Some faint-hearted Hebrews, who perhaps suspected what was coming, were diplomatic enough to swallow the new faith entire, thereby winning from Mohammed the appellation of “Witnesses.” Abdallah, son of Salam, was a shining example. Having slyly induced his brethren to give him a character testimonial before they knew that he was about to become a renegade, he presented it to the Prophet who was so pleased that he assured Abdallah he was already in Paradise--even Sa’d, chief of the Aus, had not received a comparable congratulation. But Abdallahs among the Jews were rare. Most of them continued to snicker at the hilarious ignorance and bombast revealed in Mohammed’s homiletical discourses, to disregard Allah’s grim warning that they should repent and turn to Islam “before We deface your countenances, turning the face backwards,” and to wax fat on the miseries of the Moslems. On the other hand, the Moslems themselves no longer made any effort to conceal their desire to hold their noses when they were compelled to approach the Jews on business matters; and the Prophet himself shortly decided to put a summary end to all attempts at reconciliation and brotherhood. Perhaps the success that attended his decision to fight during the sacred months suggested the idea that he was now strong enough to break definitely with the Jews. One day, not long afterward, while he stood at prayer in the Mosque with his face turned as usual toward the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem, he received a lightning revelation to turn “toward the holy Temple of Mecca. Wheresoever ye be, when ye pray, turn toward the same.” The divine injunction came just after he had prostrated himself twice toward Jerusalem; quick as a flash he reversed himself--an action instinctively followed by all the automatons in the audience--and faced toward the south until the service was ended. This symbolic event signalized his determination henceforth to separate himself wholly from the Jews, as well as to gratify the atavistic longings of his zealots who had never quite succeeded in relinquishing their love for the Black Stone and the Kaba; then too, Mohammed had grown very tired of listening to a favorite Hebraic taunt: “This Prophet of yours knew not where to find his Kibla [house of worship] till we pointed it out to him.” The Jews, who fully understood the sinister significance of Mohammed’s sudden right-about-face, were much perturbed; and they had reason to be, for he lost no time in sundering every tie that connected the worship of Allah with Hebraic ceremonies. He commanded the Moslems to keep their fast before or after the Jewish Day of Atonement; he once more followed the Arabic custom of combing his hair instead of letting it drift loose, as the Jews did; he altered the Moslem funeral rites so that they again corresponded to the immemorial Pagan ritual; and he changed the regulations pertaining to the lunar indisposition of females to a