The rigidity of the Sacred Law has been at times slightly
tempered by well-meaning and learned Moslems who have
tortured their brains in devising sophisms to show that
the legal principles and social system of the seventh
century can, by some strained and intricate process of
reasoning, be consistently and logically made to conform
with the civilized practices of the twentieth century.
But, as a rule, custom based on the religious law, coupled
with exaggerated reverence for the original lawgiver,
holds all those who cling to the faith of Islam with a
grip of iron from which there is no escape. “During the
Middle Ages,” it has been truly said, “man lived enveloped
in a cowl.” The true Moslem of the present day is even
more tightly enveloped by the sheriat.
In the third place, Islam does not, indeed, encourage, but
it tolerates slavery. “Mohammed found the custom existing
among the Pagan Arabs; he minimised the evil.” But he was
powerless to abolish it altogether. His followers have
forgotten the discouragement, and have very generally made
the permission to possess slaves the practical guide for
their conduct. This is another fatal blot in Islam.
Lastly, Islam has the reputation of being an intolerant
religion, and the reputation is, from some points of view,
well deserved, though the bald and sweeping accusation of
intolerance requires qualification and explanation. The
followers of the Prophet have, indeed, waged war against
those whom they considered infidels. They are taught by
their religious code that any unbelievers, who may be
made prisoners of war, may rightly be enslaved. Moreover,
sectarian strife has not been uncommon. Sunni has fought
against Shiah. The orthodox Moslem has mercilessly
repressed the followers of Abdul Wahab. Further, apostasy
from Islam is punishable with death, and it is not many
years ago that the sentence used to be carried into
effect. On the other hand, the annals of Islam are not
stained by the history of an Inquisition. More than this,
when he is not moved by any circumstances specially
calculated to rouse his religious passions, the Moslem
readily extends a half-contemptuous tolerance to the Jew
and the Christian. In the villages of Upper Egypt, the
Crescent and the Cross, the Mosque and the monastery,
have stood peacefully side by side for many a long
year.
—LORD CROMER in “Modern Egypt.”
All questions relating to the internal government of the Ottoman
empire would be greatly simplified and much more easily comprehended,
were the people of Turkey substantially of one race like those of
China or Japan. But this is not the case. As the Moslems overran
Syria, Mesopotamia, Armenia, and Asia Minor, they conquered peoples
of other races than themselves and of other religions. In their wars
of conquest the Mohammedans revealed a degree of toleration which is
to be commended. All conquered people were asked to embrace Islam.
If they persistently refused, they were conceded the right to live
upon the payment of an annual tribute _per capita_. The acceptance
of this condition was an outward recognition that the Moslems were
their masters, while the money thus obtained enabled the conquerors
to extend their conquests. Whoever declined to accept Islam and
refused to pay the life tax was put to the sword. This left within the
conquered districts only two classes, the Mohammedan rulers and those
who, by annual tribute, confessed themselves to be a conquered people,
permitted to live from year to year by virtue of the money paid.
It is most natural that this distinction, perpetuated for thirty
generations, should lead to aggravated relations of conqueror and
conquered. It was inevitable that the Moslems should become imperious
and the other people depressed and subservient.
In order to understand certain governmental and religious phases of
the Turkish empire, it is essential that we look a little in detail
into the history and characteristics of these divergent elements of
its population which together make up the populations of that country.
It is a subject preeminently of races and religions. Within the empire
there is only one unifying force and that is Mohammedanism. All who
embrace Islam, irrespective of the race from which they sprang, become
an integral part of the governing body. Such begin at once to use
either the Turkish or the Arabic language and to bear the name “Turk.”
Besides this one unifying force, there is no tendency to bring
together the different races or to amalgamate them. There is little
intermarriage. Each race has its own language and its distinct
religion. To them all religion is racial, or, as they call it,
“national.” A man without a religion is beyond their conception; and
under the laws of the empire he can have no place in any community or
possess any rights that others are bound to respect. Each man, woman,
and child must be registered upon the rolls of some national church.
There his name stands, and in that record his rights inhere until he
changes to Islam. Turkey allows few rights or privileges to one not a
registered member of a religious community.
We will consider briefly a few of the old historical and, in some
cases, once powerful races, now found in that empire, and among which
mission work is carried on. Only by acquaintance with these races can
we understand the real factors in the problem.
There are the many non-Moslem races of Syria, the country first
overrun by the Moslem invaders as they pushed their way northward. The
races who occupy that country in connection with perhaps one million
Mohammedans are the Nusairiyeh, the Maronites, Greeks and Armenians,
Jacobites, Druses, and Jews. The three mentioned here especially
peculiar to Syria are the Nusairiyeh, the Maronites, and the Jews.