[p.306] guilty of deadly sin. On the other hand, to spit upon any part of the Mosque, or to treat it with contempt, is held to be the act of an Infidel.
Thus the learned and religious have settled, one would have thought, accurately enough the spiritual rank and dignity of the Masjid al-Nabawi. But mankind, especially in the East, must always be in extremes. The orthodox school of Al-Malik holds Al-Madinah, on account of the sanctity of, and the religious benefits to be derived from, Mohammed's tomb, more honourable than Meccah. Some declare that the Apostle preferred his place of refuge, blessing it as Abraham did Meccah. Moreover, as a tradition declares that every man's body is drawn from the ground in which he is buried, Al-Madinah evidently had the honour of supplying materials for the Apostle's person. Others, like Omar, were uncertain which to prefer. The Wahhabis, on the other hand, rejecting the Intercession of the Apostle on the Day of Judgment, considering the grave of a mere mortal unworthy of notice, and highly disgusted by the idolatrous respect paid to it by certain foolish Moslems, plundered the sacred building with sacrilegious violence, and forbade visitors from distant countries to enter Al-Madinah.[FN#4]
The general consensus of Al-Islam admits the superiority of the Bayt Allah ("House of God") at Meccah to the whole world; and declares Al-Madinah to be more venerable than every part of Meccah, and consequently all the earth, except only the Bayt Allah. This last is a juste milieu view by no means in favour with the inhabitants of either place. In the meanwhile the Meccans claim unlimited superiority over the Madani: the Madani over the Meccans.
[p.307]Passing through muddy streets,-they had been freshly watered before evening time,-I came suddenly upon the Mosque. Like that at Meccah, the approach is choked up by ignoble buildings, some actually touching the holy "enceinte," others separated by a lane compared with which the road round St. Paul's is a Vatican Square.[FN#5] There is no outer front, no general prospect of the Prophet's Mosque; consequently, as a building, it has neither beauty nor dignity.
And entering the Bab al-Rahmah[FN#6]-the Gate of Pity,-by a diminutive flight of steps, I was astonished at the mean and tawdry appearance of a place so universally venerated in the Moslem world. It is not, like the Meccan Temple, grand and simple, the expression of a single sublime idea: the longer I looked at it, the more it suggested the resemblance of a museum of second-rate art, an old Curiosity-shop, full of ornaments that are not accessories, and decorated with pauper splendour.
The Masjid al-Nabi is a parallelogram about four hundred and twenty feet in length by three hundred and forty broad, the direction of the long walls being nearly north and south. As usual in Al-Islam, it is a hypaethral building with a spacious central area, called Al-Sahn, Al-Hosh, Al-Haswah, or Al-Ramlah,[FN#7] surrounded by a peristyle with numerous rows of pillars like the colonnades of an Italian cloister. The arcades or porticoes are flat-ceilinged, domed above with the small Media
[p.308] Naranja, or half-orange cupola of Spain, and divided into four parts by narrow passages, three or four steps below the level of the pavement. Along the whole inner length of the Northern short wall runs the Majidi Riwak, so called from the then reigning Sultan.[FN#8] The Western long wall is occupied by the Riwak of the Rahmah Gate; the Eastern by that of the Bab al-Nisa, the "Women's Entrance.[FN#9]"
Embracing the inner length of the Southern short wall, and deeper by nearly treble the amount of columns than the other porticoes, is the main colonnade, called Al-Rauzah[FN#10] (the Garden), the adytum containing all that is venerable in the building. These four Riwaks, arched externally, are supported internally by pillars of different shape and material, varying from fine porphyry to dirty plaster. The Southern, where the sepulchre or cenotaph stands, is paved with handsome slabs of white marble and marquetry work, here and there covered with coarse matting, and above this by unclean carpets, well worn by faithful feet.[FN#11]
But this is not the time for Tafarruj or lionising.
[p.309] Shaykh Hamid warns me, with a nudge, that other things are expected of a Zair (visitor). He leads me to the Bab al-Salam, fighting his way through a troop of beggars, and inquires markedly if I am religiously pure.[FN#12] Then, placing our hands a little below and on the left of the waist, the palm of the right covering the back of the left, in the position of prayer, and beginning with the dexter feet,[FN#13] we pace slowly forwards down the line called the Muwajihat al-Sharifah, or "the Illustrous Fronting," which, divided off like an aisle, runs parallel with the Southern wall of the Mosque. On my right hand walks the Shaykh, who recites aloud the following prayer, making me repeat it after him.[FN#14] It is literally rendered, as, indeed, are all the formulae, and the reader is requested to excuse the barbarous fidelity of the translation.