302 THE KORAN. 



equivalent to custom or institute, and somewhat re- 

 sembles the Jewish Mishna.* 



Of these collections six are held in peculiar es- 

 teem. One was made by Abu Horaira, a constant 

 attendant on Mohammed, who nicknamed him the 

 Father of a Cat, — an animal of which he was par- 

 ticularly fond, and carried always about with him. 

 That formed by Abu Abdallah of Bokhara is pecu- 

 liarly famous. Two hundred years after the Pro- 

 phet's death he selected 7275 genuine traditions from 

 100,000 of a doubtful, and 200,000 more of a spurious 

 character. This collection was compiled at Mecca, 

 and is adopted by the Sonnees. 



Neither the simplicity of his creed, nor the terroi 

 of the sword, nor the exhortations of the pulpit 

 could establish that unanimity of sentiment which 

 Mohammed professed so ardently to desire. The 

 spirit of division, which appeared among his follow- 

 ers even before his death, broke out with greater 

 violence under his successors. The Mussulman 

 sects have been far more numerous and violent than 

 those of Christianity ; and the history of the mosque 

 presents as melancholy a view of the weakness of 

 the human heart, and tifie pride of the human intel- 

 lect, as is afforded by the annals of the church. 

 Volumes might be fdled with their names and their 

 tenets. The same knotty points in scholastic the- 

 ology that puzzled the divines of Christendom, — the 



* The only complete work in the English language expressly 

 on these traditionary la^vs, is a translation of the Mischat ul 

 Masabih, or " Niche for holding the Lamp." The English ver- 

 sion is by Captain Matthews of the Royal Artillery, and was 

 pubUshed at Calcutta, in 2 vols. 4to,in 1809. The Mischat was 

 properly 'a commentary on the Masabih ul Sunnat, or "Lamp 

 of Religious Observances," collected by the Imam Hussein of 

 Bagdad, who died A. H. 516. Another juridical commentary is 

 the Hadaya, a work of very high authority in all Moslem coun- 

 tries where the Sonnee faith prevails. In 1791, Colonel Charles 

 Hamilton published an English edition, in 4 vols. 4to. The first 

 volume of Colonel Baillie's Digest of Mohammedan Law was 

 pubUshed at Calcutta in 180.5. 



