From Berlin to Bagdad and Babylon

by J. A. Zahm

Many there are who account for the wide spread of Islam, which now numbers two hundred and fifty million adherents, by declaring that it is an easy and sensual religion. But even good Padre Marracci, who was one of the first to make an exhaustive study of the religion of Mohammed, saw that this explanation was not satisfactory.[275] The obligation incumbent on every Mussulman to give liberal alms—which is imposed both by the Koran and by tradition; to observe the strict and very trying fast of Ramadan,—abstaining during the day from water and tobacco even though engaged in the severest kinds of manual labor, and to make at least once during his lifetime the arduous and perilous pilgrimage to Medina and Mecca, would seem rather to act as an effective deterrent to the acceptance of the religion of the Prophet.

To those who account for the success of Islam on the theory that “it attracts by pandering to the self-indulgence of men,” Voltaire addresses the pertinent question:

Were there imposed upon you a law that you should neither eat nor drink from four in the morning until ten at night through the whole month of July; ... that you should abstain from wine and gaming under penalty of damnation; that you should make a pilgrimage across burning deserts; that you should bestow at least two and a half per cent of your revenue on the poor; and that having been accustomed to eighteen wives, you should suddenly be limited to four—would you call this a sensual religion?[276]

Those who lay such stress on self-indulgence as a factor in the success of Mohammedanism forget that “a motive of sensuality could never, of itself, make the fortune of a religion.” They forget what a strong appeal the very simplicity of the Moslem creed makes to a man naturally religious. For, reduced to its simplest expression, Mohammedanism embraces but two fundamental dogmas—belief in God and belief in a future life. “A creed so precise, so stripped of all theological complexities and consequently so accessible to the ordinary understanding, might be expected to possess and does indeed possess a marvelous power of winning its way into the consciences of men.” They forget that proselytism is to every Mussulman in a certain measure innate; that every follower of Mohammed is by nature a missionary; that in the pursuit of this avocation he spares neither labor nor expense; that so intense is his conviction that one is forced to “notice and admire the kind of chivalrous pride which the average Mohammedan takes in his faith.”[277]

Nor is this all that will impress the candid observer. Leaving out of consideration the lives of the more unworthy followers of Mohammed, he will find much in Islam that he is forced to respect and admire. Whatever he may think of Moslem teaching, he cannot help admire the devotion, the zeal, the earnestness, the spirit of sacrifice which characterize so large a number of Mussulmans. There are, for instance, no poorhouses among them, for the indigent are abundantly provided for otherwise.[278]

But more remarkable still is the importance which they attach to prayer and the fidelity with which they, five times a day, recite the orisons prescribed by their religion. Mohammed is said to have called prayer the key to Paradise and to have declared it to be of more value in the eyes of Allah than fasting, almsgiving, or a pilgrimage to Mecca. When we see his followers regularly saying their daily prayers wherever they may be, even before satisfying their cravings for much needed food and drink, we must conclude that they take the reputed saying of their Prophet very much to heart and have no doubt of its supreme moment and efficacy.[279]

It is because of their profound religious earnestness, their abiding charity towards the poor and suffering and their many natural virtues that those who know them best have such good reports to give of the Mohammedans,[280] and would fain see them better known among our western people, and will welcome the day when the prejudices and animosities of ages shall disappear and when every soul-loving Christian shall constitute himself a missionary to assist the followers of Islam towards becoming members of the One Fold and finding peace and happiness under the One Shepherd.

Outside of her people, I can truthfully say with Della Valle that I found very little in Aleppo that was specially riguardevole—noteworthy. But the people, especially those I was able to visit in their homes, were most charming. And of never-failing interest were the representatives of many lands whom I met in the streets and mosques and bazaars. In the last named places were Asiatics and Africans of every race and sect and costume, “with their expressive hands, with henna-tinted nails, with narrow cunning wrists”—wild Bedouins, lordly Turks, grim-visaged Kurds and Turkomans, handsome and athletic Persians and Circassians, artful Greeks, astute Armenians,[281] crafty Jews—“all with eyes glittering with the yellow fires of greed” and all, as in the days of the city’s former commercial prosperity, bent on trade but in transactions far more limited.

I found an additional interest here in the reflection that Aleppo is on the linguistic frontier—extending from Alexandretta to Biredjik on the Euphrates—which separate the peoples of the flowery Arabic speech from those of the more laconic but no less vigorous Turkish. South of this line Turkish ceases to be heard except in the offices of the civil and military administrations of the Ottoman government.

The Syrians, like the Arabs, are Semites, but of their ancient tongue, the Aramaic, little now remains except a sort of dialect which is now confined to only a few villages on the eastern declivities of the Anti-Libanus.[282] Syriac, it is true, is still the liturgical tongue of the Maronites and Jacobites as it was for centuries that of other oriental Christians of Semitic origin. But, if a small number of priests still understand Syriac, no one any longer speaks it. For Syrians as well as for Arabs the language of conversation has for a long time been the vulgar Arabic. The Christians, however, speak a less pure form than the Moslems, for the adherents of Mohammed, by their constant reading of the Koran, become familiar with the more literary forms of classical Arabic.