585th OKDINAKY GENERA.L MEETING. 



HELD IN COMMITTEE ROOM B, THE CENTRAL HALL, 

 WESTMINSTER, ON MONDAY, FEBRUARY 5th, 1917. 

 E. J. Sewell, Esq., in the Chair. 



The Minutes of ihe previous Meeting were read and signed. 



The Secretary announced the election of the Rev. W. Dodgson Sjkes, 

 M.A., as a Member ; and of the Rev. Edward Thomas Lea, M.A., J. O. 

 Kinnaman, Esq., A.M., Ph.D., and Ernest E. Grimwood, Esq., as 

 Associates of the Institute. 



The Chairman called upon the Secretary to read a paper on " Islam 

 and Animism," in the absence of the Author : — 



ISLAM AND ANIMISM. By the Rev. S. M. Zwemer, 



M.A., D.D. 



THAT Islam is a composite faith is clear, not only from its 

 origin, but from its present-day character and its histori- 

 cal development. Its three-fold source was Judaism, Arab 

 Paganism, and Christianity. These heterogeneous elements of 

 Islam were gathered in Arabia at a time when many religions 

 had penetrated the Peninsula, and the Kaaba (or Sacred House) 

 was a Pantheon. Unless one has a knowledge of these elements 

 of the " times of ignorance," Islam is a problem. Knowing, 

 however, these heathen, Christian, and Jewish factors, Islam 

 is seen to be a natural and comprehensible development. Its 

 heathen. Christian, and Jewish elements remain, to this day, 

 perfectly recognizable, in spite of thirteen centuries of explana- 

 tion by the Moslem commentators. Rabbi Geiger, in his 

 celebrated essay, first pointed out how much Islam owes tQ 

 Judaism ;* and in his book. The Original Sources of the Quran, 

 the Rev. W. St. Clair Tisdall, D.D., devotes a chapter to the 

 influences of ancient Arabian beliefs and practices on Islam. 

 There is no doubt that at the very outset Mohammed introduced 



* Was hat Mohammed am dem Judenthmn aufgenommen^ von Abraham 

 Geiger, Bonn, 1833. 



