Saying, ‘Oh, heart I made, a heart beats here!
Face, my hands fashioned, see it in myself!
Thou hast no power nor mayst conceive of mine,
But love I gave Thee, with Myself to love,
And Thou must love me, who have died for thee.’”
R. Browning.
There is no “home life,” such as we understand the term, in Mosul. The word “beit” (house) is the only one in the Arabic language used for describing a home. It would indeed be mockery to call such by the sacred name so dear to the hearts of English people.
In a book lately published in Cairo the author, a well-known and clever Moslem writer, says: “Man is the absolute master and woman the slave. She is the object of his sensual pleasures, a toy as it were with which he plays whenever and however he pleases. Knowledge is his, ignorance is hers. The firmament and the light are his, darkness and the dungeon are hers. His is to command, hers is blindly to obey. His is everything that is, and she is an insignificant part of that everything.” This being the sentiment of every Moslem man, is it any wonder that there is no happiness or mutual regard in the family life? The men look upon the women, and treat them, as little better than brutes; then when they become so, turn and revile them. They keep their heels firmly planted on women’s necks and then dare them to rise. A man may be as vile as he likes himself, but the moment he suspects one of his hareem of misconduct there is nothing but death, or mutilation which is worse than death, for the offender.
A woman once came to the hospital who always insisted on keeping her face entirely covered with the exception of the eyes; I soon found that the reason of this was because her nose and lips were missing. These members had been cut off in a rage by an infuriated son-in-law, who declared that this woman had intrigued with his wife in allowing another man to enter the hareem in his absence. This is a husband’s ordinary method of wreaking revenge on any of his women folk whom he suspects of being false to him. This, or death.
The facility with which a man is able to divorce his wife is a great source of trouble to the women. They never feel secure in the hearts of their husbands, knowing that at any moment he may tire of them and send them adrift.