Faith in Mahomet the secret of his strength.
The secret of Abu Bekr’s strength was faith in Mahomet. He would say: ‘Call me not the Caliph of the Lord: I am but the Caliph of the Prophet of the Lord.’ The question with him ever was, What did Mahomet command? or, What now should he have done? From this he never swerved one hair’s-breadth. And so it was that he crushed apostasy, and laid secure the foundations of Islam, His reign was short, but, after Mahomet himself, there is no one to whom the Faith is more beholden.
Abu Bekr’s belief in Mahomet; presumptive evidence of Mahomet’s own sincerity.
For this reason, and because his belief in the Prophet is itself a strong evidence of the sincerity of Mahomet himself, I have dwelt at some length upon his life and character. Had Mahomet been from the first a conscious impostor, he never could have won the faith and friendship of a man who was not only sagacious and wise, but simple and sincere. Abu Bekr had no thought of personal aggrandisement. Endowed with sovereign and irresponsible power, he used it simply for the interests of Islam and the people’s good. He was too shrewd to be himself deceived, and too honest himself to act the part of a deceiver.
CHAPTER XIV.
ACCESSION OF OMAR—REINFORCEMENTS FOR IRAC—CAMPAIGN THERE UNDER ABU OBEID AND MOTHANNA.
Jumâd II., A.H. XIII.—Moharram, A.H. XIV.
August, A.D. 634–March, A.D. 635.
Accession of Omar.
On the morrow after Abu Bekr’s death, Omar ascended the pulpit, and addressed the people assembled in the Great Mosque. ‘The Arabs,’ he said, ‘are like a rebellious camel obliged to follow its driver, and it pertaineth to the driver to see which way he leadeth the same. By the Lord of the Káaba! even thus will I guide you in the way that ye should go.’
His first two acts.
The first act of the new Caliph was to issue the despatch, with which the reader is already acquainted, deposing Khâlid. The second was, in fulfilment of Abu Bekr’s dying behest, to raise a fresh levy for Mothanna. Leaving the former, we turn for the present to the latter.
Fresh levies sent to Irâc under Abu Obeid.