Ten Great Religions by James Freeman Clarke

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Thus the Prophets developed the Jewish religion to its highest point. The
simple, childlike faith of Abraham became, in their higher vision, the
sight of a universal Father, and of an age in which all men and nations
should be united into one great moral kingdom. Further than this, it was
not possible to go in vision. The difference between the Prophets and
Jesus was, that he accomplished what they foresaw. His life, full of faith
in God and man, became the new seed of a higher kingdom than that of
David. He was the son of David, as inheriting the loving trust of David in
a heavenly Father; he was also the Lord of David, by fulfilling David's
love to God with his own love to man; making piety and charity one, faith
and freedom one, reason and religion one, this life and the life to come
one. He died to accomplish this union and to make this atoning sacrifice.

Sec. 7. Judaism as a Preparation for Christianity.

After the return from the captivity the Jewish nation remained loyal to
Jehovah. The dangers of polytheism and idolatry had passed. We no more
hear of either of these tendencies, but, on the contrary, a rigid and
almost bigoted monotheism was firmly established. Their sufferings, the
teaching of their Prophets, perhaps the influence of the Persian worship,
had confirmed them in the belief that Jehovah was one and alone, and that
the gods of the nations were idols. They had lost forever the sacred ark
of the covenant and the mysterious ornaments of the high-priest. Their
kings had disappeared, and a new form of theocracy took the place of a
royal government. The high-priest, with the great council, became the
supreme authority. The government was hierarchal.

Hellenic influences began to act on the Jewish mind, and a peculiar
dialect of Hebrew-Greek, called the Hellenistic, was formed. The
Septuagint, or Greek version of the Old Testament, was made in Alexandria
about B.C. 260. In Egypt, Greek philosophy began to affect the Jewish
mind, the final result of which was the system of Philo. Greek influences
spread to such an extent that a great religious revolution took place in
Palestine (B.C. 170), and the Temple at Jerusalem was turned into a temple
of Olympic Jupiter. Many of the priests and leading citizens accepted this
change, though the heart of the people rejected it with horror. Under
Antiochus the Temple was profaned, the sacrifices ceased, the keeping of
the Sabbath and use of the Scriptures were forbidden by a royal edict.
Then arose the Maccabees, and after a long and bitter struggle
re-established the worship of Jehovah, B.C. 141.

After this the mass of the people, in their zeal for the law and their old
institutions, fell in to the narrow bigotry of the Pharisees. The
Sadducees were Jewish Epicureans, but though wealthy were few, and had
little influence. The Essenes were Jewish monks, living in communities,
and as little influential as are the Shakers in Massachusetts to-day. They
were not only few, but their whole system was contrary to the tone of
Jewish thought, and was probably derived from Orphic Pythagoreanism.[378]

The Talmud, that mighty maze of Jewish thought, commencing after the
return from the captivity, contains the history of the gradual progress
and development of the national mind. The study of the Talmud is necessary
to the full understanding of the rise of Christianity. Many of the
parables and precepts of Jesus may have had their origin in these
traditions and teachings. For the Talmud contains much that is excellent,
and the originality of Jesus was not in saying what never had been thought
before, but in vitalizing all old truth out of a central spiritual life.
His originality was not novelty, but vitality. We have room here but for a
single extract.[379]

"'Six hundred and thirteen injunctions,' says the Talmud, 'was Moses
instructed to give to the people. David reduced them all to eleven, in the
fifteenth Psalm: Lord, who shall abide in thy tabernacle who shall dwell
on thy holy hill? He that walketh uprightly,' &c.

"'The Prophet Isaiah reduced them to six (xxxiii. 15): He that walketh
righteously,' &c.

"'The Prophet Micah reduced them to three (vi. 8): What doth the Lord
require of thee but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly
with thy God?

"'Isaiah once more reduced them to two (lvi. 1): Keep ye judgment and do
justice.

"'Amos (v. 4) reduced them all to one: Seek ye me and ye shall live.

"'But lest it might be supposed from this that God could be found in the
fulfilment of his whole law only, Habakkuk said (ii. 4): The just shall
live by his faith.'"

Thus we have seen the Jewish religion gradually developed out of the
family worship of Abraham, through the national worship of the law to the
personal and filial trust of David, and the spiritual monotheism of Job
and the Prophets. Through all these changes there ran the one golden
thread of faith in a Supreme Being who was not hidden and apart from the
world, but who came to man as to his child.

At first this belief was narrow and like that of a child[380] We read
that when Noah went into the ark, "the Lord shut him in"; that when Babel
was built, "the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the
children of men had built"; that when Noah offered burnt-sacrifices, "the
Lord smelled a sweet savor"; that he told Moses to make him a sanctuary,
that he might dwell among the Israelites. We have seen, in our chapter on
Greece, that Homer makes Jupiter send a pernicious dream to Agamemnon, to
deceive him; in other words, makes Jupiter tell a lie to Agamemnon. But
how is the account in I Kings xxii. 20-23, any better?[381]

But how all this ignorance was enlightened, and this narrowness enlarged,
let the magnificent theism of the Psalms, of Job, and of Isaiah testify.
Solomon declares "The heaven of heavens cannot contain him, how much less
this house that I have builded." Job and the Psalms and Isaiah describe
the omniscience, omnipresence, and inscrutable perfections of the Deity in
language to which twenty centuries have been able to add nothing.[382]

Thus Judaism was monotheism, first as a seed, then as a blade, and then as
the ear which the sun of Christianity was to ripen into the full corn. The
highest truth was present, implicitly, in Judaism, and became explicit in
Christianity. The law was the schoolmaster to bring men to Christ. It
taught, however imperfectly, a supreme and living God; a Providence ruling
all things; a Judge rewarding good and punishing evil; a holy Being, of
purer eyes than to behold iniquity. It announced a moral law to be
obeyed, the substance of which was to love God with all the heart, and
one's neighbor as one's self.

Wherever the Apostles of Christ went they found that Judaism had prepared
the way. Usually, in every place, they first preached to the Jews, and
made converts of them. For Judaism, though so narrow and so alien to the
Greek and Latin thought, had nevertheless pervaded all parts of the Roman
Empire. Despised and satirized by philosophers and poets, it had yet won
its way by its strength of conviction. It offered to men, not a
philosophy, but a religion; not thought, but life. Too intolerant of
differences to convert the world to monotheism, it yet made a preparation
for its conversion. This was its power, and thus it went before the face
of the Master, to prepare his way.

Chapter XI.

Mohammed and Islam.

Sec. 1. Recent Works on the Life of Mohammed.
Sec. 2. The Arabs and Arabia.
Sec. 3. Early Life of Mohammed, to the Hegira.
Sec. 4. Change in the Character of Mohammed after the Hegira.
Sec. 5. Religious Doctrines and Practices among the Mohammedans.
Sec. 6. The Criticism of Mr. Palgrave on Mohammedan Theology.
Sec. 7. Mohammedanism a Relapse; the worst Form of Monotheism, and a
retarding Element in Civilization.

Note.

Sec. 1. Recent Works on the Life of Mohammed.

Dr. Samuel Johnson once declared, "There are two objects of curiosity, the
Christian world and the Mohammedan world; all the rest may be considered
as barbarous." Since Dr. Johnson's time we have learned to be curious
about other forms of human thought, and regard the famous line of Terence
as expressing more accurately the proper frame of mind for a Christian
philosopher. Nevertheless, Mohammedanism still claims a special interest
and excites a peculiar curiosity. It is the only religion which has
threatened Christianity with a dangerous rivalry. It is the only other
religion, whose origin is in the broad daylight of history. Its author is
the only one among the great men of the world who has at the same time
founded a religion, formed a people, and established an empire. The
marvellous spread of this religion is a mystery which never ceases to
stimulate the mind to new inquiry. How was it that in the short space of a
century the Arab tribes, before always at war among themselves, should
have been united into an irresistible power, and have conquered Syria,
Persia, the whole of Northern Africa and Spain? And with this religious
outbreak, this great revival of monotheism in Asia, there came also as
remarkable a renaissance of learning, which made the Arabs the teachers of
philosophy and art to Europe during a long period. Arab Spain was a focus
of light while Christian Europe lay in mediaeval darkness. And still more
interesting and perplexing is the character of Mohammed himself. What was
he,--an impostor or a prophet? Did his work advance or retard human
progress? What is his position in history? Such are some of the questions
on which we shall endeavor to throw light in the present chapter.

Within a few years new materials for this study have been made accessible
by the labors of Weil, Caussin de Perceval, Muir, Sprenger, Doellinger, and
Arnold. Dr. Gustav Weil published his work[383] in 1843. It was drawn from
Arabic manuscripts and the Koran. When Weil began his studies on Mohammed
in 1837, he found no book except that of Gagnier, published in 1732, from
which he could derive substantial aid. But Gagnier had only collected,
without any attempt at criticism, the traditions and statements concerning
Mohammed believed by orthodox Moslems. Satisfied that a literary want
existed at this point, Dr. Weil devoted himself to such studies as should
enable him to supply it; and the result was a work concerning which Milman
says that "nothing has escaped" the diligence of its author. But four
years after appeared the book of M. Caussin de Perceval,[384] a work of
which M. Saint-Hilaire says that it marks a new era in these studies, on
account of the abundance and novelty of its details, and the light thrown
on the period which in Arabia preceded the coming of Mohammed. Dr. A.
Sprenger, an eminent German scholar, early determined to devote himself to
the study of Oriental literature in the East. He spent a long time in
India, and was for twelve years principal of a Mohammedan school in Delhi,
where he established, in 1845, an illustrated penny magazine in the Hindoo
language. After returning to Europe with a vast number of Oriental
manuscripts, he composed his Life of Mohammed,[385] the result of
extensive studies. Among the preparations for this work we will cite only
one. Dr. Sprenger edited in Calcutta the first volume of the Icaba, which
contains the names and biographies of _eight thousand_ persons who were
personally acquainted with Mohammed.[386] But, as if to embarrass us with
riches, comes also Mr. Muir[387] and presents us with another life of the
prophet, likewise drawn from original sources, and written with learning
and candor. This work, in four volumes, goes over the whole ground of the
history of Arabia before the coming of the prophet, and then, from Arabic
sources, narrates the life of Mohammed himself, up to the era of the
Hegira. The result of these researches is that we know accurately what Mr.
Hallam in his time despaired of knowing,--all the main points of the
history of Mohammed. There is no legend, no myth, to trouble us. M.
Saint-Hilaire says that the French are far less acquainted with
Charlemagne than the Moslems are with their prophet, who came two
centuries earlier.

A Mohammedan writer, Syed Ahmed Khan Bahador, has lately published, in
English, a series of Essays on the life of Mohammed, Arabia, the Arabs,
Mohammedan traditions, and kindred topics, written from the stand-point of
a believer in Islam.[388] He is dissatisfied with all the recent works on
Mohammed, including those of Dr. Sprenger and Mr. Muir. He believes that
the Arabic sources from which these biographies are derived are not the
most authentic. The special objections, however, which this able
Mohammedan urges against these European biographies by Sprenger and Muir
do not affect any of the important points in the history, but only details
of small moment. Notwithstanding his criticisms, therefore, we may safely
assume that we are in a condition to understand the actual life and
character of Mohammed. All that the Syed says concerning the duty of an
impartial and friendly judgment of Islam and its author is, of course,
true. We shall endeavor in our treatment of Mohammed to follow this
exhortation.

Something, however, is always gained by hearing what the believers in a
system have to say in its behalf, and these essays of the Mohammedan
scholar may help us in this way. One of the most curious parts of the
volume is that in which he treats of the prophecies concerning Mohammed in
the Old and New Testament. Most of our readers will be surprised at
learning that any such prophecies exist; and yet some of them are quite as
striking as many of those commonly adduced by writers on prophecy as
referring to Jesus Christ. For example (Deut. xviii. 15, 18), when Moses
predicts that the Lord will raise up a prophet for the Jews, _from among
their brethren_; by emphasizing this latter clause, and arguing that the
Jews had no brethren except the Ishmaelites, from whom Mohammed was born,
an argument is derived that the latter was referred to. This is
strengthened by the declaration of Moses, that this prophet should be
"_like unto me_," since Deuteronomy xxxiv. 10 declares that "there arose
no prophet _in Israel_ like unto Moses."

Habakkuk iii. 3 says: "The Holy One came from Mount Paran." But Mount
Paran, argues our friend, is the mountain of Mecca.

The Hebrew word translated "desire" in Haggai ii. 7, "The desire of all
nations shall come," is said by Bahador to be the same word as the name
Mohammed. He is therefore predicted by his name in this passage.

When Isaiah says (xxi. 7), according to the Septuagint translation, that
he "saw two riders, one on an ass and one on a camel," Bahador argues that
the rider on the ass is Jesus, who so entered Jerusalem, and that the
rider on the camel is Mohammed.

When John the Baptist was asked if he were the Christ, or Elijah, or "that
prophet," Mohammedans say that "that prophet," so anticipated, was their
own.

Sec. 2. The Arabs and Arabia.

The Arabs are a Semitic people, belonging to the same great ethnologic
family with the Babylonians, Assyrians, Phoenicians, Hebrews, Ethiopians,
and Carthaginians. It is a race which has given to civilized man his
literature and his religion; for the alphabet came from the Phoenicians,
and the Bible from the Jews. In Hannibal, it produced perhaps the greatest
military genius the world has seen; and the Tyrian merchants,
circumnavigating Africa, discovering Great Britain, and trading with
India, ten centuries before Christ, had no equals on the ocean until the
time of the Portuguese discoveries, twenty-five centuries after. The Arabs
alone, of the seven Semitic families, remained undistinguished and unknown
till the days of Mohammed. Their claim of being descended from Abraham is
confirmed by the unerring evidence of language. The Arabic roots are, nine
tenths of them, identical with the Hebrew; and a similarity of grammatical
forms shows a plain glossological relation. But while the Jews have a
history from the days of Abraham, the Arabs had none till Mohammed. During
twenty centuries these nomads wandered to and fro, engaged in mutual wars,
verifying the prediction (Gen. xvi. 12) concerning Ishmael: "He will be a
wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man's hand against
him." Wherever such wandering races exist, whether in Arabia, Turkistan,
or Equatorial Africa, "darkness covers the earth, and gross darkness the
people." The earth has no geography, and the people no history. During all
this long period, from the time of Abraham to that of Mohammed, the Arabs
were not a nation, but only a multitude of tribes, either stationary or
wandering. But of these two the nomad or Bedouin is the true type of the
race as it exists in Northern Arabia. The Arab of the South is
in many respects different,--in language, in manners, and in
character,--confirming the old opinion of a double origin. But the
Northern Arab in his tent has remained unchanged since the days of the
Bible. Proud of his pure blood, of his freedom, of his tribe, and of his
ancient customs, he desires no change. He is, in Asia, what the North
American Indian is upon the western continent. As the Indian's, his chief
virtues are courage in war, cunning, wild justice, hospitality, and
fortitude. He is, however, of a better race,--more reflective, more
religious, and with a thirst for knowledge. The pure air and the simple
food of the Arabian plains keep him in perfect health; and the necessity
of constant watchfulness against his foes, from whom he has no defence of
rock, forest, or fortification, quickens his perceptive faculties. But the
Arab has also a sense of spiritual things, which appears to have a root in
his organization. The Arabs say: "The children of Shem are prophets, the
children of Japhet are kings, and the children of Ham are slaves." Having
no temples, no priesthood, no religious forms, their religion is less
formal and more instinctive, like that of children. The Koran says: "Every
child is born into the religion of nature; its parents make it a Jew, a
Christian, or a Magian." But when Mohammed came, the religion of the Arabs
was a jumble of monotheism and polytheism,--Judaism, Christianity,
idolatry, and fetichism. At one time there had been a powerful and
intolerant Jewish kingdom in one region. In Yemen, at another period, the
king of Abyssinia had established Christianity. But neither Judaism nor
Christianity had ever been able to conquer the peninsula; and at the end
of the sixth century idolatry was the most prevailing form of worship.

At this time Mohammed appeared, and in a few years united in one faith all
the warring tribes of Arabia; consolidated them into a single nation, and
then wielded their mighty and enthusiastic forces against Syria, Persia,
and North Africa, triumphant wherever they moved. He, certainly, if ever
man possessed it, had the rare gift of natural empire. To him, more than
to any other of whom history makes mention, was given

"The monarch mind, the mystery of commanding,
The birth-hour gift, the art Napoleon,
Of wielding, moulding, gathering, welding, banding,
The hearts of thousands till they moved as one."

Sec. 3. Early Life of Mohammed, to the Hegira.

But it was not as a soldier or ambitious conqueror that Mohammed began his
career. The first forty years of his life were passed in the quiet
pursuits of trade, or taking care of the property of Khadijah. Serious,
thoughtful, devout, he made friends of all about him. His youth was
unstained by vice, and his honorable character early obtained for him the
title, given him by common consent, of Al Amin, "the faithful." At one
time he tended sheep and goats on the hills near Mecca. At Medina, after
he became distinguished he referred to this, saying, "Pick me the blackest
of those berries; they are such as I used to gather when I fed the flocks
at Mecca. Verily, no prophet has been raised up who has not performed the
work of a shepherd." When twenty-five years of age, he entered into the
service of Khadijah, a rich widow, as her agent, to take charge of her
merchandise and to sell it at Damascus. When the caravan returned, and his
adventure had proved successful, Khadijah, then forty years old, became
interested in the young man; she was wise, virtuous, and attractive; they
were married, and, till her death, Mohammed was a kind and loving husband.
Khadijah sympathized with her husband in his religious tendencies, and was
his first convert. His habit was to retire to a cave on Mount Hira to pray
and to meditate. Sadness came over him in view of the evils in the world.
One of the Suras of the Koran, supposed to belong to this period, is as
follows:--

_Sura 103._

"By the declining day I swear!
Verily, man is in the way of ruin;
Excepting such as possess faith,
And do the things which be right,
And stir up one another to truth and steadfastness."

About this time he began to have his visions of angels, especially of
Gabriel. He saw a light, and heard a voice, and had sentences like the
above put into his mind. These communications were accompanied by strong
convulsions (epilepsy, says Weil), in which he would fall to the ground
and foam at the mouth. Sprenger considers it to have been a form of
hysteria, with a mental origin, perhaps accompanied with catalepsy. The
prophet himself said: "Inspiration descends on me in two ways. Sometimes
Gabriel cometh and communicateth the revelation, as one man to another.
This is easy. But sometimes it is as the ringing of a bell, which rends me
in pieces, and grievously afflicts me." One day, when Abu Bakr and Omar
sat in the Mosque at Medina, Mohammed came suddenly upon them, lifting up
his beard and looking at it; and Abu Bakr said, "Ah thou, for whom I would
sacrifice father and mother; white hairs are hastening upon thee!" "Yes,"
said the prophet, "Hud" (Sura 11) "and its sisters have hastened my white
hairs." "And who," asked Abu Bakr, "are its sisters?" "The _Inevitable_"
(Sura 56) "and the _Striking_" (Sura 101), replied Mohammed. These three
are called the "terrific Suras."

But these last Suras came later than the period now referred to. At this
time his visions and revelations possessed _him_; he did not possess nor
control _them_. In later years the spirit of the prophet was more subject
to the prophet. But the Koran is an unintelligible book unless we can
connect it with the biography of its writer. All the incidents of his life
took shape in some revelation. A separate revelation was given to
encourage or to rebuke him; and in his later years the too subservient
inspiration came to appease the jealousy of his wives when a new one was
added to their number. But, however it may have been afterward, in the
beginning his visions were as much a surprise to him as to others. A
careful distribution of the Suras, according to the events which befell
him, would make the Koran the best biography of the prophet. As we said of
David and his Psalms, so it may be said of Mohammed, that his life hangs
suspended in these hymns, as in votive pictures, each the record of some
grave experience.[389]

Now, it is impossible to read the detailed accounts of this part of the
life of Mohammed, and have any doubt of his profound sincerity. His
earliest converts were his bosom-friends and the people of his household,
who were intimately acquainted with his private life. Nor does a man
easily begin an ambitious course of deception at the age of forty; having
lived till that time as a quiet, peaceful, and unobtrusive citizen,[390]
what was he to gain by this career? Long years passed before he could make
more than a handful of converts. During these weary years he was the
object of contumely and hatred to the ruling tribe in Mecca. His life was
hardly safe from them. Nothing could be more hopeless than his position
during the first twelve years of his public preaching. Only a strong
conviction of the reality of his mission could have supported him through
this long period of failure, loneliness, and contempt. During all these
years the wildest imagination could not have pictured the success which
was to come. Here is a Sura in which he finds comfort in God and his
promises.--

_Sura 93._

"By the rising sunshine!
By the night when it darkeneth!
Thy Lord hath not removed from thee, neither hath he been displeased.
And verily the future shall be better than the past....
What! did he not find thee an orphan, and give thee a home?
And found thee astray, and directed thee?"

In this Sura, Mohammed refers to the fact of the death of his mother,
Amina, in his seventh year, his father having died a few months before. He
visited her tomb many years after, and lifted up his voice and wept. In
reply to the questions of his companions, he said: "This is the grave of
my mother; the Lord hath permitted me to visit it, and I asked leave to
pray for her, and it was not granted. So I called my mother to
remembrance, and the tender memory of her overcame me, and I wept." The
child had been taken by his grandfather, Abd al Mut-talib, then eighty
years old, who treated him with the greatest indulgence. At his death,
shortly after, Mohammed was adopted by his uncle, Abu Talib, the chief of
the tribe. Abu Talib brought him up like his own son, making him sleep by
his bed, eat by his side, and go with him wherever he went. And when
Mohammed, assuming his inspired position, declared himself a prophet, his
uncle, then aged and universally respected, protected him from his
enemies, though Abu himself never accepted his teaching. Mohammed
therefore had good reason to bless the Providence which had provided such
protectors for his orphaned infancy.