CHAPTER I_The Syrian Christ

[Illustration: Cover]

THE SYRIAN CHRIST

ABRAHAM MITRIE RIHBANY

BOSTON AND NEW YORK

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY

The Riverside Press Cambridge

1916

_Published October 1916_

{v}

PREFACE

This little volume is sent forth in the confident hope that it may

throw fresh light on the life and teachings of Christ, and facilitate

for the general public the understanding of the Bible. As may be

readily seen, from its perusal, the present work is not intended to be

a commentary on the Bible, nor even an exhaustive study of the subject

with which it deals. That it leaves many things to be desired is very

evident to the author, who fears that his book will be remembered by

its readers more by the things it lacks than by the things it contains.

Yet, from the cordial reception with which the opening chapters of this

publication (which made their first appearance in the _Atlantic

Monthly_) met from readers, of various religious affiliations, the

author has been encouraged to believe that his aim has not only been

clearly {vi} discerned, but thoroughly approved. The books which

undertake the systematic "expounding of the Scriptures" are a host

which no man can number, nor is there any lack of "spiritual lessons

drawn from the Bible." Therefore, as one of the Master's fellow

countrymen, and one who has enjoyed about twenty years of service in

the American pulpit, I have for several years entertained the growing

conviction that such a book as this was really needed. Not, however,

as one more commentary, but as an Oriental guide to afford Occidental

readers of the Bible a more intimate view of the original intellectual

and social environment of this sacred literature. So what I have to

offer here is a series of suggestions, and not of technically wrought

Bible lessons.

The need of the Western readers of the Bible is, in my judgment, to

enter sympathetically and intelligently into the atmosphere in which

the books of the Scriptures first took form: to have real intellectual,

as well as spiritual, fellowship with those Orientals who sought {vii}

earnestly in their own way to give tangible form to those great

spiritual truths which have been, and ever shall be, humanity's most

precious heritage.

My task has not been a light one. It is comparatively easy to take

isolated Bible texts and explain them, treating each passage as a

detached unit. But when one undertakes to group a large number of

passages which never were intended to be gathered together and treated

as the kindred thoughts of an essay, the task becomes rather difficult.

How far I have succeeded in my effort to relate the passages I have

treated in this book to one another according to their intellectual and

social affinities, the reader is in a better position to judge than I

am.

It may not be absolutely necessary for me to say that infallibility

cannot justly be ascribed to any author, nor claimed by him, even when

writing of his own experiences, and the social environment in which he

was born and brought up.

However, in Yankee, not in Oriental, {viii} fashion, I will say that

_to the best of my knowledge_ the statements contained in this book are

correct.

Finally, I deem it necessary before I bring this preface to a close to

sound a note of warning. So I will say that the Orientals' extensive

use of figurative speech should by no means be allowed to carry the

idea that _all_ Oriental speech is figurative. This manner of speech,

which is common to all races of men, is only _more extensively_ used by

Orientals than by Occidentals. I could wish, however, that the learned

theologians had suspected more strongly the literal accuracy of

Oriental utterances, and had thus been saved at times from founding a

huge doctrinal structure on a figure of speech.

Notwithstanding all this, the Gospel and the Christian faith still live

and bless and cheer the hearts and minds of men. As an Oriental by

birth, and as an American from choice, I feel profoundly grateful that

I have been enabled to render this modest service to the Churches of

{ix} America, and to present this book as an offering of love and

homage to my Master, the Syrian Christ.

ABRAHAM MITRIE RIHBANY

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS.

{xi}

CONTENTS

PART I. THE SYRIAN CHRIST.

I. Son of the East

II. Birth of a Man Child

III. The Star

IV. Mystic Tones

V. Filial Obedience

VI. Feast and Sacrament

VII. The Last Scene

PART II. The Oriental Manner Of Speech.

I. Daily Language

II. Imprecations

III. Love of Enemies

IV. "The Unveracious Oriental"

V. Impressions _vs._ Literal Accuracy

VI. Speaking in Parables

VII. Swearing

VIII. Four Characteristics

{xii}

PART III. BREAD AND SALT

I. The Sacred 'Aish

II. "Our Daily Bread"

III. "Compel Them to come in"

IV. Delaying the Departing Guest

V. Family Feasts

PART IV. OUT IN THE OPEN

I. Shelter and Home

II. Resigned Travelers

III. The Market Place

IV. The Housetop

V. The Vineyards and the Fields

VI. The Shepherd

PART V. SISTERS OF MARY AND MARTHA

I. Woman East and West

II. Paul and Woman

III. Jesus and his Mother

IV. "A Gracious Woman"

PART VI.

Here and There in the Bible

Index

{3}

PART I

THE SYRIAN CHRIST

CHAPTER I

SON OF THE EAST

Jesus Christ, the incarnation of the spirit of God, seer, teacher of

the verities of the spiritual life, and preacher of the fatherhood of

God and the brotherhood of man, is, in a higher sense, "a man without a

country." As a prophet and a seer Jesus belongs to all races and all

ages. Wherever the minds of men respond to simple truth, wherever the

hearts of men thrill with pure love, wherever a temple of religion is

dedicated to the worship of God and the service of man, there is Jesus'

country and there are his friends. Therefore, in speaking of Jesus as

the son of a certain country, I do not mean in the least to localize

his Gospel, or to set bounds and limits to the flow of his spirit and

the workings of his love.

Nor is it my aim in these chapters to imitate {4} the astute

theologians by wrestling with the problem of Jesus' personality. To me

the secret of personality, human and divine, is an impenetrable

mystery. My more modest purpose in this writing is to remind the

reader that, whatever else Jesus was, as regards his modes of thought

and life and his method of teaching, he was a Syrian of the Syrians.

According to authentic history Jesus never saw any other country than

Palestine. There he was born; there he grew up to manhood, taught his

Gospel, and died for it.

It is most natural, then, that Gospel truths should have come down to

the succeeding generations--and to the nations of the West--cast in

Oriental moulds of thought, and intimately intermingled with the simple

domestic and social habits of Syria. The gold of the Gospel carries

with it the sand and dust of its original home.

From the foregoing, therefore, it may be seen that my reason for

undertaking to throw fresh light on the life and teachings of Christ,

and {5} other portions of the Bible whose correct understanding depends

on accurate knowledge of their original environment, is not any claim

on my part to great learning or a profound insight into the spiritual

mysteries of the Gospel. The real reason is rather an accident of

birth. From the fact that I was born not far from where the Master was

born, and brought up under almost the identical conditions under which

he lived, I have an "inside view" of the Bible which, by the nature of

things, a Westerner cannot have. And I know that the conditions of

life in Syria of to-day are essentially as they were in the time of

Christ, not from the study of the mutilated tablets of the archæologist

and the antiquarian, precious as such discoveries are, but from the

simple fact that, as a sojourner in this Western world, whenever I open

my Bible it reads like a letter from home.

Its unrestrained effusiveness of expression; its vivid, almost flashy

and fantastic imagery; its naïve narrations; the rugged unstudied

simplicity of its parables; its unconventional (and {6} to the more

modest West rather unseemly) portrayal of certain human relations; as

well as its all-permeating spiritual mysticism,--so far as these

qualities are concerned, the Bible might all have been written in my

primitive village home, on the western slopes of Mount Lebanon some

thirty years ago.

Nor do I mean to assert or even to imply that the Western world has

never succeeded in knowing the mind of Christ. Such an assertion would

do violent injustice, not only to the Occidental mind, but to the

Gospel itself as well, by making it an enigma, utterly foreign to the

native spirituality of the majority of mankind. But what I have

learned from intimate associations with the Western mind, during almost

a score of years in the American pulpit, is that, with the exception of

the few specialists, it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, for

a people to understand fully a literature which has not sprung from

that people's own racial life. As a repository of divine revelation

the Bible knows no geographical limits. Its spiritual truths are {7}

from God to man. But as a literature the Bible is an imported article

in the Western world, especially in the home of the Anglo-Saxon race.

The language of the Scriptures, the mentality and the habits of life

which form the setting of their spiritual precepts, and the mystic

atmosphere of those precepts themselves, have come forth from the soul

of a people far removed from the races of the West in almost all the

modes of its earthly life.

You cannot study the life of a people successfully from the outside.

You may by so doing succeed in discerning the few fundamental traits of

character in their local colors, and in satisfying your curiosity with

surface observations of the general modes of behavior; but the little

things, the common things, those subtle connectives in the social

vocabulary of a people, those agencies which are born and not made, and

which give a race its rich distinctiveness, are bound to elude your

grasp. There is so much in the life of a people which a stranger to

that people must receive {8} by way of unconscious absorption. Like a

little child, he must learn so many things by involuntary imitation.

An outside observer, though wise, is only a photographer. He deals

with externals. He can be converted into an artist and portray the

life of a race by working from the soul outward, only through long,

actual, and sympathetic associations with that race.

From the foregoing it may be seen that I deem it rather hazardous for a

six-weeks tourist in that country to publish a book on the _life_ of

Syria. A first-class camera and "an eye to business" are hardly

sufficient qualifications for the undertaking of such a task. It is

very easy, indeed, to take a photograph, but not so easy to relate such

a picture to the inner life of a race, and to know what moral and

social forces lie behind such externals. The hasty traveler may easily

state what certain modes of thought and life in a strange land mean to

_him_, but does that necessarily mean that _his_ understanding of such

things is also the understanding of the _people_ of that land

themselves?

{9}

With the passing of the years, this thought gains in significance with

me, as a Syrian immigrant. At about the end of my second year of

residence in this country, I felt confident that I could write a book

on America and the Americans whose accuracy no one could challenge. It

was so easy for me to grasp the significance of certain general aspects

of American life that I felt I was fully competent to state how the

American people lived, what their racial, political, and religious

tendencies were, what their idioms of speech meant, and to interpret

their amorous, martial, dolorous, and joyous moods with perfect

accuracy and ease. But now, after a residence of about twenty-four

years in America--years which I have spent in most intimate association

with Americans, largely of the "original stock"--I do not feel half so

confident that I am qualified to write such a book. The more intimate

I become with American thought, the deeper I penetrate the American

spirit, the more enlightened my associations become with American

fathers, mothers, {10} and children in the joys and sorrows of life,

the more fully do I realize how extremely difficult, if not impossible,

it is for one to interpret successfully the life of an alien people

before one has actually _lived it_ himself.

Many Westerners have written very meritorious books on the thought and

life of the East. But these are not of the "tourist" type. Such

writers have been those who, first, had the initial wisdom to realize

that the beggars for _bakhsheesh_ in the thoroughfares of Syrian

cities, and those who hitch a woman with an ox to the plough in some

dark recesses of Palestine, did not possibly represent the deep soul of

that ancient East, which gave birth to the Bible and to the glorious

company of prophets, apostles, and saints. Second, such writers knew,

also, that the fine roots of a people's life do not lie on the surface.

Such feeders of life are both deep and fine; not only long residence

among a people, but intimate association and genuine sympathy with them

are necessary to reveal to a stranger the hidden {11} meaning of their

life. Social life, like biological life, energizes from within, and

from within it must be studied.

And it is those common things of Syrian life, so indissolubly

interwoven with the spiritual truths of the Bible, which cause the

Western readers of holy writ to stumble, and which rob those truths for

them of much of their richness. By sheer force of genius, the

aggressive, systematic Anglo-Saxon mind seeks to press into logical

unity and creedal uniformity those undesigned, artless, and most

natural manifestations of Oriental life, in order to "understand the

Scriptures."

"Yet show I unto you a more excellent way," by personally conducting

you into the inner chambers of Syrian life, and showing you, if I can,

how simple it is for a humble fellow countryman of Christ to understand

those social phases of the Scriptural passages which so greatly puzzle

the august minds of the West.

{12}

CHAPTER II

BIRTH OF A MAN CHILD

In the Gospel story of Jesus' life there is not a single incident that

is not in perfect harmony with the prevailing modes of thought and the

current speech of the land of its origin. I do not know how many times

I heard it stated in my native land and at our own fireside that

heavenly messengers in the forms of patron saints or angels came to

pious, childless wives, in dreams and visions, and cheered them with

the promise of maternity. It was nothing uncommon for such women to

spend a whole night in a shrine "wrestling in prayer," either with the

blessed Virgin or some other saint, for such a divine assurance; and I

remember a few of my own kindred to have done so.

Perhaps the most romantic religious practice in this connection is the

_zeara_. Interpreted literally, the word _zeara_ means simply a visit.

In its social use it is the equivalent of {13} a call of long or short

duration. But religiously the _zeara_ means a pilgrimage to a shrine.

However, strictly speaking, the word "pilgrimage" means to the Syrians

a journey of great religious significance whose supreme purpose is the

securing of a blessing for the pilgrim, with no reference to a special

need. The _zeara_ is a pilgrimage with a specific purpose. The

_zayir_ (visitor to a shrine) comes seeking either to be healed of a

certain ailment, to atone for a sin, or to be divinely helped in some

other way. Unlike a pilgrimage also, a _zeara_ may be made by one

person in behalf of another. When, for example, a person is too ill to

travel, or is indifferent to a spiritual need which such a visit is

supposed to fill, his parents or other close friends may make a _zeara_

in his behalf. But much more often a _zeara_ is undertaken by women

for the purpose of securing the blessing of fecundity, or consecrating

an approaching issue of wedlock (if it should prove to be a male) to

God, and to the patron saint of the visited sanctuary.

{14}

Again the word "pilgrimage" is used only to describe a visit by a

Christian to Jerusalem, or by a Mohammedan to Mecca, while the _zeara_

describes a visit to any one of the lesser shrines.

The happy journey is often made on foot, the parties most concerned

walking all the way "on the flesh of their feet"; that is, with neither

shoes nor sandals on. This great sacrifice is made as a mark of

sincere humility which is deemed to be pleasing to God and his holy

saints. However, the wearing of shoes and even the use of mounts is

not considered a sinful practice on such occasions, and is indulged in

by many of the well-to-do families. The state of the heart is, of

course, the chief thing to be considered.

In the fourth chapter of the Second Book of Kings we are told that "the

Shunammite woman" used an ass when she sought Elisha to restore her

dead son to her. In the twenty-second verse (the Revised Version), we

are told, "And she called unto her husband, and said, {15} Send me, I

pray thee, one of the servants, and one of the asses, that I may run to

the man of God, and come again.... Then she saddled an ass, and said

to her servant, Drive, and go forward; slacken me not the riding,

except I bid thee. So she went, and came unto the man of God to mount

Carmel."

Fasting and prayer on the way are often pronounced phases of a _zeara_.

However, wine-drinking by the men in the company and noisy gayety are

not deemed altogether incompatible with the solemnity of the occasion.

The pious visitors carry with them presents to the abbot and to the

monks who serve the shrine. A silver or even gold candlestick, or a

crown of either metal for the saint, is also carried to the altar. The

young mother in whose behalf the _zeara_ is undertaken is tenderly

cared for by every member of the party. She is "the chosen vessel of

the Lord."

The _zûwar_ (visitors) remain at the holy shrine for one or two nights,

or until the "presence" is revealed; that is, until the saint {16}

manifests himself. The prayerfully longed-for manifestation comes

almost invariably in a dream, either to the mother or some other worthy

in the party. How like the story of Joseph all this is! In the first

chapter of St. Matthew's Gospel, the twentieth verse, it is said of

Joseph, "But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the

Lord appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David,

fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived

in her is of the Holy Ghost. And she shall bring forth a son, and thou

shalt call his name Jesus; for he shall save his people from their

sins."

In this manner the promise is made to the waiting mother, who "keeps

these things, and ponders them in her heart."

The promise thus secured, the mother and the father vow that the child

shall be a _nedher_; that is, consecrated to the saint who made the

promise to the mother. The vow may mean one of several things. Either

that a sum of {17} money be "given to the saint" upon the advent of the

child, or that the child be carried to the same sanctuary on another

_zeara_ with gifts, and so forth, or that his hair will not be cut

until he is seven years old, and then cut for the first time before the

image of his patron saint at the shrine, or some other act of pious

fulfillment.

The last form of a vow, the consecration of the hair of the head for a

certain period, is practiced by men of all ages. The vow is made as a

petition for healing from a serious illness, rescue from danger, or

purely as an act of consecration. In the eighteenth chapter of the

Book of Acts, the eighteenth verse, we have the statement: "And Paul

after this tarried there yet a good while, and then took his leave of

the brethren, and sailed thence into Syria, and with him Priscilla and

Aquila; _having shorn his head in Cenchrea: for he had a vow_." It was

also in connection with this practice that Paul was induced by the

"brethren" at Jerusalem to make a compromise which cost him dearly.

{18} In the twenty-first chapter of Acts, the twenty-third verse, we

are told that those brethren said to Paul, "We have four men who have a

vow on them; them take, and purify thyself with them, and be at charges

for them, that they may _shave their heads_."

The last service of this kind which I attended in Syria was for a

cousin of mine, a boy of twelve, who was a _nedher_, or as the word is

rendered in the English Bible, a Nazarite. We assembled in the church

of St. George of Sûk. The occasion was very solemn. A mass was

celebrated after the order of the Greek Orthodox Church. Near the

close of the service the tender lad was brought by his parents in front

of the Royal Door at the altar. While repeating a prayer, the priest

cut the hair on the crown of the boy's head with the scissors, in the

shape of a cross. The simple act released the child and his parents of

their solemn vow.

"Twentieth-century culture" is prone to call all such practices

superstitions. So they are to a large extent. But I deem it the

higher {19} duty of this culture to _interpret_ sympathetically rather

than to condemn superstition in a sweeping fashion. I am a lover of a

rational theology and a reasonable faith, but I feel that in our

enthusiasm for such a theology and such a faith we often fail to

appreciate the deep spiritual longing which is expressed in

superstitious forms of worship. What is there in such religious

practices as those I have mentioned but the expression of the

heart-burning of those parents for the spiritual welfare and security

of their children? What do we find here but evidences of a deep and

sincere yearning for divine blessings to come upon the family and the

home? Thoughts of God at the marriage altar; thoughts of God when the

promise of parenthood becomes evident; thoughts of God when a child

comes into the world; thoughts of God and of his holy prophets and

saints as friends and companions in all the changes and chances of the

world. Here the challenge to modern rationalism is not to content

itself with rebuking superstitions, but to give {20} the world deeper

spiritual visions than those which superstitions reveal, and to compass

childhood and youth by the gracious presence of the living God.

In a most literal sense we always understood the saying of the

psalmist, "Children are a heritage from the Lord." Above and beyond

all natural agencies, it was He who turned barrenness to fecundity and

worked the miracle of birth. To us every birth was miraculous, and

childlessness an evidence of divine disfavor. From this it may be

inferred how tenderly and reverently agreeable to the Syrian ear is the

angel's salutation to Mary, "Hail, thou that art highly favored, the

Lord is with thee; blessed art thou among women!--Behold thou shalt

conceive in thy womb and bring forth a son."[1]

A miracle? Yes. But a miracle means one thing to your Western

science, which seeks to know what nature is and does by dealing with

secondary causes, and quite another thing to {21} an Oriental, to whom

God's will is the law and gospel of nature. In times of intellectual

trouble this man takes refuge in his all-embracing faith,--the faith

that to God all things are possible.

The Oriental does not try to meet an assault upon his belief in

miracles by seeking to establish the historicity of concrete reports of

miracles. His poetical, mystical temperament seeks its ends in another

way. Relying upon his fundamental faith in the omnipotence of God, he

throws the burden of proof upon his assailant by challenging him to

substantiate his _denial_ of the miracles. So did Paul (in the

twenty-sixth chapter of the Book of Acts) put his opponents at a great

disadvantage by asking, "Why should it be thought a thing incredible

with you, that God should raise the dead?"

But the story of Jesus' birth and kindred Bible records disclose not

only the predisposition of the Syrian mind to accept miracles as divine

acts, without critical examination, but {22} also its attitude toward

conception and birth,--an attitude which differs fundamentally from

that of the Anglo-Saxon mind. With the feeling of one who has been

reminded of having ignorantly committed an improper act, I remember the

time when kind American friends admonished me not to read from the

pulpit such scriptural passages as detailed the accounts of conception

and birth, but only to allude to them in a general way. I learned in a

very short time to obey the kindly advice, but it was a long time

before I could swing my psychology around and understand why in America

such narratives were so greatly modified in transmission.

The very fact that such stories are found in the Bible shows that in my

native land no such sifting of these narratives is ever undertaken when

they are read to the people. From childhood I had been accustomed to

hear them read at our church, related at the fireside, and discussed

reverently by men and women at all times and places. There is nothing

in the {23} phraseology of such statements which is not in perfect

harmony with the common, everyday speech of my people.

To the Syrians, as I say, "children are a heritage from the Lord."

From the days of Israel to the present time, barrenness has been looked

upon as a sign of divine disfavor, an intolerable calamity. Rachel's

cry, "Give me children, or else I die,"[2] does not exaggerate the

agony of a childless Syrian wife. When Rebecca was about to depart

from her father's house to become Isaac's wife, her mother's ardent and

effusively expressed wish for her was, "Be thou the mother of thousands

of millions."[3] This mother's last message to her daughter was not

spoken in a corner. I can see her following the bride to the door,

lifting her open palms and turning her face toward heaven, and making

her affectionate petition in the hearing of a multitude of guests, who

must have echoed her words in chorus.

In the congratulations of guests at a {24} marriage feast the central

wish for the bridegroom and bride is invariably thus expressed: "May

you be happy, live long, and have many children!" And what contrasts

very sharply with the American reticence in such matters is the fact

that shortly after the wedding, the friends of the young couple, both

men and women, begin to ask them about their "prospects" for an heir.

No more does a prospective mother undertake in any way to disguise the

signs of the approaching event, than an American lady to conceal her

engagement ring. Much mirth is enjoyed in such cases, also, when

friends and neighbors, by consulting the stars, or computing the number

of letters in the names of the parents and the month in which the

miracle of conception is supposed to have occurred, undertake to

foretell whether the promised offspring will be a son or a daughter.

In that part of the country where I was brought up, such wise

prognosticators believed, and made us all believe, that if the

calculations resulted in an odd number the birth would be a son, but

{25} if in an even number, a daughter, which, as a rule, is not

considered so desirable.

Back of all these social traits, and beyond the free realism of the

Syrian in speaking of conception and birth, lies a deeper fact. To

Eastern peoples, especially the Semites, reproduction in all the world

of life is profoundly sacred. It is God's life reproducing itself in

the life of man and in the living world below man; therefore the

evidences of this reproduction should be looked upon and spoken of with

rejoicing.

Notwithstanding the many and fundamental intellectual changes which I

have undergone in this country of my adoption, I count as among the

most precious memories of my childhood my going with my father to the

vineyard, just as the vines began to "come out," and hearing him say as

he touched the swelling buds, "Blessed be the Creator. He is the

Supreme Giver. May He protect the blessed increase." Of this I almost

always think when I read the words of the psalmist, "The earth is the

Lord's and the fullness thereof!"

{26}

Now I do not feel at all inclined to say whether the undisguised

realism of the Orientals in speaking of reproduction is better than the

delicate reserve of the Anglo-Saxons. In fact, I have been so

reconstructed under Anglo-Saxon auspices as to feel that the excessive

reserve of this race with regard to such things is not a serious fault,

but rather the defect of a great virtue. My purpose is to show that

the unreconstructed Oriental, to whom reproduction is the most sublime

manifestation of God's life, cannot see why one should be ashamed to

speak anywhere in the world of the fruits of wedlock, of a "woman with

child." One might as well be ashamed to speak of the creative power as

it reveals itself in the gardens of roses and the fruiting trees.

Here we have the background of the stories of Sarah, when the

angel-guest prophesied fecundity for her in her old age; of Rebecca,

and the wish of her mother for her, that she might become "the mother

of thousands"; of Elizabeth, when the "babe leaped in her womb," {27}

as she saw her cousin Mary; and of the declaration of the angel to

Joseph's spouse; "Thou shalt conceive in thy womb and bring forth a

son."

Here it is explained, also, why upon the birth of a "man-child,"

well-wishers troop into the house,--even on the very day of

birth,--bring their presents, and congratulate the parents on the

divine gift to them. It was because of this custom that those

strangers, the three "Wise Men" and Magi of the Far East, were

permitted to come in and see the little Galilean family, while the

mother was yet in childbed. So runs the Gospel narrative: "And when

they were come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary his

mother, and fell down and worshipped him: and when they had opened

their treasures, they presented unto him gifts,--gold, frankincense,

and myrrh."[4]

So also were the humble shepherds privileged to see the wondrous child

shortly after birth. "And it came to pass, as the angels were gone

away from them into heaven, the {28} shepherds said one to another, Let

us now go to Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which

the Lord hath made known unto us. And they came with haste, and found

Mary and Joseph and the babe lying in a manger."[5]

In the twelfth verse of the second chapter of the Gospel of St. Luke,

the English version says, "And this shall be a sign unto you; ye shall

find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger." Here the

word "clothes" is somewhat misleading. The Arabic version gives a

perfect rendering of the fact by saying, "Ye shall find a _swaddled_

babe, _laid_ in a manger."

According to general Syrian custom, in earliest infancy a child is not

really clothed, it is only swaddled. Upon birth the infant is washed

in tepid water by the midwife, then salted, or rubbed gently with salt

pulverized in a stone mortar especially for the occasion. (The salt

commonly used in Syrian homes is coarse-chipped.) Next the babe is

sprinkled with {29} _rehan_,--a powder made of dried myrtle

leaves,--and then swaddled.

The swaddle is a piece of stout cloth about a yard square, to one

corner of which is attached a long narrow band. The infant, with its

arms pressed close to its sides, and its feet stretched full length and

laid close together, is wrapped in the swaddle, and the narrow band

wound around the little body, from the shoulders to the ankles, giving

the little one the exact appearance of an Egyptian mummy. Only a few

of the good things of this mortal life were more pleasant to me when I

was a boy than to carry in my arms a swaddled babe. The "salted" and

"peppered" little creature felt so soft and so light, and was so

appealingly helpless, that to cuddle it was to me an unspeakable

benediction.

Such was the "babe of Bethlehem" that was sought by the Wise Men and

the shepherds in the wondrous story of the Nativity.

And in describing such Oriental customs it may be significant to point

out that, in certain {30} localities in Syria, to say to a person that

he was not "salted" upon birth is to invite trouble. Only a _bendûq_,

or the child of an unrecognized father, is so neglected. And here may

be realized the full meaning of that terrible arraignment of Jerusalem

in the sixteenth chapter of the Book of Ezekiel. The Holy City had

done iniquity, and therefore ceased to be the legitimate daughter of

Jehovah. So the prophet cries, "The Lord came unto me, saying, Son of

man, cause Jerusalem to know her abominations, and say, Thus saith the

Lord God unto Jerusalem; Thy birth and thy nativity are of the land of

Canaan; thy father was an Amorite, and thy mother a Hittite. And as

for thy nativity, in the day thou wast born--neither wast thou washed

in water to supple[6] thee; _thou wast not salted at all, nor swaddled

at all_. No eye pitied thee, to do any of these things for thee, to

have compassion upon thee; but thou wast cast out in the open field, to

the loathing of thy person, in the day thou wast born."

[1] Luke i: 28, 31.

[2] Gen. xxx; 1.

[3] Gen. xxiv: 60.

[4] Matt. ii: 11.

[5] Luke ii: 15-16.

[6] "Cleanse" in the Revised Version.

{31}

CHAPTER III

THE STAR

How natural to the thought of the East the story of the "star of

Bethlehem" is! To the Orientals "the heavens declare the glory of

God," and the stars reveal many wondrous things to men. They are the

messengers of good and evil, and objects of the loftiest idealization,

as well as of the crudest superstitions. Those who have gazed upon the

stars in the deep, clear Syrian heavens can find no difficulty in

entering into the spirit of the majestic strains of the writer of the

eighth Psalm. "When I consider thy heavens," says this ancient singer,

"the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast

ordained; what is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of

man, that thou visitest him?" Deeps beyond deeps are revealed through

that dry, soft, and clear atmosphere of the "land of promise," yet the

constellations seem as near {32} to the beholder as parlor lamps. "My

soul longeth" for the vision of the heavens from the heights of my

native Lebanon, and the hills of Palestine. It is no wonder to me that

my people have always considered the stars as guides and companions,

and as awe-inspiring manifestations of the Creator's power, wisdom, and

glory. "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament

sheweth his handywork. Day unto day uttereth speech and night unto

night sheweth knowledge."[1]

So great is the host of the stars seen by the naked eye in that land

that the people of Syria have always likened a great multitude to the

stars of heaven or the sand of the sea. Of a great assemblage of

people we always said, "They are _methel-ennijoom_--like the stars" (in

number). So it is written in the twenty-eighth chapter of Deuteronomy,

the sixty-second verse, "And ye shall be left few in number, whereas ye

were _as the stars of heaven for multitude_; because thou wouldst not

obey the {33} voice of the Lord thy God." According to that great

narrative in Genesis, God promised Abraham that his progeny would be as

the stars in number. In the fifteenth chapter, the fifth verse, it is

said, "And he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward

heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said

unto him, So shall thy seed be." In speaking of the omniscience of God

the writer of the one hundred and forty-seventh Psalm says, "He telleth

the number of the stars; he calleth them all by their names. Great is

our Lord, and of great power: his understanding is infinite."

But the numberless lights of the firmament were brought even closer to

us through the belief that they had vital connection with the lives of

men on the earth. I was brought up to believe that every human being

had a star in heaven which held the secret of his destiny and which

watched over him wherever he went. In speaking of an amiable person it

is said, "His star is attractive" (_nejmo jeddeeb_). Persons {34} love

one another when "their stars are in harmony." A person is in

unfavorable circumstances when his star is in the sphere of

"misfortune" (_nehiss_), and so forth. The stars indicated the time to

us when we were traveling by night, marked the seasons, and thus

fulfilled their Creator's purpose by serving "for signs, and for

seasons, and for days and years."

In every community we had "star-gazers" who could tell each person's

star. We placed much confidence in such mysterious men, who could

"arrest" an absent person's star in its course and learn from it

whether it was well or ill with the absent one.

Like a remote dream, it comes to me that as a child of about ten I went

out one night with my mother to seek a "star-gazer" to locate my

father's star and question the shining orb about him. My father had

been away from home for some time, and owing to the meagerness of the

means of communication in that country, especially in those days, we

had no news of him at all. During that afternoon {35} my mother said

that she felt "heavy-hearted" for no reason that she knew; therefore

she feared that some ill must have befallen the head of our household,

and sought to "know" whether her fear was well grounded. The

"star-arrester," leaning against an aged mulberry tree, turned his eyes

toward the stellar world, while his lips moved rapidly and silently as

if he were repeating words of awful import. Presently he said, "I see

him. He is sitting on a cushion, leaning against the wall and smoking

his _narghile_. There are others with him, and he is in his usual

health." The man took pains to point out the "star" to my mother, who,

after much sympathetic effort, felt constrained to say that she did see

what the star-gazer claimed he saw. But at any rate, mother declared

that she was no longer "heavy-hearted."

In my most keen eagerness to see my father and his _narghile_ in the

star, at least for mere intellectual delight, I clung to the arm of the

reader of the heavens like a frightened kitten, {36} and insisted upon

"seeing." The harder he tried to shake me off, the deeper did my

organs of apprehension sink into his sleeve. At last the combined

efforts of my mother and the heir of the ancient astrologers forced me

to believe that I was "too young to behold such sights."

It was the excessive leaning of his people upon such practices that led

Isaiah to cry, "Thou art wearied in the multitude of thy counsels. Let

now the astrologers, the star-gazers, the monthly prognosticators,

stand up and save thee from these things that shall come upon thee.

Behold, they shall be as stubble; the fire shall burn them; they shall

not deliver themselves from the power of the flames."

Beyond all such crudities, however, lies the sublime and sustaining

belief that the stars are alive with God. The lofty strains of such

scriptural passages as the nineteenth Psalm and the beautiful story of

the star of Bethlehem, indicate that to the Oriental mind the "hosts of

heaven" are no mere masses of dust, {37} but the agencies of the

Creator's might and love. So the narrative of the Nativity in our

Gospel sublimates the beliefs of the Orientals about God's purpose in

those lights of the firmament, by making the guide of the Wise Men to

the birthplace of the Prince of Peace a great star, whose pure and

serene light symbolized the peace and holiness which, in the "fullness

of time," his kingdom shall bring upon the earth.

The presentation of a child at the temple, or the "admittance of an

infant into the Church," is one of the most tender, most beautiful, and

most impressive services of my Mother Church--the Greek Orthodox.[2]

It is held for every child born within that fold, in commemoration of

the presentation of Jesus at the temple in Jerusalem. As Luke tells us

(11:22), "And when the days of her purification according to the law of

Moses were accomplished, they brought him to Jerusalem, to present him

to the Lord."

{38}

The purification period "according to the law of Moses" is forty

days.[3] Until this is "accomplished," the mother is not permitted to

enter into the house of worship. As a general rule the baptismal

service, which takes place any time between the eighth day and the

fortieth day after birth, is held at the home. On the first Sabbath

day after the "forty days," the mother carries the infant to the door

of the church during mass, where the robed priest, who has been

previously applied to for the sacred rite, meets the mother and

receives the child in his arms. After making the sign of the cross

with the child at the door, the priest says, "Now enters the servant of

God [naming the child] into the Holy Church, in the name of the Father,

and the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen." Then the priest walks into

the church with the child, saying, in its behalf, "I will come into thy

house in the multitude of thy mercy: and in thy fear will I worship

toward thy holy temple."[4] As he {39} approaches the center of the

church, he says again, "Now enters the servant of God," etc. Then

standing in the center of the church, and surrounded by the reverently

silent congregation, the priest says again, in behalf of the child, "In

the midst of the congregation will I praise thee, O Lord."[5] Again,

in front of the Royal Gate (the central door in the _anastasis_, or

partition which screens the altar from the congregation) the priest

says for the third time, "Now enters the servant of God," etc. After

this the priest carries the infant through the north door, which is to

the left of the Royal Gate, into the _mizbeh_, which corresponds to the

"holy place" in the ancient temple. Here he walks around the _maideh_

(altar of sacrifice), makes the sign of the cross with the child, and

walks out into the midst of the congregation, through the south door.

In this position the priest utters as his final petition the words of

the aged Simeon (Luke 11:29), "Lord, now lettest thou thy servant

depart in peace, {40} according to thy word: for mine eyes have seen

thy salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face of all people;

a light to lighten the gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel."

Then he delivers the child back to its mother. Female children are

presented in front of the Royal Gate, but are not admitted into the

_mizbeh_.

[1] Ps. xix: 1-2.

[2] See the author's autobiography, _A Far Journey_, p. 4.

[3] Lev. xii: 2-4.

[4] Ps. v: 7.

[5] Ps. xx: 22.

{41}

CHAPTER IV

MYSTIC TONES

I love to listen to the mystic tones of the Christmas carol. The story

of the "star of Bethlehem" is the medium of transmission of those

deeper strains which have come into the world through the soul of that

ancient East. I love to mingle with the social joys of the Christmas

season and its spirit of good-will, the mystic accents of the ancient

seers who expressed in the rich narratives of the New Testament the

deepest and dearest hopes of the soul.

I leave most respectfully to the "Biblical critic" the task of

assigning to the narrative of the Nativity its rightful place in the

history of the New Testament. My deep interest in this story centers

in those spiritual ideals it reveals, which have through the ages

exercised such beneficent influences over the minds of men. And I

believe that both as a Christian {42} and as an Oriental, I have a

perfect right to be a mystic, after the wholesome New Testament fashion.

In the second chapter of St. Luke's Gospel the story of the Nativity is

presented in a most exquisite poetical form. The vision of humble

shepherds, wise men, and angels, mingling together in the joy of a new

divine revelation, could have been caught only by a deep-visioned

spiritual artist. Had this fragment of religious literature been

discovered in this year of 1916, its appearance would have marked a

significant epoch in the history of religion. It is the expression of

a sublime and passionate desire of the soul for divine companionship

and for infinite peace.

"And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field,

keeping watch over their flocks by night.

"And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the

Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.

"And the angel said unto them, Fear not; {43} for, behold, I bring you

good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.

"For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is

Christ the Lord.

"And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in

swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

"And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host

praising God, and saying,

"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men."

When the angel delivered his message to the effect that God had visited

his people in the person of the new-born Christ, then the humble,

unlettered shepherds heard the heavenly song, which gave God the glory,

and prophesied peace and good-will for all mankind. Could there be

anything more profoundly and accurately interpretative of the deepest

hopes of the human soul than this picture? Even the uncouth shepherds,

being living souls, could realize that when the divine and the {44}

human met heaven and earth became one, and peace and good-will

prevailed among men. What encouragement, what hope this vision holds

out even to the humblest among men! What assurance that heaven with

all its treasures of peace and love is so near to our dust!

"And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you glad

tidings." The shepherds looked up to heaven through the eyes of all

mankind. It was the upward look of a world-old hope. No soul ever

looked up to heaven with different results. The divine response always

is, "Fear not, for I bring you good tidings!" No soul ever needs to

dwell in doubt and fear. No soul ever needs to be lonely and forlorn.

Heaven has nothing for us but "good tidings of great joy." The higher

powers are near at hand, and the soul of man may have invisible

companions.

Again we learn from this New Testament passage that in the visit of the

shepherds and the Wise Men to the holy child both were equally blest.

Both those who were steeped {45} in the wisdom of that ancient East and

the simple-minded sons of the desert stood at the shrine of a holy

personality as naked souls, divested of all artificial human

distinctions. There were no "assigned" pews in that little shrine.

All those who came into it by way of the heart received a blessing, and

went away praising God. Here we have a foregleam of that longed-for

kingdom of God--the home of all aspiring and seeking souls, regardless

of rank and station.

"There is no great and no small

To the soul that maketh all:

And where it cometh, all things are;

And it cometh everywhere."

The Christmas carol is dear to the human heart because it is a song of

spiritual optimism. To pessimism the heavens are closed and silent;

the world has no windows opening toward the Infinite. Pessimism cannot

sing because it has no hope, and cannot pray because it has no faith.

And I deem it essential at this point to ask, {46} Whither is the

spirit of the present age leading us? Are we drifting away from the

mount of vision? There seems to be but little room in this vast and

complex life of ours for spiritual dreams and visions. The combination

of our commercial activities and the never-ceasing whir of the wheels

of our industries close up our senses to the intimate whisperings of

the divine spirit. We see, but with the outward eye. We hear, but

with the outward ear. Our inward senses are in grave danger of dying

altogether from lack of exercise. The things of this life are too much

with us, and they render us oblivious to the gracious beckonings of the

higher world. Let not the lesser interests of this life close our

hearing to the angel-song which never dies upon the air. The star of

hope never sets, and God's revelations are from everlasting to

everlasting.

{47}

CHAPTER V

FILIAL OBEDIENCE

Of Jesus' life between the period spoken of in the narrative of the

Nativity and the time when he appeared on the banks of the Jordan,

seeking to be baptized by John, the New Testament says nothing. One

single incident only is mentioned. When twelve years old, the boy

Jesus went with his parents on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Annual

pilgrimages to the great shrines are still very common in Syria. The

Mohammedans go to Mecca, the Christians and the Jews to Jerusalem. But

there are many other and more accessible sanctuaries which are

frequented by the faithful in all those communions. However, a visit

to any other sanctuary than Jerusalem and Mecca is called _zeara_,

rather than a pilgrimage.[1] The simple record of Jesus' pilgrimage to

Jerusalem with his parents is that of a typical {48} experience. In

writing about it I seem to myself to be giving a personal reminiscence.

In the second chapter of the Gospel of Luke, the forty-first verse, it

is said: "Now his parents went to Jerusalem every year at the feast of

the passover. And when he was twelve years old, they went up to

Jerusalem after the custom of the feast. And when they had fulfilled

the days, as they returned, the child Jesus tarried behind in

Jerusalem; and Joseph and his mother knew not of it. But they,

supposing him to have been in the company, went a day's journey; and

they sought him among their kinsfolk and acquaintance. And when they

found him not, they turned back again to Jerusalem, seeking him."

In Syria male children are taken on a pilgrimage or _zeara_, and thus

permitted to receive the blessing, which this pious act is supposed to

bring upon them, as soon as they are able to make the journey. Full

maturity is no essential condition. I went with my parents on two

_zearas_ before I was fifteen. At the {49} present time there is no

definite rule, at least among Christians, as to how many days should be

spent at a sanctuary. Pilgrims usually "vow" to stay a certain number

of days. In ancient Judaism, "the feast of the passover" occupied

eight days, and it was that number of days which Mary and Joseph

"fulfilled."

According to Luke, on their return journey to Nazareth Jesus' parents

went a day's journey before they discovered that he was not with them.

This phase of the story seems to have greatly puzzled the good old

commentator, Adam Clarke. "Knowing what a treasure they possessed," he

observes, "how could they be so long without looking on it? Where were

the bowels and tender solicitude of the mother? Let them answer this

question who can."

Clarke did not need to be so perplexed or so mystified. For one who

knows the customs of the Syrians while on religious pilgrimages knows

also that the experience of the "holy family" was not at all a strange

one. The whole mystery is cleared up in the saying, {50} "And they

sought him among their kinsfolk and acquaintance." Kinsfolk and

acquaintances travel in large groups, and the young pilgrims, such as

the twelve-year-old Jesus, are considered safe so long as they keep in

close touch with the company. On such journeys, parents may not see

their sons for hours at a time. The homogeneous character of the

group, and the sense of security which faith gives, especially at such

times, present no occasion for anxiety concerning the dear ones.

The saying of Luke that Joseph and Mary "went a day's journey" before

they discovered that Jesus was not in the company must, it seems to me,

include also the time consumed in their return journey to Jerusalem to

seek their son. Perhaps they discovered his absence about noontime

when the company halted by a spring of water to partake of the _zad_

(food for the way). At such a time families gather together to break

bread. And what I feel certain of also is that the boy Jesus must have

been with his parents when they first {51} set out on their homeward

journey early in the morning from Jerusalem, and that he detached

himself from his kinsfolk and returned to the holy city shortly after

the company had left that place. No Syrian family ever would start out

on a journey before every one of its members had been accounted for.

The evangelist's omission of these details is easily understood. His

purpose was not to give a photographic account of all that happened on

the way. It was rather to reveal the lofty spiritual ideals which led

the boy Jesus to return to the temple, where he was found by his

anxious parents "sitting in the midst of the doctors, both hearing

them, and asking them questions."

In this brief but significant record of all the filial graces which

Jesus must have possessed one only is mentioned in the second chapter

of the Gospel of Luke, where it is stated that he went down to Nazareth

with his parents "and was subject unto them."

This seemingly casual remark is full of {52} significance. With us in

Syria, _ta'at-el-walideen_ (obedience to parents) has always been

youth's crowning virtue. Individual initiative must not overstep the

boundary line of this grace. Only in this way the patriarchal

organization of the family can be kept intact. In my boyhood days in

that romantic country, whenever my father took me with him on a "visit

of homage" to one of the lords of the land, the most fitting thing such

a dignitary could do to me was to place his hand upon my head and say

with characteristic condescension, "Bright boy, and no doubt obedient

to your parents."

As regards the grace of filial obedience, I am not aware of a definite

break between the East and the West. But there is a vital difference.

To an Oriental who has just come to this country, the American youth

seem to be indifferent to filial obedience. The strong passion for

freedom, the individualistic sense which is a pronounced characteristic

of the aggressive Anglo-Saxon, and the economic stress {53} which ever

tends to scatter the family group, and which the East has never

experienced so painfully as the West has, all convey the impression

that parental love and filial obedience are fast disappearing from

American society. But to those of us sons of the East who have

intimate knowledge of the American family, its cohesion does not seem

to be so alarmingly weak. The mad rush for "business success" is

indeed a menace to the American home, but love and obedience are still

vital forces in that home. The terms "father," "mother," "brother,"

and "sister," have by no means lost their spiritual charms in American

society. The deep affection in which the members of the better

American family hold one another and the exquisite regard they have for

one another command profound respect.

But the vital difference between the East and the West is that to

Easterners filial obedience is more than a social grace and an evidence

of natural affection. It is a _religious_ duty of far-reaching

significance. God commands {54} it. "Thou shalt honor thy father and

thy mother" is a divine command. The "displeasure" of a parent is as

much to be feared as the wrath of God. This sense permeates Syrian

society from the highest to the lowest of its ranks.

The explanation of the origin of sin in the third chapter of Genesis

touches the very heart of this matter. The writer ascribes the "fall

of man," not to any act which was in itself really harmful, but to

disobedience. Adam was commanded by his divine parent not to eat of

the "tree of knowledge of good and evil"; but he did eat, and

consequently became a stranger to the blessings of his original home.

This idea of filial obedience has been at once the strength and

weakness of Orientals. In the absence of the restraining interests of

a larger social life this patriarchal rule has preserved the cohesion

of the domestic and clannish group, and thus safeguarded for the people

their primitive virtues. On the other hand, it has served to

extinguish the spirit of {55} progress, and has thus made Oriental life

a monotonous repetition of antiquated modes of thought.

And it was indeed a great blessing to the world when Jesus broke away

from mere formal obedience to parents, in the Oriental sense of the

word, and declared, "Whosoever shall do the will of my Father in

heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother."

[1] See above, p. 14.

{56}

CHAPTER VI

FEAST AND SACRAMENT

Of Jesus' public ministry and his characteristics as an Oriental

teacher, I shall speak in later chapters. Here I will give space only

to a portrayal of the closing scenes in his personal career. The

events of the "upper room" on Mount Zion, and of Gethsemane, are

faithful photographs of striking characteristics of Syrian life.

The Last Supper was no isolated event in Syrian history. Its fraternal

atmosphere, intimate associations, and sentimental intercourse are such

as characterize every such gathering of Syrian friends, especially in

the shadow of an approaching danger. From the simple "table manners"

up to that touch of sadness and idealism which the Master gave that

meal,--bestowing upon it the sacrificial character that has been its

propelling force through the ages,--I find nothing which is {57} not in

perfect harmony with what takes place on such occasions in my native

land. The sacredness of the Last Supper is one of the emphatic

examples of how Jesus' life and words sanctified the commonest things

of life. He was no inventor of new things, but a discoverer of the

spiritual significance of things known to men to be ordinary.

The informal formalities of Oriental life are brimful of sentiment.

The Oriental's chief concern in matters of conduct is not the

correctness of the technique, but the cordiality of the deed. To the

Anglo-Saxon the Oriental appears to be perhaps too cordial, decidedly

sentimental, and over-responsive to the social stimulus. To the

Oriental, on the other hand, the Anglo-Saxon seems in danger of

becoming an unemotional intellectualist.

Be that as it may, the Oriental is never afraid to "let himself go" and

to give free course to his feelings. The Bible in general and such

portions of it as the story of the Last Supper in particular illustrate

this phase of Oriental life.

{58}

In Syria, as a general rule, the men eat their fraternal feasts alone,

as in the case of the Master and his disciples at the Last Supper,

when, so far as the record goes, none of the women followers of Christ

were present. They sit on the floor in something like a circle, and

eat out of one or a few large, deep dishes. The food is lifted into

the mouth, not with a fork or spoon,--except in the case of liquid

food,--but with small "shreds" of thin bread. Even liquid food is

sometimes "dipped up" with pieces of bread formed like the bowl of a

spoon. Here may be readily understood Jesus' saying, "He that dippeth

his hand with me in the dish, the same shall betray me."[1]

In his famous painting, The Last Supper, Leonardo da Vinci presents an

Oriental event in an Occidental form. The high table, the chairs, the

individual plates and drinking-glasses are European rather than Syrian

appointments. From a historical standpoint, the picture is misleading.

But Da Vinci's great {59} production was not intended to be a

historical, but a character, study. Such a task could not have been

accomplished if the artist had presented the Master and his disciples

as they really sat in the "upper room"--in a circle. He seats them on

one side of the table, divides them into four groups of three each--two

groups on each side of the Master. As we view the great painting, we

feel the thrill of horror which agitated the loyal disciples when Jesus

declared, "Verily, I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me."[2]

The gestures, the sudden change of position, and the facial expression

reveal the innermost soul of each disciple. This is the central

purpose of the picture. The artist gave the event a European rather

than an Oriental setting, in order to make it more intelligible to the

people for whom it was intended.

But the appointments of the Great Supper were genuinely Oriental. The

Master and his disciples sat on the floor and ate out of one or {60} a

few large, deep dishes. In Mark's account of that event[3] we read:

"And when it was evening he cometh with the twelve. And as they sat

and were eating, Jesus said, Verily I say unto you, One of you shall

betray me, even he that _eateth_ with me." The fact that they were

_all_ eating with him is shown in the statement, "They began to be

sorrowful, and to say unto him, Is it I? And he said unto them, It is

one of the twelve, he that dippeth with me in the dish."

The last sentence, "He that dippeth with me in the dish," has been

construed to mean that it was Judas only (who was sitting near to

Jesus) who was dipping in the dish out of which the Master was eating.

This is altogether possible, but by no means certain. The fact is that

according to Syrian customs on such occasions each of the few large

dishes contains a different kind of food. Each one of the guests is

privileged to reach to any one of the dishes and dip his bread in it.

From this it may be {61} safely inferred that several or all of the

disciples dipped _in turn_ in the dish which was nearest to Jesus. The

fact that the other disciples did not know whom their Master meant by

his saying that one of them should betray him, even after he had said,

"He that dippeth with me in the dish," shows plainly that Judas was

eating in the same fashion as all the other disciples were.

Therefore the saying, "He that dippeth with me," etc., was that of

disappointed love. It may be thus paraphrased: "I have loved you all

alike. I have chosen you as my dearest friends. We have often broken

bread and sorrowed and rejoiced together, yet one of you, my dear

disciples, one who is now eating with me _as the rest are_, intends to

betray me!"

And that forlorn but glorious company who met in the upper room on

Mount Zion on that historic night had certainly one cup out of which

they drank. At our feasts we always drank the wine out of one and the

same cup. We did not stay up nights thinking about {62} microbes. To

us the one cup meant fellowship and fraternal communion. The one who

gives drink (_sacky_) fills the cup and passes it to the most honored

member of the company first. He drinks the contents and returns the

cup to the _sacky_, who fills it again and hands it to another member

of the group, and so on, until all have been served once. Then the

guests drink again by way of _nezel_. It is not easy to translate this

word into English. The English word "treating" falls very short of

expressing the affectionate regard which the _nezel_ signifies. The

one guest upon receiving the cup wishes for the whole company "health,

happiness, and length of days." Then he singles out one of the group

and begs him to accept the next cup that is poured as a pledge of his

affectionate regard. The pourer complies with the request by handing

the next cup to the person thus designated, who drinks it with the most

effusive and affectionate reciprocation of his friend's sentiments. It

is also customary for a gracious host to request as a {63} happy ending

to the feast that the contents of one cup be drunk by the whole company

as a seal of their friendship with one another. Each guest takes a sip

and passes the cup to the one next to him until all have partaken of

the "fruit of the vine."

I have no doubt that it was after this custom that the disciples drank

when Jesus "took the cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave to

them: and they _all_ drank of it."[4]

No account of fraternal feasting in Syria can be complete without

mention of the _z[i-breve]kreh_ (remembrance). To be remembered by his

friends after his departure from them is one of the Syrian's deepest

and dearest desires. The _z[i-breve]kreh_ plays a very important part

in the literature of the East, and expresses the tenderest spirit of

its poetry. The expressions "I remember," "remember me," "your

remembrance," "the remembrance of those days" and like phrases are

legion among the Syrians. "O friends," cries the Arabian poet, {64}

"let your remembrance of us be as constant as our remembrance of you;

for such a remembrance brings near those that are far away."

Rarely do friends who have been feasting together part without this

request being made by those of them who do not expect to meet with

their friends again for a time. "Remember me when you meet again," is

said by the departing friend with unspeakable tenderness. He is

affectionately grateful also when he knows that he is held in

remembrance by his friends. So St. Paul pours out his soul in grateful

joy for his friends' remembrance of him. "But now when Timotheus came

from you unto us, and brought us good tidings of your faith and

charity, and that _ye have good remembrance of us always, desiring

greatly to see us, as we also to see you_."[5]

This affectionate request, "remember me," signifies, "I love you,

therefore I am always with you." If we love one another, we cannot

{65} be separated from one another. The _z[)i]ikreh_ is the bond of

fraternity between us.

Was not this the very thing which the Master meant when he said, "This

do in remembrance of me"?[6] The disciples were asked never to allow

themselves to forget their Master's love for them and for the world:

never to forget that if his love lived in their hearts he was always

with them, present at their feasts, and in their struggles in the world

to lead the world from darkness into light. "This do in remembrance of

me," is therefore the equivalent of "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto

the end of the world."[7]

"Now there was leaning on Jesus' bosom one of his disciples, whom Jesus

loved."[8] The posture of the "beloved disciple," John,--so

objectionable to Occidental taste,--is in perfect harmony with Syrian

customs. How often have I seen men friends in such an attitude. There

is not in it the slightest infringement of the rules of propriety; the

act was as natural {66} to us all as shaking hands. The practice is

especially indulged in when intimate friends are about to part from one

another, as on the eve of a journey, or when about to face a dangerous

undertaking. They then sit with their heads leaning against each

other, or the one's head resting upon the other's shoulder or breast.

They talk to one another in terms of unbounded intimacy and

unrestrained affection. The expressions, "My brother," "My eyes," "My

soul," "My heart," and the like, form the life-centers of the

conversation. "My life, my blood are for you; take the very sight of

my eyes, if you will!" And lookers-on say admiringly, "Behold, how

they love one another! By the name of the Most High, they are closer

than brothers."

Was it, therefore, strange that the Master, who knew the deepest secret

of the divine life, and whose whole life was a living sacrifice, should

say to his intimate friends, as he handed them the bread and the cup on

that {67} momentous night, "Take, eat; this is my body"; and "Drink ye

all of it; for this is my blood"? Here again the Nazarene charged the

ordinary words of friendly intercourse with rare spiritual richness and

made the common speech of his people express eternal realities.

But let me here call attention to Da Vinci's master-stroke which

changes for a moment John's posture and relieves the Last Supper of a

feature which is so objectionable to Occidental taste. The artist

seizes the moment when Peter pulled John from Jesus' breast by

beckoning to the beloved disciple "that he should ask who it should be

of whom he spoke" (the one who should betray him). John remains in the

attitude of loving repose; he simply lifts his body for an instant, and

inclines his head to hear Peter.

The treachery of Judas is no more an Oriental than it is a human

weakness. Traitors can claim neither racial nor national refuge. They

are fugitives in the earth. But in the Judas episode is involved one

of the most tender, {68} most touching acts of Jesus' whole life. To

one familiar with the customs of the East, Jesus' handing the "sop" to

his betrayer was an act of surpassing beauty and significance. In all

my life in America I have not heard a preacher interpret this simple

deed, probably because of lack of knowledge of its meaning in Syrian

social intercourse.

"And when he had dipped the sop, he gave it to Judas Iscariot, the son

of Simon."[9] At Syrian feasts, especially in the region where Jesus

lived, such sops are handed to those who stand and serve the guests

with wine and water. But in a more significant manner those morsels

are exchanged by friends. Choice bits of food are handed to friends by

one another, as signs of close intimacy. It is never expected that any

person would hand such a sop to one for whom he cherishes no friendship.

I can never contemplate this act in the Master's story without thinking

of "the love of Christ which passeth knowledge." To the one {69} who

carried in his mind and heart a murderous plot against the loving

Master, Jesus handed the sop of friendship, the morsel which is never

offered to an enemy. The rendering of the act in words is this:

"Judas, my disciple, I have infinite pity for you. You have proved

false, you have forsaken me in your heart; but I will not treat you as

an enemy, for I have come, not to destroy, but to fulfill. Here is my

sop of friendship, and 'that thou doest, do quickly.'"

Apparently Jesus' demeanor was so cordial and sympathetic that, as the

evangelist tells us, "Now no man at the table knew for what intent he

spake this unto him. For some of them thought, because Judas had the

bag, that Jesus had said unto him, Buy those things that we have need

of against the feast, or that he should give something to the poor."[10]

Thus in this simple act of the Master, so rarely noticed by preachers,

we have perhaps the finest practical example of "Love your enemies" in

the entire Gospel.

{70}

Is it therefore to be wondered at that in speaking of Judas, the writer

of St. John's Gospel says, "And after the sop Satan entered into him"?

For, how can one who is a traitor at heart reach for the gift of true

friendship without being transformed into the very spirit of treason?

Again, Judas's treasonable kiss in Gethsemane was a perversion of an

ancient, deeply cherished, and universally prevalent Syrian custom. In

saluting one another, especially after having been separated for a

time, men friends of the same social rank kiss one another on both

cheeks, sometimes with very noisy profusion. When they are not of the

same social rank, the inferior kisses the hand of the superior, while

the latter at least pretends to kiss his dutiful friend upon the cheek.

So David and Jonathan "kissed one another, until David exceeded."

Paul's command, "Salute one another with a holy kiss," so scrupulously

disobeyed by Occidental Christians, is characteristically Oriental. As

a child I always felt {71} a profound reverential admiration for that

unreserved outpouring of primitive affections, when strong men "fell

upon one another's neck" and kissed, while the women's eyes swam in

tears of joy. The passionate, quick, and rhythmic exchange of

affectionate words of salutation and kisses sounded, with perhaps a

little less harmony, like an intermingling of vocal and instrumental

music.

So Judas, when "forthwith he came to Jesus, and said, Hail, Master, and

kissed him,"[11] invented no new sign by which to point Jesus out to

the Roman soldiers, but employed an old custom for the consummation of

an evil design. Just as Jesus glorified the common customs of his

people by using them as instruments of love, so Judas degraded those

very customs by wielding them as weapons of hate.

[1] Matt. xxvi: 23.

[2] Matt. xxvi: 21.

[3] Revised Version, xiv: 17-20.

[4] Mark xiv: 23.

[5] 1 Thess. iii: 6.

[6] Luke xxii: 19.

[7] Matt. xxviii: 10.

[8] John xiii: 23.

[9] John xiii: 26.

[10] John xiii: 28, 29.

[11] Matt. xxvi: 49.

{72}

CHAPTER VII

THE LAST SCENE

Perhaps nowhere else in the New Testament do the fundamental traits of

the Oriental nature find so clear an expression as in this closing

scene of the Master's life. The Oriental's _dependence_, to which the

world owes the loftiest and tenderest Scriptural passages, finds here

its most glorious manifestations.

As I have already intimated, the Oriental is never afraid to "let

himself go," whether in joy or sorrow, and to give vent to his

emotions. It is of the nature of the Anglo-Saxon to suffer in silence,

and to kill when he must, with hardly a word of complaint upon his lips

or a ripple of excitement on his face. He disdains asking for

sympathy. His severely individualistic tendencies and spirit of

endurance convince him that he is "able to take care of himself."

During my early years in this country the reserve of Americans in times

of sorrow {73} and danger, as well as in times of joy, was to me not

only amazing, but appalling. Not being as yet aware of their inward

fire and intensity of feeling, held in check by a strong bulwark of

calm calculation, as an unreconstructed Syrian I felt prone to doubt

whether they had any emotions to speak of.

It is not my purpose here to undertake a comparative critical study of

these opposing traits, but to state that, for good or evil, the

Oriental is preëminently a man who craves sympathy, yearns openly and

noisily for companionship, and seeks help and support outside himself.

Whatever disadvantages this trait may involve, it has been the one

supreme qualification that has made the Oriental the religious teacher

of the whole world. It was his childlike dependence on God that gave

birth to the twenty-third and fifty-first Psalms, and made the Lord's

Prayer the universal petition of Christendom. It was also this

dependence on companionship, human and divine, which inspired the great

commandments, {74} "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy

heart, and thy neighbor as thyself."

Now it is in the light of this fundamental Oriental trait that we must

view Christ's utterances at the Last Supper and in Gethsemane. The

record tells us that while at the Supper he said to his disciples,

"With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you before I

suffer,"[1]--or, as the marginal note has it, "I have heartily

desired," and so forth, which brings it nearer the original text.

Again, "He was troubled in spirit, and testified and said, Verily,

verily, I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me." "This is my

body ... This is my blood ... Do this in remembrance of me." We must

seek the proper setting for these utterances, not merely in the upper

room in Zion, but in the deepest tendencies of the Oriental mind.

And the climax is reached in the dark hour of Gethsemane, in the hour

of intense suffering, imploring need, and ultimate triumph in {75}

Jesus' surrender to the Father's will. How true to that demonstrative

Oriental nature is the Scriptural record, "And being in an agony he

prayed more earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of

blood falling down to the ground."[2]

The faithful and touching realism of the record here is an example of

the childlike responsiveness of the Syrian nature to feelings of

sorrow, no less striking than the experience itself. It seems to me

that if an Anglo-Saxon teacher in similar circumstances had ever

allowed himself to agonize and to sweat "as it were great drops of

blood," his chronicler in describing the scene would have safeguarded

the dignity of his race by simply saying that the distressed teacher

was "visibly affected"!

The darkness deepened and the Master "took with him Peter and the two

sons of Zebedee, and began to be sorrowful and very heavy. Then saith

he unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death; tarry

{76} ye here, and watch with me."[3] Three times did the Great Teacher

utter that matchless prayer, whose spirit of fear as well as of trust

vindicates the doctrine of the humanity of God and the divinity of man

as exemplified in the person of Christ: "O my Father, if it be

possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as

thou wilt!"[4]

The sharp contrast between the Semitic and the Anglo-Saxon temperament

has led some unfriendly critics of Christ to state very complacently

and confidently that he "simply broke down when the critical hour

came." In this assertion I find a very pronounced misapprehension of

the facts. If my knowledge of the traits of my own race is to be

relied on, then in trying to meet this assertion I feel that I am

entitled to the consideration of one who speaks with something

resembling authority.

The simple fact is that while in Gethsemane, as indeed everywhere else

throughout his ministry, Jesus was not in the position of one {77}

trying to "play the hero." His companions were his intimate earthly

friends and his gracious heavenly Father, and to them he spoke as an

Oriental would speak to those dear to him,--_just as he felt_, with not

a shadow of show or sham. His words were not those of weakness and

despair, but of confidence and affection. The love of his friends and

the love of his Father in heaven were his to draw upon in his hour of

trial, with not the slightest artificial reserve. How much better and

happier this world would be if we all dealt with one another and with

God in the warm, simple, and pure love of Christ!

As the life and words of Christ amply testify, the vision of the

Oriental has been to teach mankind not science, logic, or

jurisprudence, but a simple, loving, childlike faith in God.

Therefore, before we can fully know our Master as the cosmopolitan

Christ, we must first know him as the Syrian Christ.

[1] Luke xxii: 15.

[2] Luke xxii: 44.

[3] Matt. xxvi: 37-38.

[4] _Ibid._ 39.

{81}

PART II

THE ORIENTAL MANNER OF SPEECH

CHAPTER I

DAILY LANGUAGE

The Oriental I have in mind is the Semite, the dweller of the Near

East, who, chiefly through the Bible, has exerted an immense influence

on the life and literature of the West. The son of the Near East is

more emotional, more intense, and more communicative than his

Far-Eastern neighbors. Although very old in point of time, his

temperament remains somewhat juvenile, and his manner of speech

intimate and unreserved.

From the remote past, even to this day, the Oriental's manner of speech

has been that of a worshipper, and not that of a business man or an

industrial worker in the modern Western sense. To the Syrian of

to-day, as to his ancient ancestors, life, with all its activities and

cares, revolves around a religious center.

Of course this does not mean that his religion {82} has not always been

beset with clannish limitations and clouded by superstitions, or that

the Oriental has always had a clear, active consciousness of the

sanctity of human life. But it does mean that this man, serene or

wrathful, at work or at play, praying or swearing, has never failed to

believe that he is overshadowed by the All-seeing God. He has never

ceased to cry: "O Lord, Thou hast searched me, and known me. Thou

knowest my downsitting and mine uprising; Thou understandest my thought

afar off. Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand

upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot

attain unto it!"[1]

And it is one of the grandest, most significant facts in human history

that, notwithstanding his intellectual limitations and superstitious

fears, because he has maintained the altar of God as life's center of

gravity, and never let die the consciousness that he was compassed

about by the living God, the Oriental {83} has been the channel of the

sublimest spiritual revelation in the possession of man.

The histories of races are the records of their desires and rewards, of

their seeking and finding. The law of compensation is all-embracing.

In the long run "whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap."[2]

"He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which

soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully."[3] In the material

world the Oriental has sown but sparingly, and his harvests here have

also been very meager. He has not achieved much in the world of

science, industry, and commerce. As an industrial worker he has

remained throughout his long history a user of hand tools. Previous to

his very recent contact with the West, he never knew what structural

iron and machinery were. As a merchant he has always been a simple

trader. He has never been a man of many inventions. His faithful

repetition of the past has left no gulf between him and his remote

ancestors. {84} The implements and tools he uses to-day are like those

his forefathers used in their day.

The supreme choice of the Oriental has been religion. To say that this

choice has not been altogether a conscious one, that it has been the

outcome of temperament, does by no means lessen its significance. From

the beginning of his history on the earth to this day the Oriental has

been conscious above all things of two supreme realities--God and the

soul. What has always seemed to him to be his first and almost only

duty was and is to form the most direct, most intimate connection

between God and the soul. "The fear of the Lord," meaning most

affectionate reverence, is to the son of the East not "the beginning of

wisdom" as the English Bible has it, but the _height_ or _acme_ of

wisdom. His first concern about his children is that they should know

themselves as living souls, and God as their Creator and Father. An

unbeliever in God has always been to the East a strange phenomenon. I

never heard of atheism or of an atheist before {85} I came in touch

with Western culture in my native land.

My many years of intimate and sympathetic contact with the more varied,

more intelligent life of the West has not tended in the least to lessen

my reverence for religion nor to lower my regard for culture. Culture

gives strength and symmetry to religious thought, and religion gives

life and beauty to culture. And just as I believe that men should pray

without ceasing, so also do I believe that they should strive to make

their religious faith ever more free and more intelligent.

Yet the history of the Orient compels me to believe that the soil out

of which scriptures spring is that whose life is the active sympathy of

religion, regardless of the degree of acquired knowledge. When the

depths of human nature are thoroughly saturated with this sympathy,

then it is prepared both to receive and to give those thoughts of which

scriptures are made. Industry and commerce have their good uses. But

an industrial and {86} commercialistic atmosphere is not conducive to

the production of sacred books. Where the chief interests of life

center in external things, religion is bound to become only one and

perhaps a minor concern in life.

The Oriental has always lived in a world of spiritual mysteries.

Fearful or confident, superstitious or rational, to him God has been

all and in all. "The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous

altogether. In keeping of them there is great reward."[4] The son of

the East has been richly rewarded. He is the religious teacher of all

mankind. Through him all scriptures have come into being. All the

great, living religions of the world originated in Asia; and the three

greatest of them--Judaism, Christianity, and Mohammedanism--have come

into the world through the Semitic race in that little country called

Syria. The perpetual yearning of the Oriental for spiritual dreams and

visions has had its rewards. He sowed bountifully, he reaped

bountifully.

{87}

Note the Syrian's daily language: it is essentially Biblical. He has

no _secular_ language. The only real break between his scriptures and

the vocabulary of his daily life is that which exists between the

classical and the vernacular. When you ask a Syrian about his business

he will not answer, "We are doing well at present," but "_Allah mûn

'aim_" (God is giving bounteously). To one starting on a journey the

phrase is not "Take good care of yourself," but "Go, in the keeping and

protection of God." By example and precept we were trained from

infancy in this manner of speech. Coming into a house, the visitor

salutes by saying, "God grant you good morning," or "The peace of God

come upon you." So it is written in the tenth chapter of Matthew, "And

as ye enter into the house, salute it. And if the house be worthy, let

your peace come upon it; but if it be not worthy, let your peace return

unto you."

In saluting a day laborer at work we said, "_Allah, yaatik-el-afie_"

(God give you health {88} and strength). In saluting reapers in the

field, or "gatherers of the increase" in the vineyards or olive groves,

we said just the words of Boaz, in the second chapter of the Book of

Ruth, when he "came from Bethlehem and said unto the reapers, The Lord

be with you. And they answered him, The Lord bless thee." Or another

Scriptural expression, now more extensively used on such occasions,

"The blessing of the Lord be upon you!" It is to this custom that the

withering imprecation which is recorded in the one hundred and

twenty-ninth Psalm refers: "Let them all be confounded and turned back

that hate Zion: let them be as the grass upon the housetops which

withereth afore it groweth up: wherewith the mower filleth not his

hand, nor he that bindeth sheaves his bosom. Neither do they which go

by say, The blessing of the Lord be upon you: we bless you in the name

of the Lord."

In asking a shepherd about his flock we said, "How are the blessed

ones?" or a parent about his children, "How are the preserved ones?"

{89} They are preserved of God through their "angels," of whom the

Master spoke when he said, "Take heed that ye despise not one of these

little ones; for I say unto you that in heaven their angels do always

behold the face of my Father."[5] Speaking of a good man we said, "The

grace of God is poured upon his face." So in the Book of Proverbs,[6]

"Blessings are upon the head of the just."

Akin to the foregoing are such expressions as these. In trying to rise

from a sitting posture (the Syrians sit on the floor with their legs

folded under them), a person, using the right arm for leverage, says,

as he springs up, "Ya _Allah_" (O God [help]). In inquiring about the

nature of an object, he says, "_Sho dinû_?" (what is its religion?) And

one of the queerest expressions, when translated into English, is that

employed to indicate that a kettleful of water, for example, has boiled

beyond the required degree: "This water has turned to be an infidel"

(_kaffer_). It may be noticed here {90} that it is not the old

theology only which associates the infidel with intense heat.

So this religious language is the Oriental's daily speech. I have

stated in my autobiography that the men my father employed in his

building operations were grouped according to their faith. He had so

many Druses, so many Greek Orthodox, Maronites, and so forth.

The almost total abstinence from using "pious" language in ordinary

business and social intercourse in America may be considered

commendable in some ways, but I consider it a surrender of the soul to

the body, a subordination of the spirit of the things which are eternal

to the spirit of the things which are temporal. In my judgment, the

superior culture of the West, instead of limiting the vocabulary of

religion to the one hour of formal worship on Sunday, and scrupulously

shunning it during the remainder of the week, should make its use, on a

much higher plane than the Orient has yet discovered, coextensive with

all the activities of life.

[1] Ps. cxxxix: 1-6.

[2] Gal. vi: 7.

[3] 2 Cor. ix: 6.

[4] Ps. xix: 9, 11.

[5] Matt. xviii: 10.

[6] x: 6.

{91}