The Mongols

by Jeremiah Curtin

Hassan ascended the pulpit and made known to his hearers the maxims of a renewed and strengthened religion. He announced to them that they were freed from all obligations of the law, for they had come to an era in which they were to know God by intuition; they were released from the burden of every command and brought to the day of Resurrection, that is to the manifestation of the Imam before whom they were now standing. They were no longer to pray five times each day, or observe other rites of religion. Then, after he had explained that an allegorical sense should be given to the dogmas of Resurrection, Hell, and Paradise, he descended from the pulpit and the people held a great banquet, yielding themselves to pleasures of all kinds, to dancing, to music, to wine and to sport in celebration of the day of Resurrection, the day when the Imam was made manifest.

From that hour when all things were lawful according to Hassan the name Molahids, or the Lost Ones, which previously had been given to the Karmathites and other great criminal disturbers, was given not only to the disciples of Hassan but to all the Ismailians. Through their Grand Prior the Order after concealing its true doctrine from mankind for years had revealed it on a sudden and exposed to the world a society founded on atheism, assassination and immorality. Thenceforth the Order was doomed to rapid internal destruction.

The Ismailians had adopted the view that the universe had never begun and would never end. The end in their eyes meant merely a phase, the close of an epoch in existence which would be followed by another whose length would depend upon the movements and position of the heavenly bodies. By Resurrection was meant the presence of men before God at the close of an epoch, and when that term came every practice of religion was included, since man’s one concern is the estimate of his actions.

The 17th Ramadan was celebrated with banquets and games, not only as the feast of the manifestation, but as the true date of publishing their doctrine. As the followers of Islam reckon their [[233]]time from the flight of the Prophet, so did the Molahids from the manifestation of the Imam, the 17th of Ramadan in the 559th year of Hegira. As Mohammed’s name was never mentioned without adding “The Blessed,” so after that day the words “Blessed be his memory” were added to Hassan’s name. The Grand Priors had called themselves simply missionaries or precursors of the Imam, but Hassan insisted that he was the Imam; in him lay all power to remove the restrictions of the law. By this claim he appeared before the people as a lawgiver. In this spirit he wrote to the different princes. His letter concerning Reis Mossafer, the Grand Prior of Kuhistan, a namesake of whom had been Grand Prior in Irak under Hassan Ben Sabah, was as follows:

“I, Hassan, declare to you that on earth I am God’s vice-gerent. Reis Mossafer is my vice-gerent in Kuhistan. The men of that province will obey him; they must listen to his words as to mine.”

Reis had a pulpit erected in the Mumin Abad castle, his residence. From the pulpit he read this epistle to the people, most of whom listened to it with pleasure. There was a great festival with music and sports; they fell to dancing, they drank wine at the foot of the pulpit, and in every way possible made known their joy at liberation from the bonds of the law. A few who remained faithful to Islam withdrew from the Order; others who did not believe but could not decide to take this step remained and shared the reputation of the “Lost Ones.”

Profligacy, atheism, infidelity and freedom from all restraint now ruled supreme, and Hassan’s name was heard from every pulpit of the Order as that of the real successor of the Prophet, the long waited for Imam.

But it was much easier for Hassan to make himself a teacher of atheism and immorality than to assume the character of Imam.

To convince the people that he was the Imam Hassan was driven to prove himself descended from the Fatimid Kalifs. He was declared to be a son of Nesar and a grandson of the Kalif Mostansir during whose reign Hassan Ben Sabah had been in Cairo, and in the political disputes of the day had taken the side of Mostansir’s elder son Nesar. For this he had been ordered by Bedr Jimali, the commander-in-chief, to leave Egypt. A certain Abul Hassan Seid, a favorite of the Kalif, had come to Alamut a year [[234]]after the death of Mostansir, and had brought with him a son of Nesar whom he confided to Hassan Ben Sabah. Hassan treated the envoy with great respect and gave the young man, also called Nesar, a village near the castle as a residence. Nesar married and had a son to whom the name “Blessed be his Memory” was given. When Nesar’s wife was delivered of her child the wife of Mohammed, the Grand Prior of Alamut, also had a child. A nurse carried “Blessed be his Memory” into the castle and substituted him for the son of Mohammed.

This tale instead of satisfying the people was received with ridicule and declared to be untrue. Then as, according to new Ismailite teaching, all was indifferent and nothing forbidden, the builders of Hassan’s genealogy found it best to maintain that Nesar had met Mohammed’s wife in secret, the result being Hassan, the Grand Prior, Imam, and Kalif, “Blessed be his Memory.”