MOHAMMEDANISM. 



583 



iously, for he possessed a power to which no 

 other man in those regions could pretend. The 

 Ameer of Afghanistan consulted him as late as 

 the summer of 1877, while he was considering 

 the course which he should pursue in reference 

 to the Russo-Turkish war, and preparing to 

 take advantage of its result. He was regarded 

 as hostile to the Wahabees, and generally kept 

 on friendly terms by the British authorities. 



Persia, the largest state after Turkey under 

 Mohammedan government, contributes nothing 

 to the strength of the faith. Besides being 

 prostrate with poverty and powerless by reason 

 of misgovernment, it has been drawn largely 

 under the influence and control of the Russian 

 Empire, so that it is practically hardly in a 

 situation to act independently. It is further- 

 more alienated from the other states of Islam 

 by the religious differences between its Shiite 

 and their Sunnite schools of theology, which 

 separate Mohammedans as the controversies of 

 the Greek and Latin Churches separated the 

 Christians during the middle ages. The Rev. 

 J. H. Shedd, who has lived in this country for 

 several years as a Presbyterian missionary, 

 gives four reasons for styling Persia the weak 

 point of Mohammedanism : 1. The people are 

 sectaries arrayed against the orthodox faith of 

 the Turks, Arabs, and Tartars, and more ready 

 to turn for sympathy and aid to Christians 

 than to their Sunnite enemies. 2. The Persians 

 are constitutionally of a more liberal spirit 

 than the other Moslem nations ; they grant of 

 their own accord the toleration to other reli- 

 gions that has had to be wrung from Turkey, 

 and permit free discussion and even invite it. 

 3. The Mohammedan system is more divided 

 against itself than in any other land. It was 

 forced upon the people by conquest and under 

 protest, and u in every age these protests have 

 been renewed by new heretical sects. During 

 the last twenty years the whole body of Mos- 

 lems has been shaken by the new religion of 

 the Bab. Immense numbers are adherents of 

 a mystical faith derived from pre-Islamitic 

 times." The recognized leader of this sect is 

 at Teheran, and it is growing in numbers and 

 influence, drawing its forces from Mohamme- 

 dans. It also favors toleration. The effect of 

 the new religions and the unsettling of the 

 faith of the people has been such that, says 

 Mr. Shedd, " the missionaries stand amazed at 

 the change of temper in the Moslem popula- 

 tion within a few years." The fourth element 

 of weakness in Persian Mohammedanism, ac- 

 cording to this writer, is that the system has 

 failed so palpably that thousands of the people 

 acknowledge its failure and are ready to trace 

 the bulk of their misfortunes to it. 



The principal western Mohammedan khan- 

 ates of Central Asia, once so fanatical that the 

 presence of a non-Mussulman stranger was not 

 tolerated in them, have been brought directly 

 or indirectly under the domination of Russia, 

 and taught to treat Western visitors with cour- 

 tesy. The Mohammedans of these khanates are 



said to have repeatedly expressed their sympa- 

 thy for the Russian armies and contributed 

 liberally to the Russian Red Cross Society, 

 during the Russo-Turkish war; and the ad- 

 vances of Russian troops toward Bokhara and 

 Afghanistan, made in 1878, in anticipation 

 of difficulties with England, it is represented, 

 " elicited new manifestations of good will on the 

 part of the Mohammedan population." The 

 Chinese have crushed the Mohammedan insur- 

 rection in their western provinces, and have 

 reconquered Kashgaria, the Mohammedan state 

 founded by Yakoob Beg, who called himself 

 Attalik Ghazi, or champion of the faith. The 

 object of the British-Indian war with Afghan- 

 istan was, virtually, to determine whether Eng- 

 lish or Russian influence should predominate 

 in the last Moslem state of the East which re- 

 mained wholly independent. The Afghans 

 have been regarded as among the most fanati- 

 cal and bigoted Mohammedan people, and pe- 

 culiarly jealous of foreigners ; but Mr. Hughes, 

 of Peshawer, stated at the General Conference 

 on Foreign Missions held in London in October, 

 1878, that they received the missionaries of 

 the Church Missionary Society with "much 

 kindness," that the Ameer had presided at the 

 mission-house in 1869, and that the mission- 

 aries had always been on more or less friendly 

 relations with some of the members of the 

 reigning family. The conquest of Kashgaria 

 by the Chinese and the occupation of a part of 

 Afghanistan by the British-Indian forces, the 

 former an event of 1877, the latter of 1878, 

 have still further reduced the extent of Mo- 

 hammedan territory, curtailed Mohammedan 

 power, and diminished Mohammedan prestige. 

 The text of the Koran and religious duties 

 are taught in countless village neighborhoods 

 and private schools in all Mohammedan coun- 

 tries, from the Adriatic Sea to the extreme 

 East Indian islands, and from Mongolia to the 

 interior of Africa ; but little else is taught in 

 them, and practical education is almost, and 

 scientific education wholly, unknown. The 

 recitations of the Koran are in Arabic, and are 

 unintelligible to all pupils except those of that 

 nativity. Instruction in arithmetic is limited 

 to an imperfect comprehension of the four 

 fundamental rules ; and the scientific teaching 

 of geography is made impossible by the neces- 

 sity of adhering to the cosmogony of the Ko- 

 ran. The university of the Great Mosque of 

 El Azar, at Cairo, is famed throughout the 

 world of Islam, and is resorted to by more 

 than ten thousand students, who come to it 

 from Morocco, Algeria, Soodan, Darfoor, Ara- 

 bia, Zanzibar, Turkistan, Persia, India, and 

 Malaya, as well as from Egypt and Turkey; 

 but nothing is taught at it except the Koran 

 and the literature of the Koran. The medres- 

 sehs of Bokhara are likewise attended by stu- 

 dents from all parts of Asia, from Afghanistan, 

 Persia, India, and the lands of the Volga, in 

 such numbers that the city has been called the 

 Rome of the Mohammedan world; but they 



