The Jew, The Gypsy and El IslamBurton, Richard Francis, Sir
Islamic
The Jew, The Gypsy and El Islam
Burton, Richard Francis, Sir
Islam; Jews; Romanies
The original Yoni becomes a Da'asah, or footprint of Hazrat
Ali; and the sacred alligator of the Hindus is revered as the creation
of a Muslim saint. Thus in Ceylon Buddha’s retreat has become Adam’s
Peak. The description of St. Mary and the Holy Infant resting in the
shade of the sycamore tree of Heliopolis in the old apocryphal gospels
is clearly borrowed from the old Egyptian symbol, Isis with Horus in
her lap sitting under the Hiero-sycaminon. In the incorporations of
traditions then current amongst the Arab Christians there is no valid
reason for charging Muhammad with fraud.
To rank the Saving Faith amongst the religions of the world, it is
necessary briefly to relate what its founder did for mankind. A youth
of noble origin, but fallen fortunes, as was the Prophet of Nazareth,
he was strengthened like the Jewish Lawgiver Moses by travel, solitude,
and meditation. Jebel Hira was his Mount Horeb. But though surrounded
by learned Jew and Christian, his education was defective; and though,
a genuine Arab, he thought strongly and clearly, and he was a perfect
master of eloquence, he had none of that knowledge which passes for a
preternaturalism amongst a barbarous people. His probity won for him
in early manhood the surname of El Amin, or the Trusty, and his noble
qualities enabled him to marry the wealthy widow in whose service he
had lived a hireling.
After a long course of meditation, fired with anger by the absurd
fanaticism of the Jews, the superstitions of the Syrian and
Arabian Christians, and the horrid idolatries of his unbelieving
countrymen, an enthusiast too--and what great soul has not been an
enthusiast?--he determined to reform those abuses which rendered
revelation contemptible to the learned and prejudicial to the vulgar.
He introduced himself as one inspired to a body of his relations and
fellow-clansmen. The step was a failure, except that it won for him
a proselyte worth a thousand sabres in the person of Ali, son of Abu
Talib. With an uncommon mixture of prudence and energy he pursued his
task till he overcame the hate, the ridicule, and the persecution of
such men as Abubekr, Umar, and Usman. Expelled by the violence of
his enemies, he fled his native city--a wonderful contrast to the
fierceness and the impatience of his race. But after a long course of
meekness and longsuffering in the work of proselytizing, his spirit,
like that of Moses, rose high against violence and oppression, and at
last--for he was an Arab--abrogating his peaceful precepts he appealed
to the God of Battles in his combat for a righteous cause. Heroes and
mighty men like Hamzah Khalid and Amru el Ays flocked to his standard,
and his personal valour and high qualities as a guerilla soldier soon
led him on to fortune. After several years’ exile, he re-entered as a
visitor the walls of his native city, whence he had fled persecuted and
proscribed. And he lived long enough to witness the splendid success of
his early projects.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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