Clemency, he claimed, had been the instrument of Moses; wisdom, that of Solomon; righteousness, that of Christ; and now the sword was to be the instrument of Mohammed.
"The sword," he exclaimed, with flashing eye, "is the key of heaven and hell. All who draw it in the cause of the faith will be rewarded with temporal advantages; every drop shed of their blood, every peril endured by them, will be registered on high as more meritorious than fasting or prayer. If they fall in battle, their sins will at once be blotted out, and they will be transported to paradise!"
This fierce, intolerant spirit took possession of Mohammed almost from his entrance into Medina. Chapter after chapter of the Koran was produced, breathing the same blood-thirsty, implacable hatred of opposition. Mohammed, in fact, seemed like one possessed in his enthusiasm, but his doctrines caught the fancy of the wild, impressionable Arabs, who flocked to him in crowds as his fame spread throughout the length and breadth of El Hejaz, throughout the Nejd, and even to the extremities of Arabia-Felix.
And now the bloody cloud of war hovered over the peninsula, and the people trembled.
The following letter from Amzi will describe the outbreak.
From Amzi the Meccan, at Medina,
To Yusuf the priest, Mecca.
My Dear Yusuf:—
I can scarcely describe the emotions with which I write you again after a six months' interval. Affairs here in Medina have taken such an unlooked-for turn that I scarcely know what to think or what to do.