474 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



THE YEZIDEES, OR DEVIL-WORSHIPERS. 



By dr. L. E. brow ski. 



THE Yezidees, sometimes called " Devil-worshipers/' are one of 

 the lialf -dozen curious and interesting sects outside of Islam 

 who live in Mesopotamia. But little is known of their inner 

 life except to the initiated, for they resist all attempts to ques- 

 tion them ; and, when driven into a corner, will put off the in- 

 quirer with a fiction. The acceptation of these stories as true 

 has been the origin of mistaken conceptions concerning them. 

 Complete reservation of their religious precepts from strangers is 

 one of their most binding obligations. To make secrecy more 

 effective, the founder of the sect. Sheik Adi, decreed that only a 

 single person at a time should be initiated into the mysteries, and 

 designated as the person to whom the secret should be confided, 

 the eldest heir of the tribe of Hassan el Bassri. Previous to his 

 initiation this person is to be instructed in written Arabic, knowl- 

 edge of which is forbidden to all others of the race, under penalty 

 of death and loss of eternal salvation. The instruction takes 

 place in a room from which all other persons are excluded. The 

 text-book is the Koran, the only book obtainable in the country ; 

 but as this book contains many unflattering mentions of the 

 devil, whose name no Yezidee must hear or pronounce or read, a 

 friendly Christian is employed to procure the copy to be used and 

 carefully cover all places where the devil is named with wax. If 

 now by any accident the devil's name should be seen on the page 

 during the studies, the book is shut at once, with an invocation, 

 and thrown into the fire, and another one is procured. When the 

 course of instruction is comi^leted, the Koran is burned at once, 

 because it is a wicked, blasphemous book, which should not be 

 tolerated in the house of a Yezidee except under the sternest 

 necessity. Instead of being devil-worshipers, as they are com- 

 monly called, the Yezidee religion is so fortunate as to have no 

 devil. 



By a most extraordinary accident the author obtained the 

 sacred book of the Yezidees, whose place of concealment is known 

 only to the single initiated, and was able to keep it long enough 

 to copy it. Previous to entering upon the analysis of its con- 

 tents, it will be proper to give a short account of the Yezidee 

 people. They belong to the Kurdish race, and claim a population 

 of three million souls. They are distributed in villages, residence 

 in cities being forbidden, a few living in the provinces of Damas- 

 cus, Aleppo, and Diarbekir, a greater number in the province of 

 Mosul and the Russian district of Erivan. They are all subject, 

 body and soul, to a chief who must be of the family of Sheik Adi, 



