ISLAM, THE FUTURE OF. 



443 



caliphate distinct from and independent of the 

 Ottoman sultanate. This was the central idea 

 of the agitation which prevailed in Syria while 

 Midhat Pasha was governor there; it is the 

 practical motive to which life is given by the 

 expectancy shared by all the Arabs of the 

 speedy coming of a Mohdy or guide who is to 

 appear as a chief to unite and purify Islam 

 and restore its prestige ; and it is a paramount 

 object of the rising of the tribes which is 

 threatened in North Africa, and which is be- 

 lieved to be directed as much against Turkish 

 authority as against European aggression. 



A correspondent of the London u Times," 

 who appears to have gained a fairly intelligible 

 view of the intrigues of the Ottoman court, 

 has written to that journal from Constantino- 

 ple, January 12, 1882, an account of the con- 

 sultations that are going on within the palace 

 of the Sultan relative to the declaration of the 

 Ottoman caliphate. At the Sublime Porte all 

 is still outwardly European in its aspect ; but 

 at the imperial palace Asiatic methods and 

 Pan-Islamic thought prevail, and it is here 

 that the radical transformation which Turkish 

 statesmanship has undergone during the present 

 Sultan's reign must be studied. The object of 

 raising Turkey to an honorable place among 

 the European powers, and making Constanti- 

 nople one of the great European capitals, which 

 had guided Turkish diplomacy for the fifty 

 years previous to the beginning of the present 

 reign, has been exchanged for that of making 

 the Ottoman Empire the nucleus of a new uni- 

 versal caliphate, and Constantinople the po- 

 litical center of the Mohammedan world ; and 

 the Sultan draws his inspiration from men who 

 are in sympathy with this ambition, and seeks 

 European advice only so far as he can use it to 

 assist him in accomplishing its object. Ac- 

 cording to this writer, whose view does not 

 otherwise differ from those of other observers, 

 the project of a united Islam under the Otto- 

 man caliphs dates from the present reign ; and 

 the patriotism of Abdul-Aziz and the party of 

 Young Turkey was of a Turkish, not of a Mo- 

 hammedan, kind. As long as it appeared pos- 

 sible or probable that Turkey would continue 

 to be able to find a patron among the Christian 

 powers, the Turks were willing to be satisfied 

 to have affairs go on in the old traditional 

 way ; and it was not till the Russian Govern- 

 ment had displayed its real policy in the Treaty 

 of San Stefano, and the Congress of Berlin had 

 shown that Turkey had no longer any Chris- 

 tian protector, that the Turks began to feel 

 that they had nothing to hope from Christen- 

 dom, and the ground was prepared for Pan- 

 Islamist theories. Under the indignation that 

 was excited against the Sultan and his dynasty 

 for the destruction of Turkish prestige under 

 their rule, a plan was formed for the elevation 

 to the caliphate of the Shereef of Mecca. In 

 order to forestall suspicion, the scheme was 

 communicated to the Sultan in a disguised 

 form, in which its real aim was concealed be- 



neath a pretense of working for an Islamitic 

 union under the sovereignty of the Sultan. 

 Abdul-Hamid, whose capacity is recognized 

 and appreciated by all observers of Turkish 

 affairs, detected the real nature of the scheme, 

 and, dexterously checkmating his enemies, 

 turned it to his own advantage by putting him- 

 self at the head of it. He enlisted, to aid him 

 in carrying it out, Sheik Zaffer, a Tripolitan, 

 who had long been his spiritual director ; Munif 

 Effendi, now Munif Pasha, who had been Min- 

 ister of Public Instruction; Abdul Huda, a 

 young sheik of an old Aleppine Arab family ; 

 Ghazi Osman, the hero of Plevna; and Beh- 

 ram Aga, the chief eunuch. Schemes for re- 

 forming and renovating the native institutions 

 in accordance with certain old principles were 

 undertaken and abandoned, after a short trial 

 under the administration of Khairredin Pasha. 

 Plans for extending the influence of the coun- 

 try to foreign populations were pressed more 

 vigorously and persistently. Personages of 

 distinction in all parts of the Mussulman world 

 were encouraged to visit Constantinople, and 

 received there a liberal hospitality and marked 

 consideration. The agents who were sent 

 abroad in the interest of the scheme were re- 

 ceived with favor in the most distant countries. 

 The Mussulmans of India were well impressed 

 with it, and a special organ in the Urdu lan- 

 guage, called the " Peik Islam," was founded at 

 Constantinople to keep them informed respect- 

 ing it. In Afghanistan the propaganda was 

 encouraged by England ; and the special envoy 

 of the Sultan, who was sent to Cabool to warn 

 Shere All against too intimate relations with 

 Russia, told, on his return to Constantinople, 

 how the people had crowded around him in 

 order to have the honor of touching the gar* 

 ment of an envoy of the Caliph. The scheme 

 was resisted for a time by the Shereef Hussein 

 of Mecca and the Khedive of Egypt, but these 

 princes were put out of the way, the former 

 by assassination, the latter by deposition. Since 

 then the idea of the caliphate has made rapid 

 progress on the eastern coast of the Red Sea 

 and in the valley of the Nile. The dispositions 

 of the people of the land which formerly com- 

 posed the Western Caliphate were at first ad- 

 verse, but were changed by the French inva- 

 sion of Tunis, which " aroused the dormant 

 hatred of the infidel, and transformed from a 

 harmless theory into a very dangerous reality 

 the Sultan's caliphal pretensions with regard 

 to Northern Africa." The danger of these 

 pretensions, in the view of the correspondent 

 of the " Times," does not lie in any probability 

 of the Sultan being able to create a vast Pan- 

 Islamic empire, but in the possibility that the 

 Mussulmans who live beyond the limits of the 

 Ottoman Empire, and who owe allegiance to 

 sovereigns other than the Sultan, should be 

 brought under the influence of Constantino- 

 ple, and that this influence should be used 

 at critical moments to produce popular sedi- 

 tion and insurrection a possibility that has 



