ARAB HORSEMAN
The devotion of the Arab to his steed has been sung in many tongues and in many lands. His mare is the first care of the Bedawy; more to him than either wife or child, save perhaps his firstborn son, when green food is scarce, and at evening the camels are brought to be milked, the mare first drinks from the foaming vessel; wives and children share what she leaves. On his robber raids he rides out upon his camel, the mare being led, saddled and ready, by his side. In the hour of peril he will commit himself to her fleet limbs; and not once nor twice in the course of his roving life the Arab will owe safety and all else to the speed of his four-footed friend. Tenderly cared for at other times, her every want anticipated, when the moment of trial comes she will fly off like the wind; and the distances often covered ere fatigue stays her career would seem fabulous in European ears. The fondness of the Arab for the horse frequently becomes a craze, leading him into the ridiculous. If a man is too poor to own a horse, e.g., he will take a bone of the noble animal and preserve it in his tent! Again, a horse may be the property not of one or two, but of many. It is considered as consisting of so many parts, which are bought by different parties. Each is thus entitled to say, with an approach to truth, that he owns horse-flesh. The owner of a good horse never willingly parts with it. If pressed by necessity, he may allow another to become part proprietor. Even then he will hardly sell outright. The man who has the rasan (“halter”) feeds the horse, and in return enjoys the use of it. Thus it was with a beautiful mare, half of which, with the rasan, was owned by the present writer. The other partners were a native Christian gentleman, a rich Moslem merchant in Acre, and the pasha of the province.
We have referred to the religious connection of certain Arab customs. From this it might be inferred that they are a religious people. This is strictly true. Nominally they are Moslems; but their religious knowledge is scanty at best, and their thinking far from clear.
They believe in the existence of God; they are taught to consider themselves His special favourites. All non-Moslems are regarded as His enemies and theirs. But of the moral character of God they have hardly the glimmering of an idea. They will “thank God” as heartily for success in a robber-raid as for recovery from sickness. One must know something of the character of God before he can understand what sin is, and why God abhors it. But the Allah of the Moslem, capricious in his choice of favourites, is very indulgent towards the frailties and failings of those who confess him and his prophet. It is futile to seek to identify Allah with the God of Christianity. His name is for ever on the lips of his devotees. The most trivial expressions they confirm by appeal to Deity, and that with equal glibness whether they be true or false. Some isolated articles of faith they have, and certain rites, such as circumcision, which are religious in their origin, but they have nothing which can properly be called a religious system. The mind of the Orient, indeed, while singularly fruitful in ideas, is deficient in the elements essential to the thinking of ideas together. It is mystical, reflective, analytic, but it lacks the power of synthesis. There are no great Arabic philosophers, in our meaning of the term. Their “philosophers” are gifted men, whose wit flashes forth in sparkling epigram, in wise discriminations and sage counsels for the conduct of life. For systematic treatment of the problems of being and well-being we search among them in vain. Even what by courtesy we call the “system” of Islâm is not an organic unity, but rather an aggregation of ideas around the great central dogma. For the hints as to systematic treatment of the revelation in Jesus Christ found in the Epistles of St. Paul—for even here there is hardly anything beyond hints—we are indebted not to his Hebrew training, but to his Gentile learning, and especially to his acquaintance with Roman Law. While the Oriental mind has been prolific in originating thought, the great task of synthesis has been given specially to the mind of the West.
Give to a rude, untutored people the simple idea of the unity of God, without any conception of His moral character, together with the further idea that they are His peculiar favourites, and you have prepared the way for a descent not to be thought of without a shudder. If, after long generations, we find this people one “whose heart is not right with God,” “whose mouth is full of cursing and deceit,” our wonder may be, not so much that they are fallen so low, as that they have preserved their nobler institutions and maintained themselves as well as they have done against the tides of corruption. And there are signs of a yearning among them for better things. Let one authentic story suffice.
External influences affecting the Beduw are few and slight. Peddling Jews from Damascus, Safed, Tiberias, Jerusalem perambulate their country by times; but their trade is almost entirely confined to the barbarous ornaments worn by the women. The Moslem pilgrimage which yearly passes through their territory is doubtless a power for evil, fortunately limited in its effects to the districts more immediately adjoining the great Hajj road. Once in a while, however, some of the men may journey to esh-Shâm (Damascus), city of wonder and beauty to their uncultured minds, returning with strange tales as to its greatness, and confused ideas of its streets, orchards, and musical waters. One such had visited this “earthly paradise,” the Arab’s dream of splendour and pleasure. He, however, was most of all impressed with what he saw of worship in the great mosque. The effect upon his own spirit was deep, and this he conveyed to his fellows in the solitudes when he returned. It stirred the slumbering necessity in all their hearts for communion with God. At sunset he drew them up upon the sand, and, standing before them, he imitated as well as he could the movements of the worshippers he had seen, and in these he was followed by his friends. Ya Allah! he said, mitl ma bikûlu fî esh-Shâm; and his fellows responded in turn, Wa azwad, wa azwad, wa azwad. “O Allah! just as they say in Damascus.” “And more, and more, and more”! The tale may seem ludicrous, if not absurd; but it has also a pathetic aspect. Does it not seem like a cry from the hearts of men in darkness, yearning for light on the Godward road? Are we not debtors to such as they?
CHAPTER XI
Ride to Jerash—Magnificent ruins—Circassian colonists—History—Preservation of buildings—East of Jordan—Sûf—A moonlight scene—Down to the Jabbok.
JERASH, GATEWAY