third and fourth centuries an equally safe asylum to the persecuted
Zoroastrians, Jews and Christians who settled in various parts of the
Peninsula. The kings of Himyar were themselves idolaters but allowed
every other sect great freedom, including the Christians. But no sooner
did the followers of Judaism gain power than persecution began. About
the year 560, Dzu Nowass, ruler of Himyar, revolted against his lord
the Abyssinian king, Elesbaan, and, instigated by the Jews, began to
persecute the Christians. All who refused to renounce their faith were
put to death without respect of age or sex, and the villages of Nejran
were given over to plunder. Large pits were dug, filled with fuel, and
many thousands of monks and virgins were committed to the flames.
Speedy punishment, however, overtook Dzu Nowass when the Abyssinian
hosts invaded Yemen. The Christian conquerors avenged the massacre on
its perpetrators, the Jews, with heathen fury. The whole fertile tract
was once more a scene of bloodshed and devastation. The churches built
before the days of Dzu Nowass were again rebuilt on the site of their
ruins and new bishops were appointed in place of the martyrs. A short,
though desperate, civil war, resulting in the proclamation of Abraha
as king of Yemen, did not disturb the steady growth of Christianity.
Paying tribute only to the Abyssinian crown, and at peace with all the
Arab tribes, Abraha was loved for his justice and moderation by all his
subjects and idolized by the Christians for his burning zeal in their
religion. Large numbers of Jews, convinced by a public dispute and a
miracle at Dhafar, were baptized. Many idolaters were added to the
church; new schemes of benevolence were inaugurated; the foundations
were being laid for a magnificent cathedral at Sana; in short Christian
Yemen seemed at the dawn of its Golden Age in the year 567 A. D.
What delayed its coming and how did the power of Abraha lose its
prestige? The story is gleaned from Moslem and Christian writers; it
is the last sad chapter in the short history of early Christianity in
Arabia and the preface to the chronicles of Islam. So important is it
considered that the synopsis of it is embodied in the Koran for the
perpetual delight of Moslems. (Surah of the Elephant.)
In the early fall of the year 568, the caravans of Arabs, which came
along the level road leading from Rhoda, bordered with rich vineyards
and fig-orchards, stopped, on entering Sana, because of a crowd that
stood gazing at a large piece of parchment nailed on the side wall of
the entrance to the city. It was a royal proclamation written in large
Himyaritic letters. A townsman in the long dress of a public teacher
stood before it and read aloud to the motley crowd that paused as
they came to morning market from the neighboring villages. Stately
camels, bearing huge loads of dates, were urged by their drivers, who
good-humoredly exchanged greetings with their Christian brethren;
donkeys, nearly hidden between baskets of luscious grapes, jostled a
group of Jewish money-changers sitting in the gate; a score of women,
dark-eyed and in picturesque peasant dress, were carrying their empty
gerbies to the wells—but one and all moved with curiosity, stood for a
moment to listen.
The presbyter, for such he was, read as follows:
“I, Ibraha, by the grace of God and Jesus Christ our Saviour, king of
Yemen, taking counsel and advice of the good Gregentius, bishop of
Dhafar, and having completed the building of the cathedral to the glory
of God and in memory of our victory over the idolaters, do now and
hereby proclaim that all the Arab tribes who annually visit the heathen
shrine at Mecca, are expected to cease going thither and to come with
their caravans of merchandise to worship the true God, on a shorter and
more convenient journey to our magnificent church at Sana, the capital,
on penalty of a levy to be put by me on all caravans of tribes that
refuse to obey this proclamation. And be it furthermore known to all
the tribes of Koreish....” The reader was rudely interrupted by a party
of Bedouin who drove their dromedaries right through the gate and up
the street with such fury that some of the crowd barely escaped being
run over.
“It is a troop of those accursed Kenanehs,” said Ibn Choza to his
companion. “They were born without manners—wild asses of the desert.”
“Yes,” answered the other; “and who insult our good king with their
nickname of El Ashram,—the split nosed,—because of the scar that
remains since his encounter with the heathen Aryat.” “If such as these,
Abood, do not obey this latest order from our Christian king, we’ll try
the spears of my Modarites, and then woe betide their caravans of semn
and their fertile palms. Not all the three hundred gods of the Kaabeh
could save them from the righteous wrath of Abraha.”
The new cathedral, whose ruined foundations yet testify as to its size
and solidity, had been completed for some months, and on the morrow
the good bishop was expected from Dhafar to preach to the crowds that
thronged Yemen’s capital at the feast. This year more strangers than
ever before crowded the markets; many were come, in obedience to the
proclamation, even from distant Yathrib and from beyond Nejran, to
engage in commerce and religion at once,—the universal custom of the
Arabs. The autumn rains were over and a fresh breeze from Jebel Nokum
increased the cold, felt by such strangers especially, as came for the
first time from the hot coast to an elevation of 9,000 feet.
Night fell on the towers and palaces of Sana, and there was no light in
the streets except that of stars shining with northern brilliancy from
between drifting clouds. Just before midnight, a solitary Arab hurried
along one of the narrow paths, too narrow to be called a street, which
led from the caravanseri to the church. His face and form were wrapped
in a long sheepskin cloak, but his erect bearing, vigorous step, and
the carved silver handle of the curved dagger, half hidden in his
belt, betrayed one of the Kenaneh tribe. Stealthily looking around,
he stopped before one of the windows of the cathedral; lifted himself
to the granite ledge, dextrously used his dagger to remove one of the
large panes of talc-stone (still used in all Sana), and jumped inside.
He lingered only a few moments, came out as he went in, and hurried off
toward the way of the North gate.
On the morrow a cry arose from the early worshippers, carried on the
lips of every Christian in Sana, till it echoed through market and
street: “_Abraha’s church has been defiled!_ Dung is on the altar, and
the holy cross is smeared with ordure! ’Tis the work of the accursed
Kenaneh—the signal of revolt for the idolaters of the North!” There was
tumult in Sana. In vain Gregentius endeavored to quiet the populace
by his eloquence. Adding fuel to the flame, came the news on the
same day of the defeat of the Modarites and the death of Ibn Choza,
whom the king had sent on an expedition to a rebellious tribe in Wady
Dauasir. Abraha’s wrath was doubly inflamed by the profanation of his
church and the death of his captain. He publicly vowed to annihilate
the idolatrous Koreish, as well as the Kenaneh, and to demolish their
temple at Mecca. Before nightfall that vow was the rallying-cry in the
soldiers’ quarter and the toast in every Jewish wine shop of Sana.
The expedition was soon on its way. Abraha rode foremost, seated on
his milk-white elephant, caparisoned with plates of gold. On his head
was a linen cap covered with gold embroidery, and from which descended
four chains. He wore a loose tunic covered with pearls and Yemen akeek
stone, over his usual dress; while his muscular arms and short neck
were almost hidden with bracelets and chains of gold in the Abyssinian
pattern; for arms he had a shield and spears. After him came a band
of musicians, and then the nobles and warriors, under command of
the valiant Kais. Than him no better leader could have been chosen.
Mourning the untimely death of his brother, Ibn Choza, slain by the
treacherous arrow of Orwa, he sought a personal revenge even more than
the honor of his religion and his king, and was prepared to risk all
in fulfillment of the expedition. The army, increased by volunteers
at every village on their route, by forced marches over two hundred
miles of mountain road, reached Jebel Orra, weary and footsore. What is
only a usual journey to the Bedouin of the North, was a succession of
hardships to the Yemen troops, accustomed as they were to mountain air,
plenty of water and the rich fertility of their native valleys. No less
did the herd of elephants suffer from the fatigue of distance and the
scarcity of pasturage and water. Every day the advance was made with
increasing difficulty.
Meanwhile the Koreish had not been idle. Rumor never runs faster than
in the desert. All those who loved Mecca, that oldest historic centre
of all Western Arabia, rallied to the standard of the Koreish. It was
the Kaaba, with its three hundred and sixty idols, against the Cross.
No sooner was Abraha’s approach known, than Dzu Neffer, Ibn Habib
and other chiefs at the head of the tribes of Hamedan and Chethamah
gathered to oppose the advance. A desperate conflict followed, but the
camels were frightened at the sight of the elephants, nor could the
desert Arabs withstand an assault of such large numbers.
The news of defeat struck the Koreish with the greatest consternation,
and Abd-ul-Mutalib, grandfather of the future prophet, who was guardian
of the Kaaba, took council with all the chiefs of the allies. A swift
messenger was sent to Abraha offering a third part of the wealth of
all Hejaz as a ransom for the sacred Beit Ullah. The king, however,
was inflexible, and his followers cried: “Vengeance for the desecrated
Cross in our sanctuary! No ransom from the idolaters! Down with the
Kaaba!” Finally Abd-ul-Mutalib himself came to seek audience. He was
admitted to Abraha’s presence and honored with a seat by his side; but
Arab tradition says he came only to ask about the loss of some camels,
and told Abraha that the Lord of the Kaaba would defend it himself!
(Such sublime faith does Moslem tradition put into the mouth of the
prophet’s ancestors, even though the anachronism proves its falsehood.)
On the following day Kais led the advance through the narrow valley
that leads into the city. Here a grievous surprise awaited the host
of The Elephant. To supplement the faith of Abd-ul-Mutalib, the Arabs
laid in ambush, and before day-dawn every one of the Koreish had
occupied his place on the heights on either side of the pass, hidden
behind the rough masses of boulder and trap that to this day make the
whole hillside a natural battery. No sooner had the elephants and
their riders entered the defile, than a shower of rocks and stones
was incessantly poured upon them by their assailants. The unwieldly
animals, mad with fright and pain, trampled the wounded to death,
and confusion was followed by headlong flight, although the unequal
contest lasted until sunset. It was the Thermopylæ of Arabian idolatry,
forever after celebrated in the Koran chapter of _The Elephant_. The
battle affords a miracle, however, to the Moslem commentator by the
easy change of a vowel, which makes “miraculous birds” with hell-stones
in their beaks God’s avengers, instead of the “camel-troops” of the
Koreish. Two months after the victory that prophet was born whose
character and career sealed the fate of early Christianity in Arabia,
already decided on the fatal day when Abraha mounted his elephant and
left Sana for revenge.
The division of the Northern tribes between the Persians and Romans,
followed by the defeat of the Yemen hosts, brought anarchy to all
central Arabia. The idolaters of Hirah and Ghassan overran the south,
and the weak reign of Yeksoum, son of Abraha, could not stay the decay
of the Christian state. Even the Persian protectorate only delayed its
final fall. The sudden rise of Islam, with its political and social
preponderance, consummated the blow. “With the death of Mohammed,” says
Wright, “the last sparks of Christianity in Arabia were extinguished,
and it may be reasonably doubted whether any Christians were then left
in the whole peninsula.”[131]
In 1888, Edward Glaser, the explorer, visited nearly every part of
Yemen and among his discoveries were many ancient inscriptions. From
Mareb, the old Sabean capital, he brought back over three hundred, one
of which dates from 542 A. D., and is considered by Professor Fritz
Hommel the latest Sabean inscription. It consists of one hundred and
thirty-six lines telling of the suppressed revolt against the Ethiopic
rule then established in Yemen. The inscription opens with the words:
“IN THE POWER OF THE ALL-MERCIFUL, AND HIS MESSIAH AND THE HOLY GHOST.”
This and the scarcely recognizable ruins of the cathedral at Sana are
the only remnants of Christianity that remain in Arabia Felix.
XXX
THE DAWN OF MODERN ARABIAN MISSIONS
“It surely is not without a purpose that this widespread and powerful
race [the Arabs] has been kept these four thousand years, unsubdued
and undegenerate, preserving still the vigor and simplicity of its
character. It is certainly capable of a great future; and as certainly
a great future lies before it. In may be among the last peoples
of Southwestern Asia to yield to the transforming influences of
Christianity and a Christian civilization. But to those influences it
will assuredly yield in the fullness of time.”—_Edson L. Clark._
“Every nation has its appointed time, and when their appointed time
comes they cannot keep it back an hour nor can they bring it on.”—_The
Koran._
Islam dates from 622 A. D., but the first Christian missionary to
Mohammedans was Raymund Lull, who was stoned to death outside the
town of Bugia, North Africa, on June 30, 1315. He was also the first
and only Christian of his day who felt the extent and urgency of the
call to evangelize the Mohammedan world. His constant argument with
Moslem teachers was: Islam is false and must die. His devotion and
his pure character coupled with such intense moral earnestness won
some converts, but his great central purpose was to overthrow the
power of Islam as a system by logical demonstration of its error;
in this he failed. His two spiritual treatises are interesting, but
his _Ars Major_ would not convince a Moslem to-day any more than it
did in the fourteenth century. His life is of romantic interest and
his indefatigable zeal will always be a model and an inspiration to
missionaries among Moslems.[132] But he lived before his time and his
age was unworthy of him.
Nothing was done to give the gospel to Arabia or the Mohammedans
from the time of Raymund Lull to that of Henry Martyn, the first
modern missionary to the Mohammedans. The histories of these two men
contain all that there is to be written about missionary work for the
Mohammedan world from 622 until 1812, so little did the Church of God
feel its responsibility toward the millions walking in darkness after
the false prophet.
To the Protestant Church of the eighteenth century Arabia and the
Levant presented no attractions or appeal. The Turks, as representing
the Mohammedan world, were remembered as early as 1549, it is true, by
the English Book of Common Prayer, in the collect for Good Friday,[133]
(which dates from the Sarum Missal). No effort was made, however, to
carry the gospel to them or to any part of their empire, until long
after other far more distant regions had been reached. Even Carey
did not have the Moslem world on his large program. It was Claudius
Buchanan who first aroused an interest in the needs of the Moslem
world. On his return from India he told, on February 25, 1809, in his
sermon at Bristol, the story of two Moslem converts, one of whom had
died a martyr to Christ. In his _Christian Researches_ he propounds a
comprehensive scheme for the evangelization of the Levant. The Church
Missionary Society sent out missionaries, and in 1819 the American
Board began work for Moslems by sending Pliny Fisk and Levi Parsons to
Syria.
This modern beginning of the gospel in Asia Minor had an indirect
bearing on the future evangelization of Arabia and was a part of the
Divine preparation. The journeys of Eli Smith and H. G. O. Dwight
brought the American churches face to face with the whole problem of
missions in that region. The Syrian Mission through its press at Malta
(1822) began the assault on the citadel of Islam’s learning. In 1833
the press was removed to Beirut; and from that day until now it has
been scattering leaves of healing throughout all the Arabic-speaking
world. When in 1865 Dr. Van Dyck wrote the last sheet of “copy” of the
Arabic Bible translation and handed it to the compositor, he marked an
era of importance not only to Syria and Asia Minor, but to the whole
of Arabia, greater than any accession or deposition of sultans. That
Bible made modern missions to Arabia possible; it was the result of
seventeen years of labor; “and herein is that saying true, One soweth,
and another reapeth ... other men labored and ye are entered into their
labors.” Whatever special difficulties and obstacles missionaries to
Arabia have met or will meet, the great work of preparing the Word of
God in the language of the people and a complete Christian literature
for every department of work, has already been accomplished by others;
and accomplished in such a way that the Arabic Bible of Beirut will
always be the Bible for Oman and Nejd and the most inland villages of
Yemen and Hadramaut.
The history of direct effort to reach the great Arabian peninsula
begins with Henry Martyn. It is deeply interesting to follow the
gradual unfoldings of the Divine Providence in the reintroduction of
the gospel into Arabia thirteen centuries after Christianity had been
blotted out in that land by the sword of Mohammed and his successors.
In more than one sense Henry Martyn was the pioneer missionary to
Arabia. He first came into contact with the Arabs through his study of
their language and his employment of that remarkable character, Sabat,
as his munshee and co-worker. Sabat and his friend Abdullah were two
Arabs of notable pedigree, who, after visiting Mecca, resolved to see
the world. They first went to Cabul, where Abdullah entered the service
of the famous Ameer Zeman Shah. Through the efforts of an Armenian
Christian he abjured Islam and had to flee for his life to Bokhara.
“Sabat had preceded him there and at once recognized him on the street.
‘I had no pity,’ said Sabat afterward, ‘I delivered him up to Morad
Shah, the king.’ He was offered his life if he would abjure Christ. He
refused. Then one of his hands was cut off and again he was pressed to
recant. ‘He made no answer, but looked up steadfastly toward heaven,
like Stephen, the first martyr, his eyes streaming with tears. He
looked at me, but it was with the countenance of forgiveness. His other
hand was then cut off. But he never changed, and when he bowed his head
to receive the blow of death all Bokhara seemed to say, What new thing
is this?’ Remorse drove Sabat to long wanderings, in which he came to
Madras, where the government gave him the office of mufti or expounder
of the law of Islam in the civil courts. At Vizagapatam he fell in with
a copy of the Arabic New Testament as revised by Solomon Negri and sent
out to India in the middle of last century by the Society for Promoting
Christian Knowledge. He compared it with the Koran and the truth fell
on him like a flood of light. He sought baptism in Madras at the hands
of the Rev. Dr. Kerr and was named Nathaniel. He was then twenty-seven
years of age. When the news reached his family in Arabia, his brother
set out to destroy him, and, disguised as an Asiatic, wounded him with
a dagger as he sat in his house at Vizagapatam. He sent him home with
letters and gifts to his mother, and then gave himself up to propagate
the truth he had once in his friend Abdullah’s person, persecuted to
the death.”[134] These two were doubtless the first fruits of modern
Arabia to Christ.
It was doubtless in a great degree Sabat who directed Martyn’s thoughts
and plans toward Arabia and the Arabs. On the last day of the year 1810
he wrote in his diary: “I now pass from India to Arabia, not knowing
what things shall befall me there.” His purpose in leaving India was
partly his broken health but more his intense longing to give the
Mohammedans of Arabia and Persia the word of God in their own tongues.
On his voyage from Calcutta to Bombay he composed tracts in Arabic,
spoke with the Arab sailors and studied the Koran and Niebuhr’s travels
in Arabia. From Bombay he sailed for Arabia and Persia in one of the
ships of the old Indian navy going on a cruise in the Persian Gulf. He
reached Muscat on April 20, 1811, and writes his first impressions in
a letter to Lydia Grenfell: “I am now in Arabia Felix; to judge from
the aspect of the country it has little pretensions to the name, unless
burning, barren rocks convey an idea of felicity; but as there is a
promise in reserve for the sons of Joktan, their land may one day be
blessed indeed.” He attempted to go inland for a short distance, but
was forbidden by the soldiers of the Sultan of Muscat.
Every word of Henry Martyn’s journal regarding Arabia is precious, but
we can quote only one more passage: “April 24. Went with one English
party and two Armenians and an Arab who served as guard and guide to
see a remarkable pass about a mile from the town and a garden planted
by a Hindu in a little village beyond. There was nothing to see, only
the little bit of green in this wilderness seemed to the Arab a great
curiosity. I conversed a good deal with him, but particularly with his
African slave, who was very intelligent about religion. The latter knew
as much about his religion as most mountaineers, and withal was so
interested that he would not cease from his argument till I left the
shore.”
Martyn did not tarry long at Muscat but his visit was “a little bit of
green in this wilderness” and the prayers he there offered found answer
in God’s Providence long afterward. On all his voyage to Bushire he
was continually busy with his Arabic translation; the people of Arabia
were still first in his heart for he expresses himself as desirous
finally “to go to Arabia circuitously by way of Persia.” His longing
to give the Arabs the Scripture began in India and intensified his
devotion to the study of Hebrew. Had Martyn’s chief assistant in the
Arabic translating, Sabat, been a better scholar their New Testament
version would have proved abidingly useful. As Sabat’s knowledge of
the language proved very faulty their Arabic Testament did not remain
in use. It was first printed at Calcutta in 1816, and although it
accomplished a good work in common with other old translations, all
have been superseded by the wonderfully perfect version of Eli Smith
and Van Dyck. It was not due to Martyn, however, that the Arabic
language had no worthy version of the Bible until 1860. In his diaries
for September 8 and 9, 1810, we read these remarkable entries: “If my
life is spared, there is no reason why the Arabic should not be done in
Arabia, and the Persian in Persia as well as the Indian in India.” ...
“Arabia shall hide me till I come forth with an approved New Testament
in Arabic.” ... “Will government let me go away for three years before
the time of my furlough arrives? If not I must quit the service, and I
cannot devote my life to a more important work than that of preparing
the Arabic Bible.”
These facts about Martyn’s life show at how many points it touched
Arabia; his purposes, his prayers, his studies, his translations, his
fellow-worker, and his visit to Muscat. But more than all these was the
result for Arabia of Martyn’s influence and the power of his spirit to
inspire others.