34. I will pause here for a while, and ask the indulgence of the reader to reflect upon the circumstances of the persecutions, insults and injuries, expulsion and attack suffered by Mohammad and his early followers,[130] and his unwavering adherence to preach against the gross idolatry and immorality of his people, which all show his sincere belief in his own mission, and his possession of an irresistible inward impulse to publish the Divine Truth of his Revelations regarding the unity in the Godhead and other moral reforms. His preachings of monotheism, and his enjoining righteousness, and forbidding evil deeds, were not attended to for many years with material success. In proportion as he preached against the gross idolatry and superstition of his people, he was subjected to ridicule and scorn, and finally to an inveterate persecution which ruined his and his follower's fortune. But he unflinchingly kept his path; no threats and no injuries hindered him from still preaching to the ungodly people a purer and higher theology and better morality than had ever been set before them. He claimed no temporal power, no spiritual domination; he asked but for simple toleration, for free permission to win men by persuasion into the way of truth. He declared he was sent neither to compel conviction by miracles, nor to constrain outward profession by the sword.[131] Does this leave any doubt of the strong conviction in his mind, as well as in the truth of his claim, to be a man sent by God to preach the Divine Perfection, and to teach mankind the ways of righteousness? He honestly and sincerely conveyed the message which he had received or which he conscientiously or intuitively believed to have received from his God and which had all the signs and marks of truth in itself. What is meant by a True Prophet or a Revelation is not more than what we find in the case of Mohammad.[132]
The general office and main business of a prophet is to proclaim to mankind the Divine Perfection, to teach publicly purer theology and higher morality, to enjoin the people to do what is right and just, and to forbid what is wrong and bad. It is neither a part of the prophet to predict future events, nor to show supernatural miracles. And further, a prophet is neither immaculate nor infallible. The Revelation is a natural product of human faculties. A prophet feels that his mind is illumined by God, and the thoughts which are expressed by him and spoken or written under this influence are to be regarded as the words of God. This illumination of the mind or the effect of the Divine Influence differ in any prophet according to the capacity of the recipient, or according to the circumstances—physical, moral, and religious—in which he is placed.
35. Although his mission was only to convey the message and preach publicly what was revealed to him, and he was not responsible for the conversion of the ungodly polytheists to the purer theology and higher morality, or in other words, to the faith of Islam, yet whatever success and beneficial results in the sphere of theology, morality, and reforms in social matters he achieved was a strong evidence of his Divine mission. In the name of God and in the character of His Apostle, he wrought a great reform according to his light in his own country. "Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit."—(Matt. VII, 17). Facts are stubborn things, and facts are conclusive in these points.
The effects produced by his preaching, and the changes wrought by them in the religious, social, and political sphere of the polytheists, the idolatrous and grossly superstitious Arabs within a comparatively short period, mostly consisting of persecutions at Mecca, and struggles at Medina, were very striking. From an indiscriminate mass of polytheism and gross superstitious belief in gods, genii, the sons and daughters of God, he gave them a pure monotheistic belief, recognizing no other superior power but the Almighty. He raised the moral standard of his countrymen, ameliorated the condition of women, curtailed and mitigated polygamy and slavery, and virtually abolished them as well as infanticide. He most sternly denounced and absolutely forbade many heinous evils of the Arab society. He united a number of wild and independent tribes into a nation and abolished their internecine wars.
Sir W. Muir says:—
"Few and simple as the positive precepts of Mahomet up to this time appear, they had wrought a marvellous and a mighty work. Never, since the days when primitive Christianity startled the world from its sleep, and waged a mortal combat with Heathenism, had men seen the like arousing of spiritual life, the like faith that suffered sacrifice and took joyfully the spoiling of goods for conscience sake.
"From time beyond memory, Mecca and the whole Peninsula had been steeped into spiritual torpor. The slight and transient influence of Judaism, Christianity, or Philosophy upon the Arab mind, had been but as the ruffling here and there the surface of a quiet lake;—all remained still and motionless below. The people were sunk in superstition, cruelty, and vice. It was a common practice for the eldest son to marry his father's widows inherited as property with the rest of the estate. Pride and poverty had introduced among them, as it has among the Hindus, the crime of female infanticide. Their religion consisted in gross idolatry, and their faith was rather the dark superstitious dread of unseen beings, whose goodwill they sought to propitiate, and to avert their displeasure, than the belief in an over-ruling Providence. The Life to come and Retribution of good and evil were, as motives of action, practically unknown.
"Thirteen years before the Hegira, Mecca lay lifeless in this debased state. What a change those thirteen years had now produced! A band of several hundred persons had rejected idolatry, adopted the worship of one great God, and surrendered themselves implicitly to the guidance of what they believed a revelation from Him;—praying to the Almighty with frequency and fervour, looking for pardon through His mercy, and striving to follow after good works, almsgiving, chastity and justice. They now lived under a constant sense of the Omnipotent power of God, and of His providential care over the minutest of their concerns. In all the gifts of nature, in every relation of life, at each turn of their affairs, individual or public, they saw His hand. And, above all, the new spiritual existence in which they joyed and gloried, was regarded as the mark of His especial grace, while the unbelief of their blinded fellow-citizens was the hardening stamp of His predestined reprobation. Mahomet was the minister of life to them,—the source under God of their new-born hopes; and to him they yielded a fitting and implicit submission.
"In so short a period, Mecca had, from this wonderful movement, been rent into two factions, which, unmindful of the old land-marks of tribe and family, were arrayed in deadly opposition one against the other. The believers bore persecution with a patient and tolerant spirit. And though it was their wisdom so to do, the credit of a magnanimous forbearance may be freely accorded to them. One hundred men and women, rather than abjure the precious faith, had abandoned their homes, and sought refuge, till the storm should be overpast, in Abyssinian exile. And now even a larger number, with the Prophet himself, emigrated from their fondly-loved city, with its sacred temple,—to them the holiest spot on earth,—and fled to Medîna. There the same wonder-working charm had within two or three years prepared for them a brotherhood ready to defend the Prophet and his followers with their blood. Jewish truth had long sounded in the ears of the men of Medîna, but it was not till they heard the spirit-stirring strains of the Arabian prophet, that they too awoke from their slumber, and sprang suddenly into a new and earnest life."[133]
Further on Sir W. Muir says:—
"And what have been the effects of the system which, established by such instrumentality, Mahomet has left behind him. We may freely concede that it banished for ever many of the darker elements of superstition which had for ages shrouded the Peninsula. Idolatry vanished before the battle-cry of Islam; the doctrine of the unity and infinite perfections of God, and of a special all-pervading Providence, became a living principle in the hearts and lives of the followers of Mahomet, even as it had in his own. An absolute surrender and submission to the divine will (the very name of Islam) was demanded as the first requirement of the religion. Nor are social virtues wanting. Brotherly love is inculcated within the circle of the faith; orphans are to be protected, and slaves treated with consideration; intoxicating drinks are prohibited, and Mahometanism may boast of a degree of temperance unknown to any other creed."[134]
Dr. Marcus Dods writes:—
"But is Mahommed in no sense a Prophet? Certainly he had two of the most important characteristics of the prophetic order. He saw truth about God which his fellowmen did not see, and he had an irresistible inward impulse to publish this truth. In respect of this latter qualification Mahommed may stand comparison with the most courageous of the heroic prophets of Israel. For the truth's sake he risked his life, he suffered daily persecutions for years, and eventually banishment, the loss of property, of the goodwill of his fellow-citizens, and the confidence of his friends—he suffered in short as much as any man can suffer short of death, which he only escaped by flight, and yet he unflinchingly proclaimed his message. No bribe, threat or inducement could silence him. 'Though they array against me the sun on the right hand, and the moon on the left, I cannot renounce my purpose.' And it was this persistency, this belief in his call, to proclaim the Unity of God which was the making of Islam. Other men have been monotheists in the midst of idolaters, but no other man has founded a strong and enduring monotheistic religion. The distinction in his case was his resolution that other men should believe.... His giving himself out as a prophet of God was, in the first instance, not only sincere, but probably correct in the sense in which he himself understood it. He felt that he had thoughts of God which it deeply concerned all around him to receive, and he knew that these thoughts were given him by God, although not, as we shall see, a revelation strictly so called. His mistake lay by no means in his supposing himself to be called upon by God to speak for him and introduce a better religion, but it lay in his gradually coming to insist quite as much on men's accepting him as a prophet as on their accepting the great truth he preached. He was a prophet to his countrymen in so far as he proclaimed the Unity of God, but this was no sufficient ground for his claiming to be their guide in all matters of religion, still less for his assuming the lordship over them in all matters civil as well...."
The learned doctor further on in his book, "Mohammed, Buddha, and Christ," remarks:—
"But as we endeavour to estimate the good and evil of Islam, it gradually appears that the chief point we must attend to is to distinguish between its value to Arabia in the seventh century and its value to the world at large. No one, I presume, would deny that to Mohammed's contemporaries his religion was an immense advance on anything they had previously believed in. It welded together the disunited tribes, and lifted the nation to the forefront of the important powers in the world. It effected what Christianity and Judaism had alike failed to effect—it swept away, once and for ever, idolatry, and established the idea of one true God. Its influence on Arabia was justly and pathetically put by the Moslem refugees in Abyssinia, who when required to say why they should not be sent back to Mecca, gave the following account of their religion and what it had done for them: 'O king, we were plunged in ignorance and barbarism; we worshipped idols; we ate dead bodies; we committed lewdness; disregarded family ties and the duties of neighbourhood and hospitality; we knew no law but that of the strong, when God sent among us a messenger of whose truthfulness, integrity, and innocence we were aware; and he called us to the unity of God, and taught us not to associate any god with him; he forbade us the worship of idols, and enjoined upon us to speak the truth, to be faithful to our trusts, to be merciful, and to regard the rights of others; to love our relatives and to protect the weak; to flee vice and avoid all evil. He taught us to offer prayers, to give alms, and to fast. And because we believed in him and obeyed him, therefore are we persecuted and driven from our country to seek thy protection.'"[135]
But after all we have here seen of the opinions of Dr. Marcus Dods and Sir W. Muir, let us turn to what the Rev. Stephens thinks of Mohammad:—
"The aim of Mahomet was to revive among his countrymen the Arabs, as Moses revived among his countrymen the Jews, the pure faith of their common forefather Abraham. In this he succeeded to a very great extent. For a confused heap of idolatrous superstitions he substituted a pure monotheistic faith; he abolished some of the most vicious practices of his countrymen, modified others; he generally raised the moral standard, improved the social condition of the people, and introduced a sober and rational ceremonial in worship. Finally he welded by this means a number of wild independent tribes, mere floating atoms, into a compact body politic, as well prepared and as eager to subdue the kingdoms of the world to their rule and to their faith, as ever the Israelites had been to conquer the land of Canaan.
"The Koran also enjoins repeatedly and in very emphatic language the duty of showing kindness to the stranger and the orphan, and of treating slaves, if converted to the faith, with the consideration and respect due to believers. The duty even of mercy to the lower animals is not forgotten, and it is to be thankfully acknowledged that Mohammedanism as well as Buddhism shares with Christianity the honour of having given birth to hospitals and asylums for the insane and sick.
"The vices most prevalent in Arabia in the time of Mahomet which are most sternly denounced and absolutely forbidden in the Koran were drunkenness, unlimited concubinage and polygamy, the destruction of female infants, reckless gambling, extortionate usury, superstitious arts of divination and magic. The abolition of some of these evil customs, and the mitigation of others, was a great advance in the morality of the Arabs, and is a wonderful and honourable testimony to the zeal and influence of the reformer. The total suppression of female infanticide and of drunkenness is the most signal triumph of his work."[136]
The reverend gentleman quoted above continues:
"First of all, it must be freely granted that to his own people Mahomet was a great benefactor. He was born in a country where political organization, and rational faith, and pure morals were unknown. He introduced all three. By a single stroke of masterly genius he simultaneously reformed the political condition, the religious creed, and the moral practice of his countrymen. In the place of many independent tribes he left a nation; for a superstitious belief in gods many and lords many he established a reasonable belief in one Almighty yet beneficent Being; taught men to live under an abiding sense of this Being's superintending care, to look to Him as the rewarder, and to fear Him as the punisher of evil-doers. He vigorously attacked, and modified and suppressed many gross and revolting customs which had prevailed in Arabia down to his time. For an abandoned profligacy was substituted a carefully regulated polygamy, and the practice of destroying female infants was effectually abolished.
"As Islam gradually extended its conquest beyond the boundaries of Arabia, many barbarous races whom it absorbed became in like manner participators in its benefits. The Turk, the Indian, the Negro, and the Moor were compelled to cast away their idols, to abandon their licentious rites and customs, to turn to the worship of one God, to a decent ceremonial and an orderly way of life. The faith even of the more enlightened Persian was purified: he learned that good and evil are not co-ordinate powers, but that just and unjust are alike under the sway of one All-wise and Holy Ruler, who ordereth all things in heaven and earth.
"For barbarous nations, then, especially—nations which were more or less in the condition of Arabia itself at the time of Mahomet—nations in the condition of Africa at the present day, with little or no civilisation, and without a reasonable religion—Islam certainly comes as a blessing, as a turning from darkness to light and from the power of satan unto God."[137]
36. What the opponents of Mohammad can possibly say against his mission is his alleged moral declension at Medina.[138] They accuse him of cruelty[139] and sensuality[140] during his sojourn in that city after he had passed without any blame more than fifty-five years of his age, and had led a pious missionary life for upwards of fifteen years. These moral stains cannot be inconsistent with his office of being a prophet or reformer. It is no matter if a prophet morally degrades his character under certain circumstances, or morally degrades his character at the end of his age—after leading for upwards of fifty-five years a life of the highest moral principles, and as a paragon of temperance and high-toned living—while he has faithfully conveyed the message, and has sincerely and honestly preached religious reforms, and the sublimity of his preachings have in themselves the marks of divine truth.
If the said prophet defends his stains or immoral deeds by professed revelations, and justifies himself in his flagrant breaches of morality by producing messages from heaven, just and equally as he does when he teaches the purer theology and higher morality for which he is commissioned, then and from that time only we will consider him as an impostor, guilty of high blasphemy in forging the name of God for his licentious self indulgences.
But in the case of Mohammad, in the first place, the charges of cruelty and sensuality during a period of six or seven years towards the end of his life, excepting three years, are utterly false; and secondly, if proved to have taken place, it is not proved that Mohammad justified himself by alleging to have received a divine sanction or command to the alleged cruelties and flagrant breaches of morality. The charges of assassinations and cruelties to the prisoners of war and others, and of the alleged perfidy and craftiness enumerated by Sir W. Muir, have been examined and refuted by me in this book. Vide pp. 60-73 and pp. 76-97. The cases of Maria, a slave-girl, and Zeinab not coming directly under the object of this book have been treated separately in Appendix B, pp. 211-220 of this work.
Mohammad, in his alleged cruelties towards his enemies, is not represented by Sir W. Muir to have justified himself by special revelation or sanction from on high, yet the Rev. Mr. Hughes, whose work has been pronounced as having "the rare merit of being accurate," makes him (Mohammad) to have done them under the sanction of God in the Koran.
"The best defenders of the Arabian Prophet[141] are obliged to admit that the matter of Zeinab, the wife of Zeid, and again of Mary, the Coptic slave, are 'an indelible stain' upon his memory; that he is untrue once or twice to the kind and forgiving disposition of his best nature; that he is once or twice unrelenting in the punishment of his personal enemies, and that he is guilty even more than once of conniving at the assassination of inveterate opponents; but they do not give any satisfactory explanation or apology for all this being done under the supposed sanction of God in the Qurán."[142]
Such is the rare accuracy of Mr. Hughes' work. It is needless for me to repeat here that none of these allegations are either true or facts, or alleged to have been committed under the sanction of God in the Koran.
The Rev. Marcus Dods writes regarding the character of Mohammad:—
"The knot of the matter lies not in his polygamy, nor even in his occasional licentiousness, but in the fact that he defended his conduct, when he created scandal, by professed revelations which are now embodied as parts of the Koran. When his wives murmured, and with justice, at his irregularities, he silenced them by a revelation giving him conjugal allowances which he had himself proscribed as unlawful. When he designed to contract an alliance with a woman forbidden to him by his own law, an inspired permission was forthcoming, encouraging him to the transgression."[143]
Both of these alleged instances given above are mere fabrications. There was no revelation giving Mohammad conjugal allowances which he had himself proscribed as unlawful, nor any permission was brought forward to sanction an alliance forbidden to him by his own law. This subject has been fully discussed by me in my work "Mohammad, the True Prophet," and the reader is referred to that work.[144] A few verses on the marital subject of Mohammad are greatly misunderstood by European writers on the subject, and Dr. Dods shares the generally wrong idea when he says:—
"He rather used his office as a title to license from which ordinary men were restrained. Restricting his disciples to four wives, he retained to himself the liberty of taking as many as he pleased." (Page 23.)
This is altogether a gross misrepresentation of the real state of things. Mohammad never retained to himself the liberty of taking as many wives as he pleased. On the contrary, Sura XXXIII, 52, expressly forbade him all women except those he had already with him, giving him no option to marry in the case of the demise of some or all of them. This will show that he rather used his office as a restraint against himself of what was lawful for the people in general to enjoy. The only so-called privilege above the rest of the believers (Sura XXXIII, 49) was not "to retain to himself the liberty of taking as many wives as he pleased," but to retain the wives whom he had already married and whose number exceeded the limit of four under Sura IV, 3. Other believers having more wives than four as in the case of Kays, Ghailán, and Naofal, were requested to separate themselves from the number exceeding the limit prescribed for the first time. This was before polygamy was declared to have been virtually abolished, i.e., between the publication of vv. 3 and 128 of Sura IV. There was neither any breach of morality, nor anything licentious in his retaining the marriages lawfully contracted by him before the promulgation of Sara IV, 3. Even this privilege (Sura XXXIII, 49) was counterbalanced by Ibid, 52, which runs thus:—
"Women are not allowed thee hereafter, nor to change them for other women, though their beauty charm thee, except those already possessed by thee."
Mr. Stanley Lane Poole suffers under the same misrepresentation as other European writers[145] do when he says that:—
"The Prophet allowed his followers only four wives, he took more than a dozen himself."
He writes:—
"When, however, all has been said, when it has been shown that Mohammad was not the rapacious voluptuary some have taken him for, and that his violation of his own marriage-law may be due to motives reasonable and just from his point of view rather than to common sensuality."
"Did Mohammad believe he was speaking the words of God equally when he declared that permission was given him to take unto him more wives, as when he proclaimed, 'There is no god but God?'"[146]
Mohammad did not violate his own marriage-law, and never pretended that permission was given to him to take more wives than what was allowed for other people. All his marriages (which are wrongly considered to have been about a dozen) were contracted by him before he published the law unjustly said to have been violated by him. He retained these wives after the law was promulgated, and their number exceeded four, but he was interdicted to marry any other women in the place of these in case of their demise or divorce. Other believers were advised after the promulgation of the law to reduce the number of their wives exceeding four, but were at liberty to replace their wives within the limit assigned in the case of their demise or divorce. Mohammad's case had no breach of morality or sensual license in it. It was very wise of Mohammad to retain all the wives he had married before Sura IV, 3, came into force, for the reason that the wives thus repudiated by him might have married some of the unbelievers, even some of his enemies, which would have been derogatory to the Prophet in the eyes of his contemporaries and a laughing-stock for his enemies.
37. It has been said with much stress regarding the teachings of Mohammad: (1) That although under the degraded condition of Arabia, they were a gift of great value, and succeeded in banishing those fierce vices which naturally accompany ignorance and barbarism, but an imperfect code of ethics has been made a permanent standard of good and evil, and a final and irrevocable law, which is an insuperable barrier to the regeneration and progress of a nation. It has been also urged that his reforms were good and useful for his own time and place, but that by making them final he has prevented further progress and consecrated half measures. What were restrictions to his Arabs would have been license to other men.[147] (2) That Islam deals with positive precepts rather than with principles,[148] and the danger of a precise system of positive precepts regulating the minute detail, the ceremonial worship, and the moral and social relations of life, is, that it should retain too tight a grip upon men when the circumstances which justified it have changed and vanished away, and therefore the imposition of a system good for barbarians upon people already possessing higher sort of civilization and the principles of a purer faith is not a blessing but a curse. Nay more, even the system which was good for people when they were in a barbarous state may become positively mischievous to those same people when they begin to emerge from their barbarism under its influence into a higher condition.[149] (3) That the exact ritual and formal observations of Islam have carried with them their own Nemesis, and thus we find that in the worship of the faithful formalism and indifferences, pedantic scrupulosity and positive disbelief flourish side by side. The minutest change of posture in prayer, the displacement of a simple genuflexion, would call for much heavier censure than outward profligacy or absolute neglect.[150] (4) That morality is viewed not in the abstract, but in the concrete. That the Koran deals much more with sin and virtue in fragmentary details than as a whole. It deals with acts more than principles, with outward practice more than inward motives, with precepts and commands more than exhortation. It does not hold up before man the hatefulness and ugliness of all sin as a whole.[151] (5) "That Islam is stationary; swathed in the rigid bands of the Coran, it is powerless, like the Christian dispensation,[152] to adapt itself to the varying circumstances of time and place, and to keep pace with, if not to lead and direct, the progress of society and the elevation of the race. In the body politic the spiritual and secular are hopelessly confounded, and we fail of perceiving any approach to free institutions or any germ whatever of popular government."[153]
38. All these objections more or less apply rather to the teachings of the Mohammadan Common Law (canon and civil), called Fiqah or Shara, than to the Koran, the Mohammadan Revealed Law. Our Common Law, which treats both ecclesiastical and the civil law, is by no means considered to be a divine or unchangeable law. This subject has been treated by me in a separate work[154] on the Legal, Political and Social Reforms to which the reader is referred. The space allowed to me in this Introduction, which has already exceeded its proper limit, does not admit a full and lengthy discussion of the objections quoted above, but I will review them here in as few words as possible.
39. (1) Mohammad had to deal with barbarous nations around him, to be gradually reformed, and besides this the subject of social reforms was a secondary question. Yet it being necessary to transform the character of the people and to reform the moral and social abuses prevailing among them, he gradually introduced his social reforms which proved immense blessings to the Arabs and other nations in the seventh century. Perhaps some temporary but judicious, reasonable and helpful accommodations had to be made to the weakness and immaturity of the people, as halting stages in the march of reforms only to be set aside at their adult strength, or to be abolished when they were to begin to emerge from their barbarism under its influence to a higher civilization. Consequently gradual amelioration of social evils had necessarily to pass several trials during progress of reform. The intermediate stages are not to be taken as final and irrevocable standard of morality and an insuperable barrier to the regeneration of the Arabian nation. Our adversaries stick indiscriminately to these temporary measures or concessions only, and call them half measures and partial reforms made into an unchangeable law which exclude the highest reforms, and form a formidable obstacle to the dawn of a progressive and enlightened civilization. I have in view here the precepts of Mohammad for ameliorating the degraded condition of women for restricting the unlimited polygamy and the facility of divorce, together with servile concubinage and slavery.[155] Mohammad's injunctions and precepts, intermediary and ultimate, temporary and permanent, intended for the removal of these social evils, are interwoven with each other, interspersed in different Suras and not chronologically arranged, in consequence of which it is somewhat difficult for those who have no deep insight into the promiscuous literature of the Koran to find out which precept was only a halting stage, and which the latest. It was only from some oversight on the part of the compilers of the Common Law that, in the first place, the civil precepts of a transitory nature and as a mediate step leading to a higher reform were taken as final; and in the second place, the civil precepts adapted for the dwellers of the Arabian desert were pressed upon the neck of all ages and countries. A social system for barbarism ought not to be imposed on a people already possessing higher forms of civilizations.
40. (2) In fact the Koran deals with positive precepts as well as with principles, but it never teaches a precise system of precepts regulating in minute details the social relations of life and the ceremonial of worship. On the contrary, its aim has been to counteract the tendency to narrowness, formality, and severity which is the consequence of a living under a rigid system of positive precepts. Mohammad had to transform the character of the Arab barbarians who had no religious or moral teacher or a social reformer before his advent. It was therefore necessary to give them a few positive precepts, moulding and regulating their moral and social conduct, to make them 'new creatures' with new notions and new purposes, and to remodel the national life. (3) But lest they should confuse virtue as identical with obedience to the outward requirements of the ceremonial law,—the formal ablutions, the sacrifices in pilgrimages, the prescribed forms of prayers, the fixed amount of alms, and the strict fasts, the voice of the Koran has ever and anon been lifted up to declare that a rigid conformity to practical precepts, whether of conduct or ceremonial, would not extenuate, but rather increase in the eyes of God the guilt of an unprincipled heart and an unholy life.
Regarding the pilgrimage[156] or the sacrifices (its chief ceremony), the Koran says:—
"By no means can their flesh reach unto God, neither their blood, but piety on your part reacheth him. Thus hath he subjected them to you, that ye might magnify God for his guidance: and announce glad tidings to the doers of good."—Sura XXII, 38.
Regarding the Kibla in prayers it is said in the Koran:—
"The west and the east is God's: therefore whichever way ye turn there is the face of God."—Sura II, 109.
"All have a quarter of the Heavens to which they turn them; but wherever ye be, hasten emulously after good."—Ibid, 143.
"There is no piety in turning your faces toward the east or west, but he is pious who believeth in God and the last day, and the angels and the scripture, and the prophets; who for the love of God disburseth his wealth to his kindred; and to the orphans, and the needy, and the wayfarer, and those who ask, and for ransoming; who observeth the prayer, and payeth alms, and who is of those who are faithful to their engagements when they have engaged in them, and patient under ills and hardships, and in time of trouble, these are they who are just, and these are they who fear the Lord."—Ibid, 172.
In the place of a fixed amount of alms the Koran only says to give what ye can spare.
"They will ask thee also what shall they bestow in alms:
"Say: What ye can spare."—Ibid, 216, 217.
Instead of imposing a very strict fast, which in the middle of summer is extremely mortifying, the Koran makes its observance optional.
"And as for those who are able to keep it and yet observe it not, the expiation of this shall be the maintenance of a poor man. And he who of his own accord performeth a good work, shall derive good from it: and good shall it be for you to fast, if ye knew it."—Ibid, 180.
The Koran does not teach any prescribed forms of worship and other ritualistic prayers. No attitude is fixed, and no outward observance of posture is required. There is no scrupulosity and punctiliousness, neither the change of posture in prayer nor the displacement of a single genuflexion calls any censure on the devotee in the Koran. Simply reading the Koran (Suras LXXIII, 20; XXIX, 44), and bearing God in mind, standing and sitting; reclining (III, 188; IV, 104) or bowing down or prostrating (XXII, 76) is the only form and ritual, if it may be called so, of prayer and worship taught in the Koran.
"Recite then as much of the Koran as may be easy to you."—Sura LXXIII, 20.
"Recite the portions of the Book which have been revealed to thee and discharge the duty of prayer; verily prayer restraineth from the filthy and the blameworthy. And assuredly the gravest duty is the remembrance of God; and God knoweth what ye do."—Sura XXIX, 44.
"And when the Koran is rehearsed, then listen ye to it and keep silence: haply ye may obtain mercy."
"And think within thine ownself on God, with lowliness and with fear and without loud-spoken words, at even and at morn; and be not of the heedless."—Sura VII, 203, 204.
The Koran condemns pretentious prayers and ostentatious almsgiving.
"Verily the hypocrites would deceive God; but he will deceive them! When they stand up for prayer, they stand carelessly to be seen of men, and they remember God but little"—Sura IV, 141.
"Woe then to those who pray,"
"Who in their prayer are careless;"
"Who make a show of devotion,"
"But refuse help to the needy."—Sura CVII, 4-7.
"And they fall down on their faces weeping, and it increaseth the humility."—Sura XVII, 110.
"O ye who believe! make not your alms void by reproaches and injury; like him who spendeth his substance to be seen of men, and believeth not in God and in the latter day. The likeness of such an one is that of a rock with a thin soil upon it, on which a heavy rain falleth, but leaveth it hard. No profit from their works shall they be able to gain; for God guideth not the unbelieving people."—Sura II, 266.
"We have made ready a shameful chastisement for the unbelievers, and for those who bestow their substance in alms to be seen of men, and believe not in God and in the last day. Whoever hath satan for his companion, an evil companion hath he!"—Sura IV, 42.
There are no indispensable hours or places to be observed for prayers. In Suras XI, 116; and IV, 104, the time of prayer is set down in general terms without specifying any fixed hour. There are some more times named in Suras XVII, 81, 82; XX, 130; L, 38, 39; and LII, 48, 49, but they are special cases for Mohammad himself, and "as an excess in the service." Vide Sura XVII, 81. On this subject Dr. Marcus Dods observes:—
"There are two features of the devout character which the Mohammedans have the merit of exhibiting with much greater distinctness than we do. They show not the smallest hesitation or fear in confessing God, and they reduce to practice the great principle that the worship of God is not confined to temples or any special place:—
"Most honour to the men of prayer,
Whose mosque is in them everywhere!
Who amid revel's wildest din,
In war's severest discipline,
On rolling deck, in thronged bazaar,
In stranger land, however far,
However different in their reach
Of thought, in manners, dress or speech,—
Will quietly their carpet spread.
To Mekkeh turn the humble head,
And, as if blind to all around,
And deaf to each distracting sound,
In ritual language God adore,
In spirit to his presence soar,
And in the pauses of the prayer,
Rest, as if rapt in glory there."
"There are of course formalists and hypocrites in Islam as well as in religions of which we have more experience. The uniformity and regularity of their prostrations resemble the movements of a well-drilled company of soldiers or of machines, but the Koran denounces "woe upon those who pray, but in their prayers are careless, who make a show of devotion, but refuse to help the needy;" while nowhere is formalism more pungently ridiculed than in the common Arabic proverb, "His head is towards the Kibleh, but his heels among the weeds." We could almost excuse a touch of formalism for the sake of securing that absolute stillness and outward decorum in worship which deceives the stranger as he enters a crowded mosque into the belief that it is quite empty. Persons who hold themselves excused from the duty of worship by every slight obstacle might do worse than get infected with the sublime formalism of Cais, son of Sad, who would not shift his head an inch from the place of his prostration, though a huge serpent lifted its fangs close to his face and finally coiled itself round his neck. And if some are formal, certainly many are very much in earnest."[157]