Perhaps all this superstition is harmless in itself or does a direct harm only to their purses. Indirectly, however, it has a demoralizing influence upon all classes of people, especially upon women, who, as guardians of customs, are most attached to these fables. Only true civilization and Christianity will redeem and deliver.
In order to deepen the impression of what has been said and to add something from real life, I will tell the story of a Moslem woman, just as I heard it in Kashgar, where I have been working for five years for the spreading of the Gospel.
Some fifty years ago there lived in Kashgar a man called Chodsha Burhaneddin. He was descended from a family which since the middle of the seventeenth century has given Kashgar its kings. His fellow citizens esteemed him very much on account of his strict observance of the religious prescriptions of Islam. He married a woman of noble descent, and for some time contented himself with his one wife. But according to Islam it is a merit to take if possible four wives, in order to increase the number of the adherents of Islam. For this reason Chodsha brought home another wife whenever he travelled on business to the Russian town of Andishan on that side of the Tienshan, until the number of four was full. The consequence was that he not only neglected his first wife, but even had her do all the housework alone, thus making her the servant of his three other wives. She had to serve them from early morning till late at night. Without grumbling and with great diligence the poor woman took all the work upon herself; secretly, however, she bewailed her hard lot and employed her few free hours for the education of her little daughter. However, she did not succeed in satisfying her husband. He always found fault, beat her, and bade her not show her face before him. His wife submitted patiently and silently; she desisted even from paying visits to her parents and acquaintances, which would have given her some comfort, lest her husband think she had gone to her beloved ones to complain of his treatment. Four years passed. Meanwhile several political revolutions had taken place in Kashgar. In China the numerous Chinese Mohammedans had revolted, and the revolt had spread over the western countries. In eastern Turkestan the Chinese officials as well as the soldiers and the merchants had been killed by the Mohammedans; only a few escaped death by accepting Islam. This state of matters was put an end to by Jakob Beg. He had come from Chanab Chokand, north of the Tienshan, under the pretext of helping the descendant of the old Kashgarian dynasty of the Chodshas to the throne. In due time he put the Prince aside and founded a kingdom of his own, which included the whole of eastern Turkestan. After taking hold of the government he tried to weaken the Chodshas in every way possible, some of them were assassinated, others put in prison in order to be executed. One of the latter was Chodsha Burhaneddin. As soon as his wife heard that her husband had been made a prisoner, she hurried to her father, who was well esteemed at Jakob Beg's court, and besought him to make the most of his influence in order to save her husband. Then she prepared a meal, took it to her imprisoned husband, and encouraged him. At his request she roused her father still more so as to betake himself at once to Jakob Beg, and to prevail on him to set the prisoner at liberty that same night. Chodsha Burhaneddin returned to his house and entered the room of his wife whom he had so long neglected, in order to thank her for his delivery. Afterwards she had one more child, a boy.
Some years after these events Chodsha fell ill. Knowing that his end was near, repentance overwhelmed him, and he asked his first wife to pardon him whatever wrong he had done her. It was only she whom he wished to be near him in his pains. His other wives he did not at all care for now, and detested them even in such a manner as to drive them away, whenever they approached him. When at last death had released him from his pains, his three younger wives were married again, leaving their children to their fate. His first wife, however, remained faithful to him even after death; she refused all proposals, honorable as some of them were, and devoted herself entirely to the education of her son and daughter, whom she lived to see married.
From this example, to which many others might be added, it becomes clear to what deep humiliations Mohammedan women are subject, and what treasure of faithfulness and sacrifice are nevertheless hidden in some of these oppressed and crushed lives. Without knowing the doctrines of Christian religion, Chodsha's wife had practised them. What she dimly anticipated, has been fulfilled in her son, whom I baptized as the first-fruits in Kashgar, and received into the church. Did the Mohammedan women but know to what height Christianity would raise them! Could they but compare the Mohammedan proverb: "Do not ask a woman's advice, and if she gives it, do the contrary," with the Apostle Paul's words: "So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife, loveth himself" (Ephes. v:28), and "There is neither male nor female, for ye are all one in Christ Jesus," they would know the distance which separates Christian views from those of Islam.
If on summer evenings when the heat of the day is over, the inhabitant of a Mohammedan town goes out for a walk to enjoy the evening coolness before the gates, he will sometimes pass the burial-grounds. Weeping and wailing come to his ear. Pitifully he will look at the figures of mourning women who are kneeling by the graves. But the sorrow which is revealed there is not always meant for the loss of some beloved one dead; very often women visit the graves of their relations or, if they have none, of saints, in order to weep out undisturbed and unheard their hopeless, desolate lives. In their houses they dare not give way to their sorrows for fear of their husbands, therefore they go to the dead in order to tell them their griefs!
May these words bring that sound of wailing to the hearts of Christian women! May they, for whom Christian morality has made life fair and worthy, who as a beloved husband's true friend and companion take part in his joys and sorrows, or those who in the fulfilment of self-chosen duties have found happiness and content, may they often remember the hard fate of their Moslem sisters in the Orient, and help carry the message of salvation to them.