SELECT LECTURES. I. Mohammedanism. BY REV. WILLIAM ARTHUR. DELIVERED BEFORE THE YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION, OF LONDON, IN THE WINTER COURSE OF 1847-8. I. Mohammedanism.* A BOUT forty miles from the shores of the Red Sea, on the west of Arabia, there lies a valley, about two miles long and one broad. The surrounding country is sterile, and utterly incapable of agriculture. The few wells that exist are brackish, and in the whole neighborhood there is but one well of good water. It is an exceedingly-copious fountain, and though the waters of it partake somewhat of the brackishness generally prevalent in the neighborhood, yet it is not altogether unfit for use. Notwithstanding the barrenness of the locality, this little valley is occupied by a city having a settled population of, perhaps, ten thousand souls. Very probably the existence of the city was owing to that of the well, and the Arabs generally, and now the Mohammedan population of the whole world believe that well to be of miraculous origin. On that very spot Ishmael, the great The quotations from the Koran in the following Lecture, are from Sale's translation. The other authors relied upon have been Price, History of Mohammedanism; Ockley, History of the Saracens; Gagnier, Vie de Mahomet; Savary, Abrege de la Vie de Mahomet; Burckhardt, Travels. Prideaux has been consulted, and also a Life of Mohammed by Bush. W. A. progenitor of the Arabian nation, was, they believe, laid down by his despairing mother, and that there the angel Gabriel made this well spring forth, where none had been before, to save the life of the young patriarch. The sacred well is called Zem-zem. Its waters are considered extremely holy; so holy that large draughts of them are very efficacious for washing away sin, and a bottle of the sacred water is considered one of the most valuable presents that a Mohammedan can receive. Around this well stands the temple-the great temple of Kaaba. It has existed from time immemorial, and the Arabians say that when Adam was expelled from Paradise, he implored that upon earth he might be permitted to have a temple, like unto the temple that he had in Paradise. His prayer was heard; and in curtains of light a model of the old temple in which he worshiped in Paradise was let down precisely under the site of the paradisiacal temple. There Adam worshiped during his lifetime. After his death, Seth built a temple on the model of that of Paradise. The Deluge swept this temple away; but the patriarch Abraham, with his son Isaac, rebuilt it, the scaffold being formed by a stone which rose and fell of its own accord, in conformity with the wants of the patriarch. The stone remains there to this day, and the prints of Abraham's feet are on it. Beside the Kaaba lies the tomb of Ishmael; and, altogether, this edifice has the utmost sacredness for the Arabs. In one corner of it is a black stone. This stone was brought directly from Paradise by the angel Gabriel, and placed in the original Kaaba. When it came from Paradise, it was of the purest white; but, on account, say they, of the sins of mankind, the pure white of Paradise was changed into its present blackness; a result that we are inclined to attribute to another reason, because, from time immemorial, this temple has been the scene of the annual pilgrimages of the Arabs, and every pilgrim has seven times gone round the temple, and at each circuit has kissed this sacred stone. From the very earliest records of the city of Mecca, the priesthood of this temple, and the command of the city, have been vested in the same person. The worship of the temple was, at the beginning of the sixth century, and so far before as the records proceed, idolatrous. The chief idols of the temple were Abraham and Ishmael. To their images, each holding a bunch of arrows, such as the Arabs use for divining, regular worship was offered. It is one of the most singular and melancholy facts in the religious history of man, that Abraham, who was the chosen of God to be a witness in all the earth against idolatry, himself, even among his own descendants after the flesh, became, in process of time, the object of that worship that he had so strenuously claimed for the only God, but which was actually paid to his own image. Besides Abraham and his son, there were about three hundred and sixty other gods. About the time we have alluded to, in the sixth century, a noble tribe of Arabs, called Koreish, had obtained the principality and pontificate of the city. One of that tribe, called Hashem, was an individual so distinguished that he gave his name to all his descendants from that time to the present. His grandson, Abdul Motalleb, had thirteen sons. Of these thirteen, the eldest, Abdallah, was a man renowned in Arabia for his personal beauty; so much so, that, according to some authorities, when he at last made choice of the beautiful Amina for his wife, two hundred Arabian ladies met their death for grief. However, Amina was not permitted long to enjoy the happiness of being Abdallah's wife, for he shortly died, leaving to her charge an only son, a boy |