Under the absolute Amir

by Frank A. Martin

From the indications given, it seems probable that good coal lies under the valley of Kabul; but the late Amir pronounced the coal-boring work I commenced as mad-headed, and wanted to know what was the advantage of making known the existence of coal many hundred feet below the surface, for who could get coal from the bowels of the earth, which were full of water, as the wells about proved. This he said in durbar, and not to me, so I had no chance of vindicating my action in the matter. To me he simply wrote that he wished the men who were employed on that work to be sent about the country to see if coal could not be found on the hillside, as it was in Turkestan; and it was not my duty to dispute a definite order, nor was the Amir the kind of man to listen had I done so, for he would never acknowledge himself in the wrong after forming an opinion.

CHAPTER XVI
RELIGION

Suni and Shiah—Moullahs and their influence on the people—Jihads or holy wars—The Koran—Late Amir’s distrust of Moullahs—Holy men, fakirs, and holy graves—Madmen and reverence paid them as God-stricken—Sayid and Hafiz—Beggars and alms—Stoning to death for religious offences—Prayers—Punishments for not knowing prayers—Musjids—Ramazan and fastings—Haj—Afghan colony in Australia—Lawful and unlawful food—Plurality of wives.

The religion of the Afghans is the Mussulman, or Mahomedan religion, as it is more generally called in Christian countries, and if the people were to act up to the tenets of their religion, as taught by the Koran, then a good Mussulman would be a good man, for it is as a rule the people who practice a religion who bring credit or discredit on it. There are two sects of this religion in the country, the Shiah and the Suni. The latter sect includes the royal family and the bulk of the people, while the Shiah sect is chiefly composed of the Kuzilbash people, who are the descendants of Persians. These Kuzilbash live in the south-west portion of Kabul, called Chindawal, and form a small colony of their own; but a great number of them live in Kandahar and Herat, and near the Persian frontier. The difference between these two sects appears to be more in form of ritual than in any real difference in belief; but there is, however, a great deal of ill-feeling between them, and this leads at times to much bloodshed, much as it used to in days gone by between those of the Roman Church and Protestants.

The moullahs, or priests, are those who are brought up in the musjids, and who understand the Koran, or at least can read it in the old Arabic, in which language only is it allowed to be written. They live a holy life of constant prayer combined with a good deal of fasting, and their beads, similar to the rosary beads, are always in their hands. While walking or sitting, or even carrying on a conversation, these beads are rapidly slipped between the finger and thumb as they repeat the name of God for each bead so handled. The sight of a kafar, and all who are not Mussulman are infidels, is so obnoxious that they spit on the ground when passing him in the street, and to kill one of them is quite a meritorious action in their eyes. The majority of the people are equally fanatical, and they also consider it no sin to lie to or swindle a kafar.

The influence the moullahs exert over the people is very great, and they have little trouble in getting them to join in the Jihad or holy war against the enemies of their religion. They argue that the enemy of their religion is the enemy of God and therefore a loathsome thing, and that the Koran commands them to kill all such, and promises that if they are themselves killed in doing so, they shall go straight to Paradise, and that the man who fails to kill a kafar, but suffers death himself in the attempt, has only a little less rank in heaven than the one who succeeds.

The moullahs also teach that in Paradise good Mussulmans shall lie in the shade of gold and silver-leafed trees, whose fruits are precious stones, with beautiful houri around attending to all their desires, and with rivers of milk and honey flowing past them; and in this Paradise, if they desire one of the many beautiful birds which sit singing in the trees about, it is instantly placed ready cooked before them, and when they have eaten, the bird will assume its former shape and fly back to the branches above, for there is no taking of life in Paradise. There is enough in this picture of future happiness to fire the desire of the average Afghan, for his life is generally one long struggle for existence.

The Koran is always kept and handled very reverently, and when not in use it is wrapped in several cloths, and the person who intends reading it washes his hands before taking it out of its wrappings. The Koran is written in Arabic only, and when I wondered why it was not translated by competent moullahs into Persian, so that all who could read might understand, I was told that the language of the Koran was such that no one could copy or imitate it, and therefore any translation must necessarily be full of errors, and the word of God violated. For this reason also, those who read it are taught to pronounce each word exactly, for the short vowels are not written in Arabic, and it would be easy for a beginner to wrongly pronounce a word, because there are many words which are similarly written and differ only in the pronunciation of the unwritten short vowels, and therefore the meaning would become confused, and they say that there is no greater sin than misconstruing the words inspired by God. Very few, with the exception of the moullahs, can read the Koran, and the latter apparently give very free translations when it suits their purpose; such, for instance, as that of killing unbelievers, on which is built up the principles of Jihad, holy war, and the Amir has had printed in pamphlet form and distributed throughout the country of late. I have been assured by Mussulmans of other countries that the meaning of the Koran has been twisted in this, for true Mussulmans are exhorted in the Koran to live with unbelievers for neighbours in such manner that all may know them for good and upright men, and when the time comes to fight against them, then to fight to the utmost of their power.

The late Amir, who distrusted the moullahs, as he had reason to do, for on more than one occasion they caused the people to rise against him by proclaiming that he did not act up to his religion and was therefore a kafar, always treated them in such manner as to lower them in the eyes of the people rather than give them honour and uphold their influence; and he did not fail to punish them as he did the rest of the people when they deserved it. One such case was when the moullahs of a holy shrine wrote him a petition praying for money to repair the walls and rooms of the tomb, which were in a dilapidated condition. A holy grave is usually surrounded by a building, in the rooms of which the priests who guard the tomb live. The Amir knew that this place, in common with others, was much visited by women ostensibly for prayer, but in reality to keep assignations made with lovers, and that many had lovers among the moullahs themselves. A woman’s prayers usually have her own fruitfulness for objective, and they are supposed to have greater virtue at a holy shrine, and, under the circumstances, it is possible that results in some cases were such as to encourage this supposition. The Amir accordingly sent for the moullahs, who were sleek and well-fed men, and told them that he knew of their iniquities, and, cursing them, ordered the place to be closed and the moullahs dispersed.