MOHAMMED 



247 



the messenger of God or at least as the Prince of 

 Arabia, and the year 8 of the Hegira was therefore 

 called the year of the Deputations. Once more lie 

 made most extensive preparations for a war against 

 the Syrian subjects of Byzantium ; but, not being 

 able to bring together a sufficient army, he had to 

 be satisfied with tlie homage of a few minor princes 

 on his way to the frontiers. Towards the end of 

 the tenth year of the Hegira he undertook his last 

 solemn pilgrimage to Mecca, and there on Mount 

 Arafat fixed for all time the ceremonies of the 

 pilgrimage (Hajj); and he again solemnly ex- 

 horted his believers to righteousness and piety, 

 and chiefly recommended them to protect the 

 weak, the poor, and the women, and to abstain 

 from usury. 



Returned from Mecca, lie occupied himself again 

 with the carrying out of his expedition against 

 Syria, a necessary aid to religion and patriotism 

 in keeping his people together, but fell dangerously 

 ill very soon after his return. One night while 

 suffering from an attack of fever he went to the 

 cemetery of Medina and prayed and wept upon the 

 tombs, praising the dead, and wishing that tie him- 

 self might soon ! delivered from the storms of this 

 world. For a few more days he went alwut ; at 

 last, too weak further to visit his wives, he chose 

 the house of Ayeshah, situated near the mosque, as 

 his abode during his sickness. He continued to 

 take part in the public prayers as long as he could, 

 until at last, feeling that his hour had come, he once 

 more preached to the people recommending Abu 

 Bekr and Osama the son of Zaid as the generals 

 whom he had chosen for the army. He tlien asked 

 whether he hod wronged aiiv one, and read passages 

 from the Koran preparing the minds of his hearers 

 for his death and exhorting them to peace among 

 themselves. A few days afterwards lie asked for 

 writing materials, probably in order to fix his suc- 

 cessor as chief of tlie faithful ; but Omar, the most 

 iiiHucntinl of his followers and friends, fearing 

 he might chose AH while he himself inclined to 

 Abu Bekr, would not allow him to be furnished 

 with them. In his last wanderings he siH>ke only 

 of angels and heaven. He died in the lap of 

 Ayeshah aliout noon of Monday the 12th (llth) 

 of the third month in the year 11 of the Hegira 

 (Sih June 632). His death caused an immense 

 excitement and distress among the faithful ; and 

 Omar, who himself would not believe in it, tried 

 to persuade the people that he was still alive. But 

 Abu Bekr said to the assembled multitude : 'Who- 

 ever among you has served Mohammed let him 

 know that Mohammed is dead ; but he who has 

 served the God of Mohammed let him continue in 

 His service, for He is still alive and never dies.' 

 While his corpse was yet unbnried the quarrels 

 about his successor, whom he had not definitely 

 lieen able to appoint, commenced ; but finally Abu 

 Bekr received the homage of the principal Moslems 

 at Medina. Mohammed was then buried in the 

 night between the 9th and 10th of June, after 

 long discussions, in the house of Ayeshah, where 

 he had died, and which afterwards became part of 

 tli" iiiljoiniii" mosque. 



A man of Mohammed's extraordinary powers 

 and gifts is not to be judged by a modern common- 

 place standard ; the manners and morals of his 

 own time and country must also be taken into 

 ideration. He was at times deceitful, cunning, 

 rei-engeful, cowardly, addicted to sensuality, and 

 even a murderer. Yet not only his public station 

 as prophet, preacher, and prince, out also his 

 private character, his amiability, his faithfulness 

 towards friends, his tenderness towards his family, 

 and the frequent readiness to forgive an enemy must 

 be taken into consideration, liesides the extreme 

 simplicity of his domestic life ; he lived when 



already in full power in a miserable hut, mended 

 his own clothes, and freed all his slaves. And, to 

 do him full justice, his melancholic temperament, 

 his nervousness, which often bordered on frenzy and 

 brought him to the brink of suicide, and his poetic 

 temperament must not be forgotten. Altogether 

 his mind contained the strangest mixture of right 

 and wrong, of truth and error. Although his self- 

 chosen mission was the abolition of superstition, he 

 yet believed in jinns, omens, charms, and dreams 

 an additional reason against the now generally 

 abandoned notion that he was a vulgar designer, 

 who by no means deceived himself about those 

 revelations he pretended to have received. And 

 though the religion of Islam may rightly or wrongly 

 l)e considered the bane of eastern states and nations 

 in our day, it should be remembered that it is not 

 necessarily Islam that has caused the corruption, 

 as indeed its ethics are for the most part of a high 

 order ; and in the second place, that Mohammed 

 is not to be made res]w>nsible for all the errors of 

 his successors. Take him all in all, the history of 

 humanity has seen few more earnest, noble, and 

 sincere 'prophets,' men irresistibly impelled by an 

 inner power to admonish and to teach, and to utter 

 austere and sublime truths the full purport of which 

 is often unknown to themselves. 



See the Lives in German by Weil (1843), Sprenger 

 ( 1861-65 ), Niildeke ( 1863 ), Krehl ( vol. i. 1884 ) ; in French 

 by Delaporte (1874) ; and Sir W. Muir, Life of Mahomet 

 (4 vols. 1858-61; new ed. 1877), and Mahomet and Islam 

 ( 1887) ; also Syed Ameer Ali, C.I.E., The Life and Teach- 

 iniji of Muhammtd ( 1890). 



MOHAMMEDANISM, the religion founded by 

 Molmmmed, or, according to him, the only orthodox 

 creed existing from the beginning of the world, and 

 preached by all the prophets ever since Adam. It 

 is also called IslAm, ' Resignation,' entire Sub- 

 mission to the will and precepts of God. In its 

 exclusively dogmatical or theoretical part it is 

 ImAn, 'Faith;' in its practical, I)i>i, 'Religion.' 

 The fundamental principles of the former are con- 

 tained in the two articles of belief : ' There is no 

 God but God; and Mohammed is God's Apostle." 

 The Mohammedan doctrine of God's nature and 

 attributes coincides with the Christian, in so far 

 as He is by both declared to be the Creator of 

 all things in heaven and earth, who rules and pre- 

 serves all things, without beginning, omnipotent, 

 omniscient, omnipresent, and full of mercy. But, 

 according to the Mohammedan belief, He has no 

 offspring : 'He begetteth not, nor is He begotten.' 

 Nor is Jesus called anything but a prophet and 

 apostle, although His birth is said to have been 

 due to a miraculous divine operation ; and as the 

 Koran superseded the Gospel, so Mohammed super- 

 seded Christ. The crucifixion is said to have been 

 carried out upon another person, Christ having 

 been taken up unto God before the decree was put 

 into execution. Christ will come again upon the 

 earth to establish everywhere the Moslem religion, 

 and to be a sign of the coming of the day of judg- 

 ment. Next to the belief in God, that in angels 

 forms a prominent dogma. Created of fire, and 

 endowed with a kind of uncorporeal body, of no 

 sex, they stand lietween God and man, adoring or 

 waiting upon God, or interceding for anil guarding 

 man. The four chief angels are Gabriel, ' The Holy 

 Spirit' or 'Angel of Revelations;' Michael, the 

 special protector and guardian of the Jews; Raphael 

 ( A/.rael, Azratl ), the ' Angel of Death ; ' and Uriel 

 ( Israfil ), whose office it will be to sound the trumpet 

 at the Resurrection. Islam l>orro\ved its ideas of the 

 unseen world from the Persians or from the Jews, 

 who had borrowed them from the Persians (see 

 ANGEL). To each human being are appointed two 

 guardian angels. Besides angels, there are good 

 and evil genii, the chief of the latter, who are 



