On a great feast day, while the hermits bearing the cross went in procession around the church, they saw, hanging on a tree, a piece of paper with this inscription: “O ye devout monks! Let it be known to you that God has forgiven all your sins, great and small; cease to undergo religious exercises; leave your hermitage; disperse, marry and rear children. Peace be unto you!” On the second day they observed the same thing, and were led to dispute among themselves whether this were a device of God or of a devil. When on the third day the same incident was repeated, they agreed to leave the abbey and follow what seemed to them a divine order. Šeiḫ ‘Adi, the legend goes on, had foretold to the Yezidis of that district that the monks of this monastery would desert their place, would become Yezidis, would marry and beget children; that he would die during that time; and that he wishes his followers to pull down the altar of the church in that priory and bury him there. Shortly after the fulfilment of his prophecy, the Šeiḫ died, and was entombed in the place of the altar. And since that time, it is asserted, the spot has become the sanctuary of the devil-worshippers. In support of this statement, it is argued, that there was a Syriac inscription in the temple mentioning the name of the founder of the monastery and the patriarch in whose time it was built; that some of the Yezidis themselves bear testimony to this fact, and say they have removed the writing from its former place and have hidden it at the entrance to ‘Adi’s temple, a spot the whereabouts of which only a few of them know. The reason why this record is hidden, it is explained, is the fear that the Nestorians may see it and reclaim the church.[84] Such is the eastern Christian’s tradition relative to the origin of the Yezidis. It is, of course, merely a legend; but its character is such as to require careful examination and critical study. It may embody a measure of truth that will indirectly throw some light on the subject in hand. One noticeable thing regarding this current view is that it is not a recent invention; else it might be said to be the creation of ignorance at a time far removed from the event which it records. Assemani, himself an oriental of distinguished scholarship, in that part of his book wherein he treats of the religion of Mesopotamia, according to the natives of the country, says that the Yezidis were at one time Christians, who, however, in the course of time, had forgotten the fundamental principles of their faith.[85] This statement is incorporated in the writings of all western orientals that have travelled in the East.[86]