. Entitled, Lokmân; containing 34 verses
32. Entitled, Adoration; containing 30 verses
33. Entitled, The Confederates; containing 73 verses
34. Entitled, Saba; containing 54 verses
35. Entitled, The Creator; containing 45 verses
36. Entitled, Y. S; containing 83 verses
37. Entitled, Those who rank themselves in Order; containing 182 verses
38. Entitled, S.; containing 88 verses
39. Entitled, The Troops; containing 75 verses
40. Entitled, The True Believer; containing 85 verses
41. Entitled, Are distinctly explained; containing 54 verses
42. Entitled, Consultation; containing 53 verses
43. Entitled, The Ornaments of Gold; containing 89 verses
44. Entitled, Smoke; containing 59 verses
45. Entitled, The Kneeling; containing 37 verses
46. Entitled, Al Ahkaf; containing 35 verses
47. Entitled, Mohammed; containing 38 verses
48. Entitled, The Victory; containing 29 verses
49. Entitled, The Inner Apartments; containing 18 verses
50. Entitled, K.; containing 45 verses
51. Entitled, The Dispersing; containing 60 verses
52. Entitled, The Mountain; containing 49 verses
53. Entitled, The Star; containing 62 verses
54. Entitled, The Moon; containing 55 verses
55. Entitled, The Merciful; containing 78 verses
56. Entitled, The Inevitable; containing 96 verses
57. Entitled, Iron; containing 29 verses
58. Entitled, She who disputed; containing 22 verses
59. Entitled, The Emigration; containing 24 verses
60. Entitled, She who is tried; containing 13 verses
61. Entitled, Battle Array; containing 14 verses
62. Entitled, The Assembly; containing 11 verses
63. Entitled, The Hypocrites; containing 11 verses
64. Entitled, Mutual Deceit; contianing 18 verses
65. Entitled, Divorce; containing 12 verses
66. Entitled, Prohibition; containing 12 verses
67. Entitled, The Kingdom; containing 30 verses
68. Entitled, The Pen; containing 52 verses
69. Entitled, The Infallible; containing 52 verses
70. Entitled, The Steps; containing 44 verses
71. Entitled, Noah; containing 28 verses
72. Entitled, The Genii; containing 28 verses
73. Entitled, The Wrapped up; containing 20 verses
74. Entitled, The Covered; containing 56 verses
75. Entitled, The Resurrection; containing 40 verses
76. Entitled, Man; containing 31 verses
77. Entitled, Those which are sent; containing 50 verses
78. Entitled, The News; containing 40 verses
79. Entitled, Those who tear forth; containing 46 verses
80. Entitled, He Frowned; containing 42 verses
81. Entitled, The Folding up; containing 29 verses
82. Entitled, The Cleaving in Sunder; containing 19 verses
83. Entitled, Those who give Short Measure or Weight; containing 36 verses
84. Entitled, The Rending in Sunder; containing 25 verses
85. Entitled, The Celestial Signs; containing 22 verses
86. Entitled, The Star which appeareth by Night; containing 17 verses
87. Entitled, The Most High; containing 19 verses
88. Entitled, The Overwhelming; containing 26 verses
89. Entitled, The Daybreak; containing 30 verses
90. Entitled, The Territory; containing 20 verses
91. Entitled, The Sun; containing 15 verses
92. Entitled, The Night; containing 21 verses
93. Entitled, The Brightness; containing 11 verses
94. Entitled, Have we not Opened; containing 8 verses
95. Entitled, The Fig; containing 8 verses
96. Entitled, Congealed Blood; containing 19 verses
97. Entitled, Al Kadr; containing 5 verses
98. Entitled, The Evidence; containing 8 verses
99. Entitled, The Earthquake, containing 8 verses
100. Entitled, The War Horses which run swiftly; containing 11 verses
101. Entitled, The Striking; containing 11 verses
102. Entitled, The Emulous Desire of Multiplying; containing 8 verses
103. Entitled, The Afternoon; containing 3 verses
104. Entitled, The Slanderer; containing 9 verses
105. Entitled, The Elephant; containing 5 verses
106. Entitled, Koreish; containing 4 verses
107. Entitled, Necessaries; containing 7 verses
108. Entitled, Al Cawthar; containing 3 verses
109. Entitled, The Unbelievers; containing 6 verses
110. Entitled, Assistance; containing 3 verses
111. Entitled, Abu Laheb; containing 5 verses
112. Entitled, The Declaration of GOD's Unity; containing 4 verses
113. Entitled, The Daybreak; containing 5 verses
114. Entitled, Men; containing 6 verses

THE

PRELIMINARY DISCOURSE

SECTION I.

OF THE ARABS BEFORE MOHAMMED; OR, AS THEY EXPRESS IT, IN THE TIME
OF IGNORANCE; THEIR HISTORY, RELIGION, LEARNING, AND CUSTOMS

THE Arabs, and the country they inhabit, which themselves call Jezirat al Arab,
or the Peninsula of the Arabians, but we Arabia, were so named from Araba, a
small territory in the province of Tehâma; to which Yarab the son of Kahtân, the
father of the ancient Arabs, gave his name, and where, some ages after, dwelt
Ismael the son of Abraham by Hagar. The Christian writers for several
centuries speak of them under the appellation of Saracens; the most certain
derivation of which word is from shark, the east, where the descendants of
Joctan, the Kahtân of the Arabs, are placed by Moses, and in which quarter they
dwelt in respect to the Jews.
The name of Arabia (used in a more extensive sense) sometimes comprehends
all that large tract of land bounded by the river Euphrates, the Persian Gulf,
the Sindian, Indian, and Red Seas, and part of the Mediterranean: above two-
thirds of which country, that is, Arabia properly so called, the Arabs have
possessed almost from the Flood; and have made themselves masters of the
rest, either by settlements or continual incursions; for which reason the Turks
and Persians at this day call the whole Arabistân, or the country of the Arabs.
But the limits of Arabia, in its more usual and proper sense, are much
narrower, as reaching no farther northward than the Isthmus, which runs from
Aila to the head of the Persian Gulf, and the borders of the territory of Cufa;
which tract of land the Greeks nearly comprehended under the name of Arabia
the Happy. The eastern geographers make Arabia Petraea to belong partly to
Egypt, and partly to Shâm or Syria, and the desert Arabia they call the deserts
of Syria.
Proper Arabia is by the oriental writers generally divided into five provinces,
viz., Yaman, Hejâz, Tehâma, Najd, and Yamâma; to whichsome add Bahrein, as a
sixth, but this province the more exact make part of Irak; others reduce them
all to two, Yaman and Hejâz, the last including the three other provinces of
Tehâma, Najd, and Yamâma.
The province of Yaman, so called either from its situation to the right hand,
or south of the temple of Mecca, or else from the happiness and verdure of its
soil, extends itself along the Indian Ocean from Aden to Cape Rasalgat; part of
the Red Sea bounds it on the west and south sides, and the province of Hejâz on
the north. It is subdivided into several lesser provinces, as Hadramaut, Shihr,
Omân, Najrân, &c., of which Shihr alone produces the frankincense. The
metropolis of Yaman is Sanaa, a very ancient city, in former times called Ozal,
and much celebrated for its delightful situation; but the prince at present
resides about five leagues northward from thence, at a place no less pleasant,
called Hisn almawâheb, or the Castle of delights.
This country has been famous from all antiquity for the happiness of its
climate, its fertility and riches, which induced Alexander the Great, after his
return from his Indian expedition, to form a design of conquering it, and fixing
there his royal seat; but his death, which happened soon after, prevented the
execution of this project. Yet, in reality, great part of the riches which the
ancients imagined were the produce of Arabia, came really from the Indies and
the coasts of Africa; for the Egyptians, who had engrossed that trade, which
was then carried on by way of the Red Sea, to themselves, industriously
concealed the truth of the matter, and kept their ports shut to prevent
foreigners penetrating into those countries, or receiving any information
thence; and this precaution of theirs on the one side, and the deserts,
unpassable to strangers, on the other, were the reason why Arabia was so
little known to the Greeks and Romans. The delightfulness and plenty of Yaman
are owing to its mountains; for all that part which lies along the Red Sea is a
dry, barren desert, in some places ten or twelve leagues over, but in return
bounded by those mountains, which being well watered, enjoy an almost
continual spring, and, besides coffee, the peculiar produce of this country,
yield great plenty and variety of fruits, and in particular excellent corn, grapes,
and spices. There are no rivers of note in this country, for the streams which
at certain times of the year descend from the mountains, seldom reach the
sea, being for the most part drunk up and lost in the burning sands of that
coast.
The soil of the other provinces is much more barren than that of Yaman; the
greater part of their territories being covered with dry sands, or rising into
rocks, interspersed here and there with some fruitful spots, which receive
their greatest advantages from their water and palm trees.
The province of Hejâz, so named because it divides Najd from Tehâma, is
bounded on the south by Yaman and Tehâma, on the west by the Red Sea, on the
north by the deserts of Syria, and on the east by the province of Najd. This
province is famous for its two chief cities, Mecca and Medina, one of which is
celebrated for its temple, and having given birth to Mohammed; and the other
for being the place of his residence for the last ten years of his life, and of his
interment.
Mecca, sometimes also called Becca, which words are synonymous, and signify
a place of great concourse, is certainly one of the most ancient cities of the
world: it is by some thought to be the Mesa of the scripture, a name not
unknown to the Arabians, and supposed to be taken form one of Ismael's sons.
It is seated in a stony and barren valley, surrounded on all sides with mountains.
The length of Mecca from south to north is about two miles, and its breadth
from the foot of the mountain Ajyad, to the top of another called Koaikaân,
about a mile. In the midst of this space stands the city, built of stone cut from
the neighbouring mountains. There being no springs at Mecca, at least none but
what are bitter and unfit to drink, except only the well Zemzem, the water of
which, though far the best, yet cannot be drank of any continuance, being
brackish, and causing eruptions in those who drink plentifully of it, the
inhabitants are obliged to use rain-water which they catch in cisterns. But
this not being sufficient, several attempts were made to bring water thither
from other places by aqueducts; and particularly about Mohammed's time,
Zobair, one of the principal men of the tribe of Koreish, endeavoured at a great
expense to supply the city with water from Mount Arafat, but without success;
yet this was effected not many years ago, being begun at the charge of a wife
of Solimân the Turkish emperor. But long before this, another aqueduct had
been made from a spring at a considerable distance, which was, after several
years' labour, finished by the Khalif al Moktader.
The soil about Mecca is so very barren as to produce no fruits but what are
common in the deserts, though the prince or Sharif has a garden well planted
at his castle of Marbaa, about three miles westward from the city, where he
usually resides. Having therefore no corn or grain of their own growth, they
are obliged to fetch it from other places; and Hashem, Mohammed's great-
grandfather, then prince of his tribe, the more effectually to supply them
with provisions, appointed two caravans to set out yearly for that purpose,
the one in summer, and the other in winter: these caravans of purveyors are
mentioned in the Koran. The provisions brought by them were distributed also
twice a year, viz., in the month of Rajeb, and at the arrival of the pilgrims.
They are supplied with dates in great plenty from the adjacent country, and
with grapes from Tayef, about sixty miles distant, very few growing at Mecca.
The inhabitants of this city are generally very rich, being considerable gainers
by the prodigious concourse of people of almost all nations at the yearly
pilgrimage, at which time there is a great fair or mart for all kinds of
merchandise. They have also great numbers of cattle, and particularly of
camels: however, the poorer sort cannot but live very indifferently in a place
where almost every necessary of life must be purchased with money.
Notwithstanding this great sterility near Mecca, yet you are no sooner out
of its territory than you meet on all sides with plenty of good springs and
streams of running water, with a great many gardens and cultivated lands.
The temple of Mecca, and the reputed holiness of this territory, will be
treated of in a more proper place.
Medina, which till Mohammed's retreat thither was called Yathreb, is a
walled city about half as big as Mecca, built in a plain, salt in many places, yet
tolerably fruitful, particularly in dates, but more especially near the mountains,
two of which, Ohod on the north, and Air on the south, are about two leagues
distant. Here lies Mohammed interred in a magnificent building, covered with a
cupola, and adjoining to the east side of the great temple, which is built in the
midst of the city.
The province of Tehâma was so named from the vehement heat of its sandy
soil, and is also called Gaur from its low situation; it is bounded on the west by
the Red Sea, and on the other sides by Hejâz and Yaman, extending almost from
Mecca to Aden.
The province of Najd, which word signifies a rising country, lies between
those of Yamâma, Yaman, and Hejâz, and is bounded on the east by Irak.
The province of Yamâma, also called Arud from its oblique situation, in
respect of Yaman, is surrounded by the provinces of Najd, Tehâma, Bahrein,
Omân, Shihr, Hadramaut, and Saba. The chief city is Yamâma, which gives name
to the province: it was anciently called Jaw, and is particularly famous for
being the residence of Mohammed's competitor, the false prophet Moseilama.
The Arabians, the inhabitants of this spacious country, which they have
possessed from the most remote antiquity, are distinguished by their own
writers into two classes, viz., the old lost Arabians, and the present.
The former were very numerous, and divided into several tribes, which are
now all destroyed, or else lost and swallowed up among the other tribes, nor are
any certain memoirs or records extant concerning them; though the memory
of some very remarkable events and the catastrophe of some tribes have been
preserved by tradition, and since confirmed by the authority of the Koran.
The most famous tribes amongst these ancient Arabians were Ad, Thamud,
Tasm, Jadis, the former Jorham, and Amalek.
The tribe of Ad were descended from Ad, the son of Aws, the son of Aram,
the son of Sem, the son of Noah, who, after the confusion of tongues, settled
in al Ahkâf, or the winding sands in the province of Hadramaut, where his
posterity greatly multiplied. Their first king was Shedâd the son of Ad, of
whom the eastern writers deliver many fabulous things, particularly that he
finished the magnificent city his father had begun, wherein he built a fine
palace, adorned with delicious gardens, to embellish which he spared neither
cost nor labour, proposing thereby to create in his subjects a superstitious
veneration of himself as a god. This garden or paradise was called the garden
of Irem, and is mentioned in the Koran, and often alluded to by the oriental
writers. The city, they tell us, is still standing in the deserts of Aden, being
preserved by providence as a monument of divine justice, though it be invisible,
unless very rarely, when GOD permits it to be seen, a favour one Colabah
pretended to have received in the reign of the Khalif Moâwiyah, who sending for
him to know the truth of the matter, Colabah related his whole adventure; that
as he was seeking a camel he had lost, he found himself on a sudden at the
gates of this city, and entering it saw not one inhabitant, at which, being
terrified, he stayed no longer than to take with him some fine stones which he
showed the Khalif.
The descendants of Ad in process of time falling from the worship of the
true God into idolatry, GOD sent the prophet Hud (who is generally agreed to
be Heber) to preach to and reclaim them. But they refusing to acknowledge
his mission, or to obey him, GOD sent a hot and suffocating wind, which blew
seven nights and eight days together, and entering at their nostrils passed
through their bodies. and destroyed them all, a very few only excepted, who
had believed in Hud and retired with him to another place. That prophet
afterwards returned into Hadramaut, and was buried near Hasec, where there
is a small town now standing called Kabr Hud, or the sepulchre of Hud. Before
the Adites were thus severely punished, GOD, to humble them, and incline them
to hearken to the preaching of his prophet, afflicted them with a drought for
four years, so that all their cattle perished, and themselves were very near
it; upon which they sent Lokmân (different from one of the same name who
lived in David's time) with sixty others to Mecca to beg rain, which they not
obtaining, Lokmân with some of his company stayed at Mecca, and thereby
escaped destruction, giving rise to a tribe called the latter Ad, who were
afterward changed into monkeys.
Some commentators on the Koran tell us these old Adites were of prodigious
stature, the largest being 100 cubits high, and the least 60; which
extraordinary size they pretend to prove by the testimony of the Koran.
The tribe of Thamud were the posterity of Thamud the son of Gather the son
of Aram, who falling into idolatry, the prophet Sâleh was sent to bring them
back to the worship of the true GOD. This prophet lived between the time of
Hud and of Abraham, and therefore cannot be the same with the patriarch
Sâleh, as Mr. d'Herbelot imagines. The learned Bochart with more probability
takes him to be Phaleg. A small number of the people of Thamud hearkened
to the remonstrances of Sâleh, but the rest requiring, as a proof of his mission,
that he should cause a she-camel big with young to come out of a rock in their
presence, he accordingly obtained it of GOD, and the camel was immediately
delivered of a young one ready weaned; but they, instead of believing, cut the
hamstrings of the camel and killed her; at which act of impiety GOD, being
highly displeased, three days after struck them dead in their houses by an
earthquake and a terrible noise from heaven, which, some say, was the
voice of Gabriel the archangel crying aloud, "Die, all of you." Sâleh, with those
who were reformed by him, were saved from this destruction; the prophet
going into Palestine, and from thence to Mecca, where he ended his days.
This tribe first dwelt in Yaman, but being expelled thence by Hamyar the
son of Sâba, they settled in the territory of Hejr in the province of Hejâz,
where their habitations cut out of the rocks, mentioned in the Koran, are
still to be seen, and also the crack of the rock whence the camel issued,
which, as an eyewitness hath declared, is 60 cubits wide. These houses of
the Thamudites being of the ordinary proportion, are used as an argument to
convince those of a mistake who who this people to have been of a gigantic
stature.
The tragical destructions of these two potent tribes are often insisted on
in the Koran, as instances of GOD'S judgment on obstinate unbelievers.
The tribe of Tasm were the posterity of Lud the son of Sem, and Jadis of
the descendants of Jether. These two tribes dwelt promiscuously together
under the government of Tasm, till a certain tyrant made a law that no maid
of the tribe of Jadis should marry unless first defloured by him; which the
Jadisians not enduring, formed a conspiracy, and inviting the king and chiefs
of Tasm to an entertainment, privately hid their swords in the sand, and in
the midst of their mirth fell on them and slew them all, and extirpated the
greatest part of that tribe; however, the few who escaped obtaining aid of the
king of Yaman, then (as is said) Dhu Habshân Ebn Akrân, assaulted the Jadis
and utterly destroyed them, there being scarce any mention made from that
time of either of these tribes.
The former tribe of Jorham (whose ancestor some pretend was one of the
eighty persons saved in the ark of Noah, according to a Mohammedan tradition)
was contemporary with Ad, and utterly perished. The tribe of Amalek were
descended from Amalek the son of Eliphaz the son of Esau, though some of the
oriental authors say Amalek was the son of Ham the son of Noah, and others
the son of Azd the son of Sem. The posterity of this person rendered
themselves very powerful, and before the time of Joseph conquered the lower
Egypt under their king Walid, the first who took the name of Pharaoh, as the
eastern writers tell us; seeming by these Amalekites to mean the same people
which the Egyptian histories call Phoenician shepherds. But after they had
possessed the throne of Egypt for some descents, they were expelled by the
natives, and at length totally destroyed by the Israelites.
The present Arabians, according to their own historians, are sprung from
two stocks, Kahtân, the same with Joctan the son of Eber, and Adnân descended
in a direct line from Ismael the son of Abraham and Hagar; the posterity of the
former they call al Arab al Ariba, i.e., the genuine or pure Arabs, and those of
the latter al Arab al mostareba, i.e., naturalized or institious Arabs, though
some reckon the ancient lost tribes to have been the only pure Arabians, and
therefore call the posterity of Kahtân also Mutareba, which word likewise
signifies insititious Arabs, though in a nearer degree than Mostareba; the
descendants of Ismael being the more distant graff.
The posterity of Ismael have no claim to be admitted as pure Arabs, their
ancestor being by origin and language an Hebrew; but having made an alliance
with the Jorhamites, by marrying a daughter of Modad, and accustomed himself
to their manner of living and language, his descendants became blended with
them into one nation. The uncertainty of the descents between Ismael and
Adnân is the reason why they seldom trace their genealogies higher than the
latter, whom they acknowledge as father of their tribes, the descents from
him downwards being pretty certain and uncontroverted.
The genealogy of these tribes being of great use to illustrate the Arabian
history, I have taken the pains to form a genealogical table from their most
approved authors, to which I refer the curious.
Besides these tribes of Arabs mentioned by their own authors, who were all
descended from the race of Sem, others of them were the posterity of Ham by
his son Cush, which name is in scripture constantly given to the Arabs and
their country, though our version renders it Ethiopia; but strictly speaking,
the Cushites did not inhabit Arabia properly so called, but the banks of the
Euphrates and the Persian Gulf, whither they came form Chuzestân or Susiana,
the original settlement of their father. They might probably mix themselves
in process of time with the Arabs of the other race, but the eastern writers
take little or no notice of them.
The Arabians were for some centuries under the government of the
descendants of Kâhtan; Yarab, one of his sons, founding the kingdom of Yaman,
and Jorham, another of them, that of Hejâz.
The province of Yaman, or the better part of it, particularly the provinces
of Saba and Hadramaut, was governed by princes of the tribe of Hamyar,
though at length the kingdom was translated to the descendants of Cahlân, his
brother, who yet retained the title of king of Hamyar, and had all of them the
general title of Tobba, which signifies successor, and was affected to this
race of princes, as that of Caesar was to the Roman emperors, and Khalif
to the successors of Mohammed. There were several lesser princes who
reigned in other parts of Yaman, and were mostly, if not altogether, subject
to the king of Hamyar, whom they called the great king, but of these history
has recorded nothing remarkable or that may be depended upon.
The first great calamity that befell the tribes settled in Yaman was the
inundation of Aram, which happened soon after the time of Alexander the Great,
and is famous in the Arabian history. No less than eight tribes were forced
to abandon their dwellings upon this occasion, some of which gave rise to the
two kingdoms of Ghassân and Hira. And this was probably the time of the
migration of those tribes or colonies which were led into Mesopotamia by three
chiefs, Becr, Modar, and Rabia, from whom the three provinces of that country
are still named Diyar Becr, Diyar Modar, and Diyar Rabia. Abdshems, surnamed
Saba, having built the city from him called Saba, and afterwards Mareb, made a
vast mound, or dam, to serve as a basin or reservoir to receive the water
which came down from the mountains, not only for the use of the inhabitants,
and watering their lands, but also to keep the country they had subjected in
greater awe by being masters of the water. This building stood like a mountain
above their city, and was by them esteemed so strong that they were in no
apprehension of its ever failing. The water rose to the height of almost twenty
fathoms, and was kept in on every side by a work so solid, that many of the
inhabitants had their houses built upon it. Every family had a certain portion of
this water, distributed by aqueducts. But at length, GOD, being highly
displeased at their great pride and insolence, and resolving to humble and
disperse them, sent a mighty flood, which broke down the mound by night while
the inhabitants were asleep, and carried away the whole city, with the
neighbouring towns and people.
The tribes which remained in Yaman after this terrible devastation still
continued under the obedience of the former princes, till about seventy years
before Mohammed, when the king of Ethiopia sent over forces to assist the
Christians of Yaman against the cruel persecution of their king, Dhu Nowâs, a
bigoted Jew, whom they drove to that extremity that he forced his horse into
the sea, and so lost his life and crown, after which the country was governed
by four Ethiopian princes successively, till Selif, the son of Dhu Yazan, of the
tribe of Hamyar, obtaining succours from Khosru Anushirwân, king of Persia,
which had been denied him by the emperor Heraclius, recovered the throne
and drove out the Ethiopians, but was himself slain by some of them who were
left behind. The Persians appointed the succeeding princes till Yaman fell into
the hands of Mohammed, to whom Bazan, or rather Badhân, the last of them,
submitted, and embraced this new religion.
This kingdom of the Hammyarites is said to have lasted 2,020 years, or as
others say above 3,000; the length of the reign of each prince being very
uncertain.
It has been already observed that two kingdoms were founded by those who
left their country on occasion of the inundation of Aram: they were both out
of the proper limits of Arabia. One of them was the kingdom of Ghassân.
The founders of this kingdom were of the tribe of Azd, who, settling in Syria
Damascena near a water called Ghassân, thence took their name, and drove
out (the Dajaamian Arabs of the tribe of Salih, who before possessed the
country; where they maintained their kingdom 400 years, as others say 600,
or as Abulfeda more exactly computes, 616. Five of these princes were
named Hâreth, which the Greeks write Aretas: and one of them it was whose
governor ordered the gates of Damascus to be watched to take St. Paul.
This tribe were Christians, their last king being Jabalah the son of al Ayham,
who on the Arabs' successes in Syria professed Mohammedism under the
Khalif Omar; but receiving a disgust from him, returned to his former faith,
and retired to Constantinople.
The other kingdom was that of Hira, which was founded by Malec, of the
descendants of Cahlân in Chaldea or Irâk; but after three descents the throne
came by marriage to the Lakhmians, called also the Mondars (the general name
of those princes), who preserved their dominion, notwithstanding some small
interruption by the Persians, till the Khalifat of Abubecr, when al Mondar al
Maghrur, the last of them, lost his life and crown by the arms of Khaled Ebn
al Walid. This kingdom lasted 622 years eight months. Its princes were under
the protection of the kings of Persia, whose lieutenants they were over the
Arabs of Irâk, as the kings of Ghassân were for the Roman emperors over
those of Syria.
Jorham the son of Kahtân reigned in Hejâz, where his posterity kept the
throne till the time of Ismael; but on his marrying the daughter of Modad, by
whom he had twelve sons, Kidar, one of them, had the crown resigned to him
by his uncles the Jorhamites, though others say the descendants of Ismael
expelled that tribe, who retiring to Johainah, were, after various fortune, at
last all destroyed by an inundation.
Of the kings of Hamyar, Hira, Ghassân, and Jorham, Dr. Pocock has given us
catalogues tolerably exact, to which I refer the curious.
After the expulsion of the Jorhamites, the government of Hejâz seems not to
have continued for many centuries in the hands of one prince, but to have been
divided among the heads of tribes, almost in the same manner as the Arabs of
the desert are governed at this day. At Mecca an aristocracy prevailed, where
the chief management of affairs till the time of Mohammed was in the tribe of
Koreish, especially after they had gotten the custody of the Caaba from the
tribe of Khozâah.
Besides the kingdoms which have been taken notice of, there were some
other tribes which in latter times had princes of their own, and formed states
of lesser note, particularly the tribe of Kenda: but as I am not writing a just
history of the Arabs, and an account of them would be of no great use ot my
present purpose, I shall waive any further mention of them.
After the time of Mohammed, Arabia was for about three centuries under
the Khalifs his successors. But in the year 325 of the Hejra, great part of
that country was in the hands of the Karmatians, a new sect who had
committed great outrages and disorders even in Mecca, and to whom the
Khalifs were obliged to pay tribute, that the pilgrimage thither might be
performed: of this sect I may have occasion to speak in another place.
Afterwards Yaman was governed by the house of Thabateba, descended from
Ali the son-in-law of Mohammed, whose sovereignty in Arabia some place so
high as the time of Charlemagne. However, it was the posterity of Ali, or
pretenders to be such, who reigned in Yaman and Egypt so early as the tenth
century. The present reigning family in Yaman is probably that of Ayub, a
branch of which reigned there in the thirteenth century, and took the title of
Khalif and Imâm, which they still retain. They are not possessed of the whole
province of Yaman, there being several other independent kingdoms there,
particularly that of Fartach. The crown of Yaman descends not regularly from
father to son, but the prince of the blood royal who is most in favour with the
great ones, or has the strongest interest, generally succeeds.
The governors of Mecca and Medina, who have always been of the race of
Mohammed, also threw off their subjection to the Khalifs, since which time
four principal families, all descended from Hassan the son of Ali, have reigned
there under the title of Sharif, which signifies noble, as they reckon themselves
to be on account of their descent. These are Banu Kâder, Banu Musa Thani,
Banu Hashem, and Banu Kitâda; which last family now is, or lately was, in the
throne of Mecca, where they have reigned above 500 years. The reigning
family at Medina are the Banu Hashem, who also reigned at Mecca before
those of Kitâda.
The kings of Yaman, as well as the princes of Mecca and Medina, are
alsolutely independent and not at all subject to the Turk, as some late
authors have imagined. These princes often making cruel wars among
themselves, gave an opportunity to Selim I. and his son Solimân, to make
themselves masters of the coasts of Arabia on the Red Sea, and of part of
Yaman, by means of a fleet built at Sues: but their successors have not been
able to maintain their conquests; for, except the port of Jodda, where they
have a Basha whose authority is very small, they possess nothing considerable
in Arabia.
Thus have the Arabs preserved their liberty, of which few nations can
produce so ancient monuments, with very little interruption, from the very
Deluge; for though very great armies have been sent against them, all attempts
to subdue them were unsuccessful. The Assyrian or Median empires never got
footing among them. The Persian monarchs, though they were their friends,
and so far respected by them as to have an annual present of frankincense,
yet could never make them tributary; and were so far from being their masters,
that Cambyses, on his expedition against Egypt, was obliged to ask their leave
to pass through their territories; and when Alexander had subdued that mighty
empire, yet the Arabians had so little apprehension of him, that they alone, of
all the neighbouring nations, sent no ambassadors to him, either first or last;
which, with a desire of possessing so rich a country, made him form a design
against it, and had he not died before he could put it in execution, this people
might possibly have convinced him that he was not invincible: and I do not find
that any of his successors, either in Asia or Egypt, ever made any attempt
against them. The Romans never conquered any part of Arabia properly so
called; the most they did was to make some tribes in Syria tributary to them,
as Pompey did one commanded by Sampsiceramus or Shams'alkerâm, who
reigned at Hems or Emesa; but none of the Romans, or any other nations that
we know of, ever penetrated so far into Arabia as Alius Gallus under Augustus
Caesar; yet he was so far from subduing it, as some authors pretend, that he
was soon obliged to return without effecting anything considerable, having lost
the best part of his army by sickness and other accidents. This ill success
probably discouraged the Romans from attacking them any more; for Trajan,
notwithstanding the flatteries of the historians and orators of his time, and
the medals struck by him, did not subdue the Arabs; the province of Arabia,
which it is said he added to the Roman empire, scarce reaching farther than
Arabia Petraea, or the very skirts of the country. And we are told by one
author, that this prince, marching against the Agarens who had revolted, met
with such a reception that he was obliged to return without doing anything.
The religion of the Arabs before Mohammed, which they call the state of
ignorance, in opposition to the knowledge of GOD'S true worship revealed to
them by their prophet, was chiefly gross idolatry; the Sabian religion having
almost overrun the whole nation, though there were also great numbers of
Christians, Jews, and Magians among them.
I shall not here transcribe what Dr. Prideaux has written of the original of
the Sabian religion; but instead thereof insert a brief account of the tenets
and worship of that sect. They do not only believe one GOD, but produce many
strong arguments for His unity, though they also pay an adoration to the
stars, or the angels and intelligences which they suppose reside in them, and
govern the world under the Supreme Deity. They endeavour to perfect
themselves in the four intellectual virtues, and believe the souls of the
wicked men will be punished for nine thousand ages, but will afterwards be
received to mercy. They are obliged to pray three times a day; the first,
half an hour or less before sunrise, ordering it so that they may, just as the
sun rises, finish eight adorations, each containing three prostrations; the
second prayer they end at noon, when the sun begins to decline, in saying
which they perform five such adorations as the former: and in the same they
do the third time, ending just as the sun sets. They fast three times a year,
the first time thirty days, the next nine days, and the last seven. They offer
many sacrifices, but eat no part of them, burning them all. They abstain from
beans, garlic, and some other pulse and vegetables. Asto the Sabian Kebla, or
part to which they turn their faces in praying, authors greatly differ; one will
have it to be the north, another the south, a third Mecca, and a fourth the star
to which they pay their devotions: and perhaps there may be some variety in
their practice in this respect. They go on pilgrimage to a place near the city
of Harran in Mesopotamia, where great numbers of them dwell, and they have
also a great respect for the temple of Mecca, and the pyramids of Egypt;
fancying these last to be the sepulchres of Seth, and of Enoch and Sabi his
two sons, whom they look on as the first propagators of their religion; at
these structures they sacrifice a cock and a black calf, and offer up incense.
Besides the book of Psalms, the only true scripture they read, they have other
books which they esteem equally sacred, particularly one in the Chaldee tongue
which they call the book of Seth, and is full of moral discourses. This sect say
they took the name of Sabians from the above-mentioned Sabi, though it
seems rather to be derived from Saba, or the host of heaven, which they
worship. Travellers commonly call them Christians of St. John the Baptist,
whose disciples also they pretend to be, using a kind of baptism, which is the
greatest mark they bear of Christianity. This is one of the religions, the
practice of which Mohammed tolerated (on paying tribute), and the professors
of it are often included in that expression of the Koran, "those to whom the
scriptures have been given," or literally, the people of the book.
The idolatry of the Arabs then, as Sabians, chiefly consisted in worshipping
the fixed stars and planets, and the angels and their images, which they
honoured as inferior deities, and whose intercession they begged, as their
mediators with GOD. For the Arabs acknowledged one supreme GOD, the
Creator and LORD of the universe, whom they called Allah Taâla, the most high
GOD; and their other deities, who were subordinate to him, they called simply
al Ilahât, i.e., the goddesses; which words the Grecians not understanding, and
it being their constant custom to resolve the religion of every other nation into
their own, and find out gods of their to match the others', they pretend that
the Arabs worshipped only two deities, Orotalt and Alilat, as those names are
corruptly written, whom they will have to be the same with Bacchus and Urania;
pitching on the former as one of the greatest of their own gods, and educated
in Arabia, and on the other, because of the veneration shown by the Arabs to
the stars.
That they acknowledged one supreme GOD, appears, to omit other proof,
from their usual form of addressing themselves to him, which was this, "I
dedicate myself to thy service, O GOD! Thou hast no companion, except thy
companion of whom thou art absolute master, and of whatever is his." So that
they supposed the idols not to be sui juris, though they offered sacrifices and
other offerings to them, as well as to GOD, who was also often put off with
the least portion, as Mohammed upbraids them. Thus when they planted fruit
trees, or sowed a field, they divided it by a line into two parts, setting one
apartfor their idols, and the other for GOD; if any of the fruits happened to fall
from the idol's part into GOD'S, they made restitution; but if from GOD'S part
into the idol's, they made no restitution. So when they watered the idol's
grounds, if the water broke over the channels made for that purpose, and ran
on GOD'S part, they damned it up again; but if the contrary, they let it run
on, saying, they wanted what was GOD'S, but he wanted nothing. In the same
manner, if the offering designed for GOD happened to be better than that
designed for the idol, they made an exchange, but not otherwise.
It was from this gross idolatry, or the worship of inferior deities, or
companions of GOD, as the Arabs continue to call them, that Mohammed
reclaimed his countrymen, establishing the sole worship of the true GOD
among them; so that how much soever the Mohammedans are to blame in
other points, they are far from being idolaters, as some ignorant writers
have pretended.
The worship of the stars the Arabs might easily be led into, from their
observing the changes of weather to happen at the rising and setting of
certain of them, which after a long course of experience induced them to
ascribe a divine power to those stars, and to think themselves indebted to
them for their rains, a very great benefit and refreshment to their parched
country: this superstition the Koran particularly takes notice of.
The ancient Arabians and Indians, between which two nations was a great
conformity of religions, had seven celebrated temples, dedicated to the seven
planets; one of which in particular, called Beit Ghomdân, was built in Sanaa, the
metropolis of Yaman, by Dahac, to the honour of al Zoharah or the planet
Venus, and was demolished by the Khalif Othman; by whose murder was
fulfilled the prophetical inscription set, as is reported, over this temple, viz.,
"Ghomdân, he who destroyeth thee shall be slain. The temple of Mecca is also
said to have been consecrated to Zohal, or Saturn.
Though these deities were generally reverenced by the whole nation, yet
each tribe chose some one as the more peculiar object of their worship.
Thus as to the stars and planets, the tribe of Hamyar chiefly worshipped
the sun; Misam, al Debarân, or the Bull's-eye; Lakhm and Jodâm, al Moshtari,
or Jupiter; Tay, Sohail, or Canopus; Kais, Sirius, or the Dog-star; and Asad,
Otâred, or Mercury. Among the worshippers of Sirius, one Abu Cabsha was
very famous; some will have him to be the same with Waheb, Mohammed's
grandfather by the mother, but others say he was of the tribe of Khozâah.
This man used his utmost endeavours to persuade the Koreish to leave their
images and worship this star; for which reason Mohammed, who endeavoured
also to make them leave their images, was by them nicknamed the son of Abu
Cabsha. The worship of this star is particularly hinted at in the Koran.
Of the angels or intelligences which they worshipped, the Koran, makes
mention only of three, which were worshipped under female names; Allat, al
Uzza, and Manah. These were by them called goddesses, and the daughters
of GOD; an appellation they gave not only to the angels, but also to their images,
which they either believed to be inspired with life by GOD, or else to become the
tabernacles of the angels, and to be animated by them; and they gave them
divine worship, because they imagined they interceded for them with GOD.
Allât was the idol of the tribe of Thakif who dwelt at Tayef, and had a temple
consecrated to her in a place called Nakhlah. This idol al Mogheirah destroyed
by Mohammed's order, who sent him and Abu Sofiân on that commission in the
ninth year of the Hejra. The inhabitants of Tayef, especially the women,
bitterly lamented the loss of this their deity, which they were so fond of, that
they begged of Mohammed as a condition of peace, that it might not be
destroyed for three years, and not obtaining that, asked only a month's
respite; but he absolutely denied it. There are several derivations of this
word which the curious may learn from Dr. Pocock: it seems most probably to
be derived from the same root with Allah, to which it may be a feminine, and
will then signify the goddess.
Al Uzza, as some affirm, was the idol of the tribes of Koreish and Kenânah,
and part of the tribe of Salim: others tell us it was a tree called the Egyptian
thorn, or acacia, worshipped by the tribe of Ghatfân, first consecrated by one
Dhâlem, who built a chapel over it, called Boss, so contrived as to give a sound
when any person entered. Khâled Ebn Walid being sent by Mohammed in the
eighth year of the Hejra to destroy this idol, demolished the chapel, and cutting
down this tree or image, burnt it: he also slew the priestess, who ran out with
her hair dishevelled, and her hands on her head as a suppliant. Yet the author
who relates this, in another place says, the chapel was pulled down, and Dhâlem
himself killed by one Zohair, because he consecrated this chapel with design to
draw the pilgrims thither from Mecca, and lessen the reputation of the Caaba.
The name of this deity is derived from the root azza, and signifies the most
mighty.
Manah was the object of worship of the tribes of Hodhail and Khazâah, who
dwelt between Mecca and Medina, and, as some say, of the tribes of Aws,
Khazraj, and Thakif also. This idol was a large stone, demolished by one Saad,
in the eighth year of the Hejra, a year so fatal to the idols of Arabia. The name
seems derived from mana, to flow, from the flowing of the blood of the victims
sacrificed to the deity; whence the valley of Mina, near Mecca, had also its
name, where the pilgrims at this day slay their sacrifices.
Before we proceed to the other idols, let us take notice of five more, which
with the former three are all the Koran mentions by name, and they are Wadd,
Sawâ, Yaghuth, Yauk, and Nasr. These are said to have been antediluvian idols,
which Noah preached against, and were afterwards taken by the Arabs for
gods, having been men of great merit and piety in their time, whose statues
they reverenced at first with a civil honour only, which in process of time
became heightened to a divine worship.
Wadd was supposed to be the heaven, and was worshipped under the form of
a man by the tribe of Calb in Daumat al Jandal.
Sawâ was adored under the shape of a woman by the tribe of Hamadan, or, as
others write, of Hodhail in Rohat. This idol lying under water for some time
after the Deluge, was at length, it is said, discovered by the devil, and was
worshipped by those of Hodhail, who instituted pilgrimages to it.
Yaghuth was an idol in the shape of a lion, and was the deity of the tribe of
Madhaj and others who dwelt in Yaman. Its name seems to be derived from
ghatha, which signifies to help.
Yauk was worshipped by the tribe of Morâd, or, according to others, by that
of Hamadan, under the figure of a horse. It is said he was a man of great
piety, and his death much regretted; whereupon the devil appeared to his
friends in a human form, and undertaking to represent him to the life,
persuaded them, by way of comfort, to place his effigies in their temples,
that they might have it in view when at their devotions. This was done, and
seven others of extraordinary merit had the same honours shown them, till at
length their posterity made idols of them in earnest. The name Yauk probably
comes from the verb âka, to prevent or avert.
Nasr was a deity adored by the tribe of Hamyar, or at Dhu'l Khalaah in their
territories, under the image of an eagle, which the name signifies.
There are, or were, two statues at Bamiyân, a city of Cabul in the Indies,
50 cubits high, which some writers suppose to be the same with Yaghuth and
Yauk, or else with Manah and Allât; and they also speak of a third standing near
the others, but something less, in the shape of an old woman, called Nesrem or
Nesr. These statues were hollow within, for the secret giving of oracles; but
they seem to have been different from the Arabian idols. There was also an
idol at Sumenat in the Indies, called Lât or al Lât, whose statue was 50 fathoms
high, of a single stone, and placed in the midst of a temple supported by 56
pillars of massy gold: this idol Mahmud Ebn Sebecteghin, who conquered that
part of India, broke to pieces with his own hands.
Besides the idols we have mentioned, the Arabs also worshipped great
numbers of others, which would take up too much time to have distinct
accounts given of them; and not being named in the Koran, are not so much
to our present purpose: for besides that every housekeeper had his household
god or gods, which he last took leave of and first saluted at his going abroad
and returning home, there were no less than 360 idols, equalling in number the
days of their year, in and about the Caaba of Mecca; the chief of whom was
Hobal, brought from Belka in Syria into Arabia by Amru Ebn Lohai, pretending
it would procure them rain when they wanted it. It was the statue of a man,
made of agate, which having by some accident lost a hand, the Koreish repaired
it with one of gold: he held in his hand seven arrows without heads or feathers,
such as the Arabs used in divination. This idol is supposed to have been the
same with the image of Abraham, found and destroyed by Mohammed in the
Caaba, on his entering it, in the eighth year of the Hejra, when he took Mecca,
and surrounded with a great number of angels and prophets, as inferior deities;
among whom, as some say, was Ismael, with divining arrows in his hand also.
Asâf and Nayelah, the former the image of a man, the latter of a woman,
were also two idols brought with Hobal from Syria, and placed the one on Mount
Safâ, and the other on Mount Merwa. They tell us Asâf was the son of Amru,
and Nayelah the daughter of Sahâl, both of the tribe of Jorham, who committing
whoredom together in the Caaba, were by GOD converted into stone, and
afterwards worshipped by the Koreish, and so much reverenced by them, that
though this superstition was condemned by Mohammed, yet he was forced to
allow them to visit those mountains as monuments of divine justice.
I shall mention but one idol more of this nation, and that was a lump of dough
worshipped by the tribe of Hanifa, who used it with more respect than the
Papists do theirs, presuming not to eat it till they were compelled to it
by famine.
Several of their idols, as Manah in particular, were no more than large rude
stones, the worship of which the posterity of Ismael first introduced; for as
they multiplied, and the territory of Mecca grew too strait for them, great
numbers were obliged to seek new abodes; and on such migrations it was usual
for them to take with them some of the stones of that reputed holy land, and
set them up in the places where they fixed; and these stones they at first only
compassed out of devotion, as they had accustomed to do the Caaba. But this
at last ended in rank idolatry, the Ismaelites forgetting the religion left them
by their father so far as to pay divine worship to any fine stone they met with.
Some of the pagan Arabs believed neither a creation past, nor a resurrection
to come, attributing the origin of things to nature, and their dissolution to age.
Others believed both, among whom were those who, when they died, had their
camel tied by their sepulchre, and so left, without meat or drink, to perish,
and accompany them to the other world, lest they should be obliged, at the
resurrection, to go on foot, which was reckoned very scandalous. Some
believed a metem-psychosis, and that of the blood near the dead person's
brain was formed a bird named Hâmah, which once in a hundred years visited
the sepulchre; though others say this bird is animated by the soul of him that
is unjustly slain, and continually cries, Oscuni, Oscuni, i.e., "give me to drink"--
meaning of the murderer's blood--till his death be revenged, and then it flies
away. This was forbidden by the Koran to be believed.
I might here mention several superstitious rites and customs of the ancient
Arabs, some of which were abolished and others retained by Mohammed; but
I apprehend it will be more convenient to take notice of them, hereafter
occasionally, as the negative or positive precepts of the Koran, forbidding
or allowing such practices, shall be considered.
Let us now turn our view from the idolatrous Arabs, to those among them
who had embraced more rational religions.
The Persians had, by their vicinity and frequent intercourse with the
Arabians, introduced the Magian religion among some of their tribes,
particularly that of Tamim, a long time before Mohammed, who was so far
from being unacquainted with that religion, that he borrowed many of his own
institutions from it, as will be observed in the progress of this work. I refer
those who are desirous to have some notion of Magism, to Dr. Hyde's curious
account of it, a succinct abridgment of which may be read with much pleasure
in another learned performance.
The Jews, who fled in great numbers into Arabia from the fearful destruction
of their country by the Romans, made proselytes of several tribes, those of
Kenânah, al Hareth Ebn Caaba, and Kendah in particular, and in time became
very powerful, and possessed of several towns and fortresses there. But the
Jewish religion was not unknown to the Arabs, at least above a century before;
Abu Carb Asad, taken notice of in the Koran, who was king of Yaman, about
700 years before Mohammed, is said to have introduced Judaism among the
idolatrous Hamyarites. Some of his successors also embraced the same
religion, one of whom, Yusef, surnamed Dhu Nowâs, was remarkable for his zeal
and terrible persecution of all who would not turn Jews, putting them to death
by various tortures, the most common of which was throwing them into a
glowing pit of fire, whence he had the opprobrious appellation of the Lord of
the Pit. This persecution is also mentioned in the Koran.
Christianity had likewise made a very great progress among this nation
before Mohammed. Whether St. Paul preached in any part of Arabia, properly
so called, is uncertain; but the persecutions and disorders which happened in
the eastern church soon after the beginning of the third century, obliged
great numbers of Christians to seek for shelter in that country of liberty,
who, being for the most part of the Jacobite communion, that sect generally
prevailed among the Arabs. The principal tribes that embraced Christianity
were Hamyar, Ghassân, Rabiâ, Taghlab, Bahrâ, Tonuch, part of the tribes of
Tay and Kodâa, the inhabitants of Najrân, and the Arabs of Hira. As to the two
last, it may be observed that those of Najrân became Christians in the time of
Dhu Nowâs, and very probably, if the story be true, were some of those who
were converted on the following occasion, which happened about that time, or
not long before. The Jews of Hamyar challenged some neighbouring Christians
to a public disputation, which was held sub dio for three days before the king
and his nobility and all the people, the disputants being Gregentius, bishop of
Tephra (which I take to be Dhafâr) for the Christians, and Herbanus for the
Jews. On the third day, Herbanus, to end the dispute, demanded that Jesus of
Nazareth, if he were really living and in heaven, and could hear the prayers of
his worshippers, should appear from heaven in their sight, and they would then
believe in him; the Jews crying out with one voice, "Show us your Christ, alas!
and we will become Christians." Whereupon, after a terrible storm of thunder
and lightning, Jesus Christ appeared in the air, surrounded with rays of glory,
walking on a purple cloud, having a sword in his hand, and an inestimable diadem
on his head, and spake these words over the heads of the assembly: "Behold I
appear to you in your sight, I, who was crucified by your fathers." After which
the cloud received him from their sight. The Christians cried out, "Kyrie
eleeson," i.e., "Lord, have mercy upon us;" but the Jews were stricken blind,
and recovered not till they were all baptized.
The Christians at Hira received a great accession by several tribes, who
fled thither for refuge from the persecution of Dhu Nowâs. Al Nooman,
surnamed Abu Kabus, king of Hira, who was slain a few months before
Mohammed's birth, professed himself a Christian on the following occasion.
This prince, in a drunken fit, ordered two of his intimate companions, who
overcame with liquor had fallen asleep, to be buried alive. When he came to
himself, he was extremely concerned at what he had done, and to expiate his
crime, not only raised a monument to the memory of his friends, but set apart
two days, one of which he called the unfortunate, and the other the fortunate
day; making it a perpetual rule to himself, that whoever met him on the former
day should be slain, and his blood sprinkled on the monument, but he that met
him on the other day should be dismissed in safety, with magnificent gifts. On
one of those unfortunate days there came before him accidentally an Arab, of
the tribe of Tay, who had once entertained this king, when fatigued with hunting,
and separated from his attendants. The king, who could neither discharge him,
contrary to the order of the day, nor put him to death, against the laws of
hospitality, which the Arabians religiously observe, proposed, as an expedient,
to give the unhappy man a year's respite, and to send him home with rich gifts
for the support of his family, on condition that he found a surety for his
returning at the year's end to suffer death. One of the prince's court, out of
compassion, offered himself as his surety, and the Arab was discharged.
When the last day of the term came, and no news of the Arab, the king, not at
all displeased to save his host's life, ordered the surety to prepare himself to
die. Those who were by represented to the king that the day was not yet
expired, and therefore he ought to have patience till the evening: but in the
middle of their discourse the Arab appeared. The king, admiring the man's
generosity, in offering himself to certain death, which he might have avoided
by letting his surety suffer, asked him what was his motive for his so doing?
to which he answered, that he had been taught to act in that manner by the
religion he professed; and al Nooman demanding what religion that was, he
replied, the Christian. Whereupon the king desiring to have the doctrines of
Christianity explained to him, was baptized, he and his subjects; and not only
pardoned the man and his surety, but abolished his barbarous custom. This
prince, however, was not the first king of Hira who embraced Christianity;
al Mondar, his grandfather, having also professed the same faith, and built
large churches in his capital.
Since Christianity had made so great a progress in Arabia, we may
consequently suppose they had bishops in several parts, for the more orderly
governing of the churches. A bishop of Dhafâr has been already named, and we
are told that Najrân was also a bishop's see. The Jacobites (of which sect we
have observed the Arabs generally were) had two bishops of the Arabs subject
to their Mafriân, or metropolitan of the east; one was called the bishop of the
Arabs absolutely, whose seat was for the most part at Akula, which some
others make the same with Cufa, others a different town near Baghdâd.
The other had the title of bishop of the Scenite Arabs, of the tribe of Thaalab
in Hira, or Hirta, as the Syrians call it, whose seat was in that city. The
Nestorians ahd but one bishop, who presided over both these dioceses of Hira
and Akula, and was immediately subject to their patriarch.
These were the principal religions which obtained among the ancient Arabs;
but as freedom of thought was the natural consequence of their political
liberty and independence, some of them fell into other different opinions. The
Koreish, in particular, were infected with Zendicism, an error supposed to have
very near affinity with that of the Sadducees among the Jews, and, perhaps,
not greatly different from Deism; for there were several of that tribe, even
before the time of Mohammed, who worshipped one GOD, and were free from
idolatry, and yet embraced none of the other religions of the country.
The Arabians before Mohammed were, as they yet are, divided into two
sorts, those who dwell in cities and towns, and those who dwell in tents. The
former lived by tillage, the cultivation of palm trees, breeding and feeding of
cattle, and the exercise of all sorts of trades, particularly merchandising,
wherein they were very eminent, even in the time of Jacob. The tribe of
Koreish were much addicted to commerce, and Mohammed, in his younger years,
was brought up to the same business; it being customary for the Arabians to
exercise the same trade that their parents did. The Arabs who dwelt in tents,
employed themselves in pasturage, and sometimes in pillaging of passengers;
they lived chiefly on the milk and flesh of camels; they often changed their
habitations, as the convenience of water and of pasture for their cattle invited
them, staying in a place no longer than that lasted, and then removing in search
of other. They generally wintered in Irâk and the confines of Syria. This way of
life is what the greater part of Ismael's posterity have used, as more agreeable
to the temper and way of life of their father; and is so well described by a late
author, that I cannot do better than refer the reader to his account of them.
The Arabic language is undoubtedly one of the most ancient in the world, and
arose soon after, if not at, the confusion of Babel. There were several dialects
of it, very different from each other: the most remarkable were that spoken
by the tribes of Hammyar and the other genuine Arabs, and that of the
Koreish. The Hamyaritic seems to have approached nearer ot the purity of the
Syriac, than the dialect of any other tribe; for the Arabs acknowledge their
father Yarab to have been the first whose tongue deviated from the Syriac
(which was his mother tongue, and is almost generally acknowledged by the
Asiatics to be the most ancient) to the Arabic. The dialect of the Koreish is
usually termed the pure Arabic, or, as the Koran, which is written in this
dialect, calls it, the perspicuous and clear Arabic; perhaps, says Dr. Pocock,
because Ismael, their father, brought the Arabic he had learned of the
Jorhamites nearer to the original Hebrew. But the politeness and elegance
of the dialect of the Koreish, is rather to be attributed to their having the
custody of the Caaba, and dwelling in Mecca, the centre of Arabia, as well
more remote from intercourse with foreigners, who might corrupt their
language, as frequented by the Arabs from the country all around, not only
on a religious account, but also for the composing of their differences, from
whose discourse and verses they took whatever words or phrases they judged
more pure and elegant; by which means the beauties of the whole tongue
became transfused into this dialect. The Arabians are full of the
commendations of their language, and not altogether without reason; for
it claims the preference of most others in many respects, as being very
harmonious and expressive, and withal so copious, that they say no man
without inspiration can be a perfect master of it in its utmost extent; and
yet they tell us, at the same time, that the greatest part of it has been lost;
which will not be thought strange, if we consider how late the art of writing
was practised among them. For though it was known to Job, their countryman,
and also the Hamyarites (who used a perplexed character called al Mosnad,
wherein the letters were not distinctly separate, and which was neither
publicly taught, nor suffered to be used without permission first obtained)
many centuries before Mohammed, as appears from some ancient monuments,
said to be remaining in their character; yet the other Arabs, and those of
Mecca in particular, were, for many ages, perfectly ignorant of it, unless such
of them as were Jews or Christians: Morâmer Ebn Morra of Anbar, a city of Irâk,
who lived not many years before Mohammed, was the inventor of the Arabic
character, which Bashar the Kendian is said to have learned from those of
Anbar, and to have introduced at Mecca but a little while before the institution
of Mohammedism. These letters of Marâmer were different from the
Hamyaritic; and though they were very rude, being either the same with, or
very much like the Cufic, which character is still found in inscriptions and some
ancient books, yet they were those which the Arabs used for many years, the
Koran itself being at first written therein; for the beautiful character they now
use was first formed from the Cufic by Ebn Moklah, Wazir (or Visir) to the
Khalifs al Moktader, al Kâher, and al Râdi, who lived about three hundred years
after Mohammed, and was brought to great perfection by Ali Ebn Bowâb, who
flourished in the following century, and whose name is yet famous among them
on that account; yet, it is said, the person who completed it, and reduced it to
its present form, was Yakut al Mostasemi, secretary to al Mostasem, the last
of the Khalifs of the family of Abbâs, for which reason he was surnamed al
Khattât, or the Scribe.
The accomplishments the Arabs valued themselves chiefly on, were,
1. Eloquence, and a perfect skill in their own tongue; 2. Expertness in the use
of arms, and horsemanship; and 3. Hospitality. The first they exercised
themselves in, by composing of orations and poems. Their orations were of
two sorts, metrical, or prosaic, the one being compared to pearls strung, and
the other to loose ones. They endeavoured to excel in both, and whoever was
able, in an assembly, to persuade the people to a great enterprise, or dissuade
them from a dangerous one, or gave them other wholesome advice, was
honoured with the title of Khâteb, or orator, which is now given to the
Mohammedan preachers. They pursued a method very different from that of
the Greek and Roman orators; their sentences being like loose gems, without
connection, so that this sort of composition struck the audience chiefly by
the fulness of the periods, the elegance of the expression, and the acuteness
of the proverbial sayings; and so persuaded were they of their excelling in this
way, that they would not allow any nation to understand the art of speaking in
public, except themselves and the Persians; which last were reckoned much
inferior in that respect to the Arabians. Poetry was in so great esteem among
them, that it was a great accomplishment, and a proof of ingenuous extraction,
to be able to express one's self in verse with ease and elegance, on any
extraordinary occurrence; and even in their common discourse they made
frequent applications to celebrated passages of their famous poets. In their
poems were preserved the distinction of descents, the rights of tribes, the
memory of great actions, and the propriety of their language; for which
reasons an excellent poet reflected an honour on his tribe, so that as soon as
any one began to be admired for his performances of this kind in a tribe, the
other tribes sent publicly to congratulate them on the occasion, and
themselves made entertainments, at which the women assisted, dressed in
their nuptial ornaments, singing to the sound of timbrels the happiness of their
tribe, who had now one to protect their honour, to preserve their genealogies
and the purity of their language, and to transmit their actions to posterity;
for this was all performed by their poems, to which they were solely obliged
for their knowledge and instructions, moral and economical, and to which they
had recourse, as to an oracle, in all doubts and differences. No wonder,
then, that a public congratulation was made on this account, which honour they
yet were so far from making cheap, that they never did it but on one of these
three occasions, which were reckoned great points of felicity, viz., on the birth
of a boy, the rise of a poet, and the fall of a foal of generous breed. To keep
up an emulation among their poets, the tribes had, once a year, a general
assembly at Ocadh, a place famous on this account, and where they kept a
weekly mart or fair, which was held on our Sunday. This annual meeting
lasted a whole month, during which time they employed themselves, not only
in trading, but in repeating their poetical compositions, contending and vieing
with each other for the prize; whence the place, it is said, took its name. The
poems that were judged to excel, were laid up in their kings' treasuries, as were
the seven celebrated poems, thence called al Moallakât, rather than from their
being hung upon the Caaba, which honour they also had by public order, being
written on Egyptian silk, and inn letters of gold; for which reason they had also
the name of al Modhahabât, or the golden verses.
The fair and assembly at Ocadh were suppressed by Mohammed, in whose
time, and for some years after, poetry seems to have been in some degree
neglected by the Arabs, who were then employed in their conquests; which
being completed, and themselves at peace, not only this study was revived,
but almost all sorts of learning were encouraged and greatly improved by them.
This interruption, however, occasioned the loss of most of their ancient pieces
of poetry, which were then chiefly preserved in memory; the use of writing
being rare among them, in their time of ignorance. Though the Arabs were so
early acquainted with poetry, they did not at first use to write poems of a just
length, but only expressed themselves in verse occasionally; nor was their
prosody digested into rules, till some time after Mohammed; for this was done,
as it is said, by al Khalil Ahmed al Farâhidi, who lived in the reign of the Khalif
Harun al Rashid.
The exercise of arms and horsemanship they were in a manner obliged to
practise and encourage, by reason of the independence of their tribes, whose
frequent jarrings made wars almost continual; and they chiefly ended their
disputes in field battles, it being a usual saying among them that GOD had
bestowed four peculiar things on the Arabs--that their turbans should be to
them instead of diadems, their tents instead of walls and houses, their swords
instead of entrenchments, and their poems instead of written laws.
Hospitality was so habitual to them, and so much esteemed, that the
examples of this kind among them exceed whatever can be produced from
other nations. Hatem, of the tribe of Tay, and Hasn, of that of Fezârah, were
particularly famous on this account; and the contrary vice was so much in
contempt, that a certain poet upbraids the inhabitants of Waset, as with the
greatest reproach, that none of their men ad the heart to give, nor their
women to deny.
Nor were the Arabs less propense to liberality after the coming of Mohammed
than their ancestors had been. I could produce many remarkable instances of
this commendable quality among them, but shall content myself with the
following. Three men were disputing in the court of the Caaba, which was the
most liberal person among the Arabs. One gave the preference to Abdallah, the
son of Jaafar, the uncle of Mohammed; another to Kais Ebn Saad Ebn Obâdah;
and the third gave it to Arâbah, of the tribe of Aws. After much debate, one
that was present, to end the dispute, proposed that each of them should go
to his friend and ask his assistance, that they might see what every one gave,
and form a judgment accordingly. This was agreed to; and Abdallah's friend,
going to him, found him with his foot in the stirrup, just mounting his camel for
a journey, and thus accosted him: "Son of the uncle of the apostle of GOD, I am
travelling and in necessity." Upon which Abdallah alighted, and bid him take
the camel with all that was upon her, but desired him not to part with a sword
which happened to be fixed to the saddle, because it had belonged to Ali, the
son of Abutâleb. So he took the camel, and found on her some vests of silk
and 4,000 pieces of gold; but the thing of greatest value was the sword. The
second went to Kais Ebn Saad, whose servant told him that his master was
asleep, and desired to know his business. The friend answered that he came to
ask Kais's assistance, being in want on the road. Whereupon the servant said
that he had rather supply his necessity than wake his master, and gave him a
purse of 7,000 pieces of gold, assuring him that it was all the money then in
the house. He also directed him to go to those who had the charge of the
camels, with a certain token, and take a camel and a slave, and return home
with them. When Kais awoke, and his servant informed him of what he had
done, he gave him his freedom, and asked him why he did not call him, "For,"
says he, "I would have given him more." The third man went to Arâbah, and
met him coming out of his house in order to go to prayers, and leaning on two
slaves, because his eyesight failed him. The friend no sooner made known his
case, but Arâbah let go the slaves, and clapping his hands together, loudly
lamented his misfortune in having no money, but desired him to take the two
slaves, which the man refused to do, till Arâbah protested that if he would not
accept of them he gave them their liberty, and leaving the slaves, groped his
way along by the wall. On the return of the adventurers, judgment was
unanimously, and with great justice, given by all who were present, that
Arâbah was the most generous of the three.
Nor were these the only good qualities of the Arabs; they are commended
by the ancients for being most exact to their words, and respectful to their
kindred. And they have always been celebrated for their quickness of
apprehension and penetration, and the vivacity of their wit, especially those
of the desert.
As the Arabs have their excellencies, so have they, like other nations,
their defects and vices. Their own writers acknowledge that they have
a natural disposition to war, bloodshed, cruelty, and rapine, being so much
addicted to bear malice that they scarce ever forget an old grudge; which
vindictive temper some physicians say is occasioned by their frequent feeding
on camel's flesh (the ordinary diet of the Arabs of the desert, who are
therefore observed to be most inclined to these vices), that creature being
most malicious and tenacious of anger, which account suggests a good reason
for a distinction of meats.
The frequent robberies committed by these people on merchants and
travellers have rendered the name of an Arab almost infamous in Europe; this
they are sensible of, and endeavour to excuse themselves by alleging the hard
usage of their father Ismael, who, being turned out of doors by Abraham, had
the open plains and deserts given him by GOD for his patrimony, with
permission to take whatever he could find there; and on this account they
think they may, with a safe conscience, indemnify themselves as well as they
can, not only on the posterity of Isaac, but also on everybody else, always
supposing a sort of kindred between themselves and those they plunder. And
in relating their adventures of this kind, they think it sufficient to change the
expression, and instead of "I robbed a man of such or such a thing," to say,
"I gained it." We must not, however, imagine that they are the less honest
for this among themselves, or towards those whom they receive as friends;
on the contrary, the strictest probity is observed in their camp, where
everything is open and nothing ever known to be stolen.
The sciences the Arabians chiefly cultivated before Mohammedism, were
three; that of their genealogies and history, such a knowledge of the stars
as to foretell the changes of weather, and the interpretation of dreams.
They used to value themselves excessively on account of the nobility of their
families, and so many disputes happened on that occasion, that it is no wonder
if they took great pains in settling their descents. What knowledge they had
of the stars was gathered from long experience, and not from any regular
study, or astronomical rules. The Arabians, as the Indians also did, chiefly
applied themselves to observe the fixed stars, contrary to other nations,
whose observations were almost confined to the planets, and they foretold
their effects from their influences, not their nature; and hence, as has been
said, arose the difference of the idolatry of the Greeks and Chaldeans, who
chiefly worshipped the planets, and that of the Indians, who worshipped the
fixed star. The stars or asterisms they most usually foretold the weather
by, were those they called Anwâ, or the houses of the moon. These are 28 in
number, and divide the zodiac into as many parts, through one of which the
moon passes every night; as some of them set in the morning, others rise
opposite to them, which happens every thirteenth night; and from their rising
and setting, the Arabs, by long experience, observed what changes happened
in the air, and at length, as has been said, came to ascribe divine power to
them; saying, that their rain was from such or such a star: which expression
Mohammed condemned, and absolutely forbade them to use it in the old sense;
unless they meant no more by it, than that GOD had so ordered the seasons,
that when the moon was in such or such a mansion or house, or at the rising
or setting of such and such a star, it should rain or be windy, hot or cold.
The old Arabians therefore seem to have made no further progress in
astronomy, which science they afterwards cultivated with so much success
and applause, than to observe the influence of the stars on the weather, and
to give them names; and this it was obvious for them to do, by reason of their
pastoral way of life, lying night and day in the open plains. The names they
imposed on the stars generally alluded to cattle and flocks, and they were
so nice in distinguishing them, that no language has so many names of stars
and asterisms as the Arabic; for though they have since borrowed the names
of several constellations from the Greeks, yet the far greater part are of
their own growth, and much more ancient, particularly those of the more
conspicuous stars, dispersed in several constellations, and those of the lesser
constellations which are contained within the greater, and were not observed
or named by the Greeks.
Thus have I given the most succinct account I have been able, of the state
of the ancient Arabians before Mohammed, or, to use their expression, in the
time of ignorance. I shall now proceed briefly to consider the state of religion
in the east, and of the two great empires which divided that part of the world
between them, at the time of Mohammed's setting up for a prophet, and what
were the conducive circumstances and accidents that favoured his success.

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