For instance, the Shiahs have a custom of temporary marriages, according to which it is lawful for a man, besides the four regular wives allowed by Islam, to have as many inferior wives as he likes, contracting these marriages for any length of time he pleases, from a few days upwards. There is, however, a legal fiction by which these women are supposed to be lowered to the rank of slaves, which ought to entirely remove the Sunni objection; for, unless it can be proved that the temporary ownership of a slave is impossible, it is very difficult to understand why this evasion should not be considered quite legitimate according to the undoubted principles of Mohammedanism. That there is a certain amount of latitudinarianism in Shiah Islam is indisputable, but so there is in the whole of Mohammed’s teaching and practice.
As a matter of fact his attitude towards Jews and Christians, and even towards the idolaters, was largely opportunist. At one time he made leagues with the Jews, promising that they should not be disturbed in their religion; at other times he picked quarrels with them, and put every one who would not accept Islam to the sword. This latitudinarianism has found its way into the Quran itself, where a verse is to be found telling Mohammedans that they may eat the food of “the people of the book,” that is, of the people holding religions whose origin he recognised as divine. The strict Shiahs in Yezd interpret this as meaning dry food. They make a great distinction between wet and dry; only a few years ago it was dangerous for an Armenian Christian to leave his suburb and go into the bazaars in Isfahan on a wet day. “A wet dog is worse than a dry dog.” Nevertheless, there are great differences of opinion on this point, and most non-clerical Shiahs would take tea at any European’s house. There was a Shiah woman who used to freely take tea at the house of a Christian lady, the lady herself making it and pouring it out, but she refused to use the tea-glasses used in the same house by Babi women. Another Shiah lent a donkey for a Christian lady, but told her that he could not use it again if she allowed her Parsi nurse to ride upon it. And yet it is more easy to get the Mussulmans to eat food with the Parsis than with the Jews, whose religion ranks higher than Zoroastrianism in the popular regard, though they themselves are specially despised by the Mohammedans. This curious mixture of breadth and bigotry is only explicable on the assumption that the Shiah’s main ideal is exactly that opportunist position which was taken up by Mohammed during his lifetime.
Perhaps we ought not to leave this subject without discussing rather more fully the assertion which has been made about the Persian Shiahs, that they have changed the doctrine of the unity of God for a loose pantheism, and have dethroned the Quran for the utterance of Sufi poets. That the Persians as a race have an extreme veneration for Sufi poetry, which contains expressions of questionable orthodoxy, cannot well be called in question; but before discussing the more serious part of the allegation, it is necessary to thoroughly understand about whom it is stated; for there are small Shiah sects, of whom it is quite true that they are only half Mussulman, but these are very different from the sect which is at present predominant in Persia, and which in Yezd at any rate does not appear to lack veneration for the Quran. One point, however, must be granted, and that is, that all Persian Mussulmans, orthodox or otherwise, are often led to express acquiescence in a statement which appears to be in itself correct, however opposed it may be to the general tenor of their other beliefs. The fact is that they do not easily see a contradiction, and this has made it possible for the Shiah to accept poetry which he would otherwise have absolutely rejected. I do not myself know a single Christian doctrine to which I could not get most Shiahs to agree, if I was careful to state it in language with which they were familiar, and not to dwell on its divergence from the Mussulman idea.
But doctrines so allowed to pass, whether Christian or Sufi, would have no strength against the system of Islam, which most Yezdis have grasped as an integral whole. The general plan of Mussulman doctrine, constructed as it was for inhabitants of a desert, is peculiarly comprehensible to people like the Yezdis, who are accustomed to isolated objects and ideas, and are slow at grasping a too elaborately connected argument. For the system of Islam is not elaborately connected: that there is a general consistency in it, is true, but the consistency is like that of a certain housewife’s accounts, in which a large number of items were entered under the heading of “forgets.” The accounts were true and accurate, but they were not highly instructive. Similarly in Islam a large variety of commandments have been labelled, “commandments for the age of Moses,” or “commandments for the age of Mohammed,” and the doctrine of the paighambari is so formulated as to make further systematisation unnecessary. This being a scheme of arrangement which a Persian can understand, it has laid hold of his mind to a peculiar degree. Phrases and expressions that are opposed to it, he will often accept, but their influence on his behaviour is exceedingly small. The thing which dominates him, and will, unless explicitly resisted and combated, always continue to dominate him, is Islam and Islam alone.
Before going on to discuss in another chapter some other important aspects of the Yezdi’s religion, it will be well to consider how the whole Mussulman theory has affected his character. First of all, it has made him even more disposed to unconnected and disjunctive views of life than he would otherwise have been. This becomes plain when we compare him with his fellow-townsmen who have been in touch with other religions. Secondly, we find that he possesses a very low view of the value of morality, which in Mohammedanism has no unique place, but is only one of the ways of attaining salvation. Another way is through accuracy of religious observance, and, when a Persian takes to this, he generally abandons any attempt to live straight. Residents in the country are well aware of this, and are justly inclined to distrust a man who is very particular about his prayers and ceremonial duties.
I must ask the reader to pardon me if I have said in this chapter anything which appears disrespectful to Mohammedanism. In trying to record facts and to correctly weigh impressions, one cannot avoid frankly stating what has been forcibly brought before both mind and eyes, even though the things stated may not be exactly what they are expected to be. The fact is that Islam has ruined Persia; and it is not fair to the real character of the people to underrate the effect that this religion has produced on them. As to Mohammed, I believe that I have stated nothing about him which is not a matter of common knowledge. Doubtless the author who starts with the determination to write an interesting and sympathetic book, will be able, by selecting his incidents, to convey a more favourable impression, just as a criminal lawyer may be able to find much in favour of even a guilty client; but the historical critic who starts on the examination of Mohammed’s history without any pre-judgment must necessarily find it difficult not to come to a very unfavourable conclusion. The Arabian prophet headed a monotheistic movement which had started without him, and which would have probably succeeded to a very large extent whether he had touched it or not, and to this movement he did a great deal of damage without making any serious ethical contribution. It may be readily admitted that Mohammed was an attractive person, and that he possessed other great gifts, one of which was unusual eloquence. He seems to have been an enthusiast who in his worst moments absolutely believed in himself and in his mission, and there is no doubt that he drew into his company, both by persuasion and violence, men who might have looked askance at a more spiritual leader. But those who want to know what Islam does for a people who accept it had better compare the Yezdi Mussulman with the Yezdi Parsi. The Parsis have a curious and interesting religion, the main point of which seems to be the belief that God has created all things of the four elements, and that He therefore expects from all His creatures a reverential and sympathetic treatment of one another. The religion is Gospelless, it is coated over with gross superstitions, and it has the very great defect of being so elementary in its teaching that there is a strong tendency amongst its professors to deny revelation altogether, and to become simply rationalists. For all this the Zoroastrian Parsi possesses, as a rule, a strong moral character, which, when he becomes a Mohammedan, is almost always lost in a few generations. Unfortunately, the Behāī movement is just now attracting a large number of Zoroastrians, and is becoming a serious danger; for the Behāī, whatever he may say to the contrary, is really a Mussulman, and his system, in which opportunism takes the place of the doctrine of the growth of the moral law, retains most of the more serious defects of Islam. However, as the majority of the Yezdi Parsis are not likely to become Behāīs, it is a matter for congratulation that any European power that may have to solve the problem of establishing good government in Southern Persia will find ready to hand a considerable community of this intelligent and interesting people in at least one of the Persian towns.
CHAPTER IV
Results of Islam—Untruthfulness—Superstitions—Pilgrimages—Divining—Jins and dīvs—The evil eye—Trivial commandments—Entertainments—Islam includes rather than controls the life—Two purposes better than one—Ceremonial uncleanness.