Discoveries Among the Ruins of Nineveh and BabylonLayard, Austen Henry
History
Discoveries Among the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon
Layard, Austen Henry
Babylon (Extinct city); Middle East -- Description and travel; Nineveh (Extinct city); Scientific expeditions
They believe that Christ will come to govern the world, but that after him
Sheikh Medi will appear, to whom will be given special jurisdiction over
those speaking the Kurdish language, including the Yezidis (this is
evidently a modern interpolation, derived from Mussulman sources, perhaps
invented to conciliate the Mohammedans).
All who go to heaven must first pass an expiatory period in hell, but no
one will be punished eternally. Mohammedans they exclude from all future
life, but not Christians. (This may have been said to avoid giving
offence.)
The Yezidis will not receive converts to their faith; circumcision is
optional. When a child is born near enough to the tomb of Sheikh Adi, to
be taken there without great inconvenience or danger, it should be
baptized as early as possible after birth. The Cawals in their periodical
visitations carry a bottle or skin filled with the holy water, to baptize
those children who cannot be brought to the shrine.
There are forty days fast in the spring of the year, but they are observed
by few; one person in a family may fast for the rest.[30] They should
abstain during that period as completely as the Chaldæans from animal
food. Sheikh Nasr fasts rigidly for one month in the year, eating only
once in twenty-four hours and immediately after sunset.
Only one wife is strictly lawful, although the chief takes more; but
concubines are not forbidden. The wife may be turned away for great
misconduct, and the husband, with the consent of the Sheikhs, may marry
again; but the discarded wife never can. Even such divorces ought only to
be given in cases of adultery; for formerly, when the Yezidis administered
their own temporal laws, the wife was punished with death, and the husband
of course was then released.
The religious, as well as the political, head of all Yezidis, wherever
they may reside, is Hussein Bey, who is called the Kalifa, and he holds
this position by inheritance. As he is young and inexperienced, he deputes
his religious duties to Sheikh Nasr. Sheikh Nasr is only the chief of the
Sheikhs of the district of Sheikhan. The Cawals are all of one family, and
are under the orders of Hussein Bey, who sends them periodically to
collect the voluntary contributions of the various tribes. The amount
received by them is divided into two equal parts, one of which goes to the
support of the tomb of Sheikh Adi, and half of the other to Hussein Bey,
the remainder being equally shared by the Cawals. Neither the priests nor
Hussein Bey ever shave their beards. They ought not to marry out of their
own order, and though the men do not observe this rule very strictly, the
women are never given in marriage to one out of the rank of the
priesthood. Hussein Bey ought to take his wife from the family of Chul
Beg.
After death, the body of a Yezidi, like that of a Mohammedan, is washed in
running water, and then buried with the face turned towards the north
star.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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