The Women of the Arabs

by Henry Harris Jessup

The people are simple and country-like in dress and manners, and the most of them have a cow-yard within the courts of their houses, thus combining the pastoral with the citizen life. The majority of the Greeks are silk-weavers and shoemakers, weaving girdles, scarfs and robes for different parts of Syria and Egypt, and supplying the Bedawin and the Nusairy villagers with coarse red-leather boots and shoes.

Hums early became the seat of a Christian Church, and in the reign of Diocletian, its bishop, Silvanus, suffered martyrdom. In 636 a. d., it was captured by the Saracens, (or "Sherakîyeen," "Easterns," as the Arab Moslems were called,) and although occupied for a time by the Crusaders, it has continued a Moslem city, under Mohammedan rule. The Greek population have been oppressed and ground to the very dust by their Moslem neighbors and rulers, and their women have been driven for protection into a seclusion and degradation similar to that of the Moslem hareems.

The Rev. D. M. Wilson, a missionary of the A. B. C. F. M., took up his residence in Hums in October 1855, and remained until obliged to leave by the civil war which raged in the country in 1860. Mr. and Mrs. Aiken went to Hums in April, 1856, but Mrs. Aiken died June 20, after having given promise of rare usefulness among the women of Syria.

After Mr. Wilson left Hums, a faithful native helper, Sulleba Jerwan, was sent to preach in Hums. His wife, Luciya Shekkoor, had been trained in the family of Rev. W. Bird in Deir el Komr, and was a devoted and excellent laborer on behalf of the women of Hums. In October, 1862, one of the more enlightened men among the Greeks was taken ill, and sent for Pastor Sulleba to come and make him a religious visit. He went, and found quite a company of relatives and friends present. The sick man asked him to read from the Word of God, and among the passages selected, was that containing the Ten Commandments. While he was reading the Second Commandment, the wife of the sick man exclaimed, "Is that the Word of God? If it is, read it again." He did so, when she arose and tore down a wooden painted picture of a saint, which had been hung at the head of the bed, declaring that henceforth there should be no idol worship in that house. Then taking a knife, she scraped the paint from the picture, and took it to the kitchen to serve as the cover to a saucepan! This was done with the approbation of all present. The case was the more remarkable, as it was one of the first cases in Syria in which a woman has taken such a decided stand against picture-worship and saint-worship, in advance of the rest of the family.

In the year 1863, before the ordination of Pastor Sulleba, there being no Protestant properly qualified to perform the marriage ceremony in Hums, I went to that city to marry two of the Protestant young men. It was the first time a Protestant marriage had ever taken place in Hums, and great interest was felt in the ceremony. It is the custom among the other sects to pronounce the bride and groom husband and wife, neither giving an opportunity to spectators to object, nor asking the girl if she is willing to marry the man. The girl is oftentimes not consulted, but simply told she is to marry such a man. If it pleases her, well and good. If not, there is no remedy. The Greek Church gives no liberty in this respect, although the priest takes it for granted that the friends have satisfied both bride and groom with regard to the desirableness of the match. If they are not satisfied, the form of the ceremony gives neither of them the right of refusal.

The two young men, Ibrahim and Yunis, called upon me soon after my arrival, to make arrangements for the marriage. I read them the form of the marriage ceremony and they expressed their approval, but said it would be necessary to give the brides very careful instructions as to how and when to answer, lest they say yes when they should say no, and no when they wished to say yes! I asked them to accompany me to the houses of the girls, that I might give them the necessary directions. They at once protested that this would not be allowed. They had never called at the brides' houses when the girls were present, and it would be a grievous breach of decorum for them to go even with me. So certain of the male relatives of the girls were sent for to accompany me, and I went to their houses. On entering the house of the first one, it was only after long and elaborate argument and diplomatic management, that we could induce the bride to come in from the other room and meet me. At length she came, with her face partially veiled, and attended by several married women, her relatives.

They soon began to ply me with questions. "Do you have the communion before the ceremony?" "No." "Do you use the "Ikleel" or crown, in the service?" "No, we sometimes use the ring." Said one, "I hear that you ask the girl if she is willing to take this man to be her husband." "Certainly we do." "Well, if that rule had been followed in my day, I know of one woman who would have said no; but they do not give us Greek women the chance."

I then explained to them that the bride must stand beside the bridegroom, and when I asked her if she knew of any lawful reason why she should not marry this man, Ibrahîm, she should say No,—and when I asked her if she took him to be her lawful and wedded husband, she must answer Yes. Some of the women were under great apprehension that she might answer No in the wrong place; so I repeated it over and over again until the girl was sure she should not make a mistake. The woman above alluded to now said, "I would have said No in the right place, if I had been allowed to do it!" I then went to the house of the other bride and gave her similar instructions. The surprise of the women who came in from the neighborhood, that the girl should have the right to say yes or no, was most amusing and suggestive. That one thing seemed to give them new ideas of the dignity and honor of woman under the Gospel. Marriage in the East is so generally a matter of bargain and sale, or of parental convenience and profit, or of absolute compulsion, that young women have little idea of exercising their own taste or judgment in the choice of a husband.

This was new doctrine for the city of Heliogabalus, and, as was to be expected, the news soon spread through the town that the next evening a marriage ceremony was to be performed by the Protestant minister, in which the bride was to have the privilege of refusing the man if she wished. And, what was even more outrageous to Hums ideas of propriety, it was rumored that the brides were to walk home from the Church in company with their husbands! This was too much, and certain of the young Humsites, who feared the effect of conferring such unheard-of rights and privileges on women, leagued together to mob the brides and grooms if such a course were attempted. We heard of the threat and made ample preparations to protect Protestant women's rights.

The evening came, and with it such a crowd of men, women and children, as had never assembled in that house before. The houses of Hums are built around a square area into which all the rooms open, and the open space or court of the mission-house was very large. Before the brides arrived, the entire court, the church and the schoolroom, were packed with a noisy and almost riotous throng. Men, women and children were laughing and talking, shouting and screaming to one another, and discussing the extraordinary innovation on Hums customs about to be enacted. Soon the brides arrived, accompanied by a veiled and sheeted crowd of women, all carrying candles and singing as they entered the house. We took them into the study of the native preacher Sulleba, and after a reasonable delay, we forced a way for them through the crowd into the large square room, then used as a church. My brother and myself finally succeeded in placing them in a proper position in front of the pulpit, and then we waited until Asaad and Michaiel and Yusef and Nasif had enforced a tolerable stillness. It should be said that silence and good order are almost unknown in the Oriental churches. Men are walking about and talking, and even laughing, while the priests are "performing" the service, and they are much impressed by the quiet and decorum of Protestant worship.