a large building, said to have been erected by Noah; and a large piece
of wood is exhibited through an iron grating, which is said to have
formed a portion of his ark. There is also to be seen at Chenna a well,
said to have been dug by the patriarch Jacob, of which the water is icy
cold.
The Armenians say that a certain monk, Jacob, once ascended Ararat,
and carried off a fragment of the ark, which he made afterwards into a
cross, and this is preserved amongst the sacred relics of Etchmiadzin.
When the Persian king, Abassus the great, sent to inquire about the
ark, the monks replied that it was in vain for him to attempt to
reach it, on account of the precipices and glaciers, and innumerable
difficulties of the way.[263]
XIX.
CERTAIN DESCENDANTS OF HAM.
We shall follow certain Mussulman traditions for what follows. Ad,
son of Amalek, therefore grandson of Ham, established himself in
Arabia, where he became chief of the tribe of the Adites. He fell into
idolatry. He had two sons named Schedad and Scheded, who reigned over
numerous subjects--one for two hundred and fifty, the other for three
hundred years. They built a superb city, where houses were of sumptuous
magnificence; the like of this city was never seen before, nor will
be seen again. This city vanished when the tribe of the Adites was
exterminated; as we shall relate when we give the legends attaching to
Heber. The commentators of the Koran tell marvels of this wondrous city.
Under the Khalifate of Moawiyah, first of the Ommiades, an Arab of the
desert, named Kolabah, going in quest of his camel in the plain of
Aden, lighted on the gate of a beautiful city. He went in, but, being
filled with fear, he did not remain there more time than sufficed for
him to collect some of the stones of the street, and then he returned.
His neighbors, to whom he relates his adventure, repeated it to the
Khalif, who ordered Kolabah to be brought before him. The Arab related
frankly what he had seen, but Moawiyah would not give credence to the
marvellous tale, till he had consulted his learned men, and especially
the illustrious Al-Akhbar, who assured him that the story of the poor
Arab was worthy of all trust, for the city he had seen was none other
than that built by Schedad, son of Ad, in the land of the Adites in
which Aden is situated; and that, as the pride of this prince knew no
bounds, God had sent His angel to destroy all the inhabitants, and
conceal their splendid city from the eyes of men, to be revealed only
at intervals, that the memory of God’s judgment might not fade out of
men’s minds.
Schedad had a son named Dhohak, of whom strange tales are told. He knew
magic, and gained the sovereignty over the entire universe; and he kept
his subjects in terror by excessive cruelty. In the Caherman-Nâmeh it
is related that the Devil, satisfied with his proceedings, offered
him his services gratuitously, and they were cheerfully accepted. The
ferocity of the tyrant increased, he skinned men alive, impaled and
crucified them on the slightest charges.
After having served him five years, the Evil One thus addressed him:
“Sire! for many years I have been thy faithful attendant, neither
have I received of thee any recompense. Now I beseech of thee one
favor--that I may kiss thy shoulders.”
This favor was readily granted. Dhohak himself plucked off his mantle
to facilitate the kiss.
But no sooner had the Devil applied his lips to the two shoulders of
the tyrant, than two serpents, which could not be plucked off, fastened
there and began to gnaw his flesh.
Tabari says that the king bore on his shoulders two frightful ulcers or
cancers, resembling serpents’ heads, sent him by God as a punishment
for his crimes. These cancers caused him such acute agony, that he
shrieked night and day. No one was able to provide a remedy or to abate
the torment.
One night when he was asleep, some one appeared to him in a dream, and
said, “If you desire your ulcers to give less pain, apply to them human
brains.”
Next day, Dhohak awoke and ordered two men to be brought before him; he
slew them, cut open their skulls, extracted the brains and applied them
to his cancers. The relief was instantaneous, and Dhohak felt, for the
first time for many days, some hours of repose.
After this, every day two men were killed to form poultices for his
ulcers. During the two hundred latter years of the life of Dhohak, the
prisons were emptied to satisfy his requirement for fresh brains; and
when no more criminals could be procured, it was made a tribute for his
kingdom to render to him two men, each day, to be immolated to soothe
his pain.
Now there was at Ispahan a blacksmith, named Kaveh, who had two
beautiful sons, whom he loved more dearly than his own life. One day
they were seized, carried before the king, and his shoulders were
poulticed with their brains.
Kaveh was at work at his anvil when the news of the slaying of his
sons reached him. He deserted his anvil; and uttering a piercing
cry, he rushed into the streets, with his leathern apron before him,
bitterly lamenting his loss, and calling for vengeance on the monarch.
The people crowded about him, they plucked off his leather apron, and
converted it into a standard.
The crowd gathered as it advanced. From every street men flowed to join
the army, and shortly the blacksmith found himself at the head of a
hundred thousand men.
They marched to Demavend, where was the palace of the tyrant. And
Kaveh, before attacking it, thus addressed his soldiers, “I am not one
to lead you against a king; you need a king to make war against a king.”
“Well,” said his followers, “we elect you to be our king.”
“I am but a simple blacksmith, and am not fit to rule,” answered Kaveh,
“but there is a royal prince named Afridoun, the son of Djemschid, who
is fled from the cruelty of Dhohak: choose him.”
They agreed. The prince was found and invested with the sovereignty;
then a battle was fought, and Dhohak’s army was routed, and the tyrant
was slain.
When Afridoun mounted the throne, he named Kaveh governor of Ispahan.
And when Kaveh was dead, the king asked his children to give him their
father’s leathern apron. Then, having obtained it, he placed it among
his treasures, and whenever he went to battle he attached the smith’s
apron to a tall staff, and marched under that banner against his
enemies.
In after years, this leathern apron was studded with precious stones,
till Omar, despising it, ordered the old piece of leather to be burnt;
but Yezdeguerd had already robbed it of its gems.[264]
Afridoun exercised the sovereignty during two hundred years. He was
the first to study astronomy, and he founded the science of medicine.
He was the first king to ride on an elephant. He had three sons, Tur,
Salm, and Irad. He loved the third son, Irad, more than the two elder,
and he gave him the sovereignty over Irad, Mosul, Koufa, Bagdad.
After the death of Afridoun, Tur and Salm marched against Irad,
defeated him and killed him, saying: “Our father has divided his
inheritance unjustly. He has given to Irad the best portion, the centre
of the world; as for us, we are cast out to its extremities.”
On the death of Tur and Salm, the crown left this family, and passed to
a king named Cush, who was of the sons of Ham, the son of Noah. Cush
reigned forty years. After him Canaan ascended the throne. Cush and
Canaan worshipped idols. It is said that Nimrod was the son Canaan.
When Canaan died, Nimrod succeeded him. Nimrod had a vizir named
Azar (Terah), son of Nahor, son of Sarough (Serug), who was sixth in
generation from Noah. This Azar was the father of Abraham, the friend
of God.
From the time of the Deluge to the time of Abraham was three thousand
years. During that period, there was no prophet save Hud (Eber), who
was sent to the Adites, and Saleh, who was sent to the Thamudites.
We shall relate the history of Hud and of Saleh, and then return to
that of Nimrod.[265]
XX.
SERUG.
“_And Eber lived four and thirty years, and begat Peleg._
“_And Peleg lived thirty years, and begat Reu. And Reu lived two and
thirty years, and begat Serug. And Serug lived thirty years, and begat
Nahor._”[266]
Serug is said to have discovered the art of coining gold and silver
money. In his days men erected many idols, into which demons entered
and wrought great signs by them. Samiri was king of the Chaldees, and
he discovered weights and measures and how to weave silk, and also how
to dye fabrics. He is related to have had three eyes and two horns.
At the same time Apiphanus was king of Egypt. He built a ship, and in
it made practical descents upon the neighboring people living on the
shores of the Mediterranean Sea. He was succeeded by Pharaoh, son of
Saner, and the kings after him assumed his name as their title.[267]
Nahor was the son of Serug. In the twenty-fifth year of his life, Job
the Just, underwent his trial, according to the opinion of Arudha the
Canaanite. At that time Armun, king of Canaan, built the two cities
Sodom and Gomorrah, and called them after the names of his two sons;
but Zoar he named after his mother. At the same time, Murk or Murph,
king of Palestine, built Damascus.[268]
XXI.
THE PROPHET EBER.
“_Unto Shem, the father of all the children of Eber, the brother of
Japheth the elder, even to him were children born._
“_The children of Shem;--Elam, and Asshur, and Arphaxad and Lud and
Aram._
“_And the children of Aram;--Uz, and Hul, and Gether, and Mash._
“_And Arphaxad begat Salah; and Salah begat Eber._”[269]
According to some Mussulman writers, Oudh (Lud), the son of Shem, had a
son named Ad; but, according to others, Ad was the son of Aram, son of
Shem.
The tribes of Ad and Thamud lived near one another in the desert of
Hedjaz, in the south of Arabia. The land of the people of Ad was nearer
Mecca than the valley of Hidjr, and the valley of Hidjr is situated at
the extremity of the desert on the road to Syria.
Never in all the world were there such great and mighty men as the
Adites. Each of them was twelve cubits high, and they were so strong
that if any of them stamped on the ground he sank up to his knees.
The Adites raised great monuments in the land which they inhabited.
Wherever these Cyclopean edifices exist, they are called by the Arabs
the constructions of the Adites.
God ordered the prophet Hud (Eber) to go to the Adites and preach to
them the One true God, and turn them from idolatry. But the Adites
would not hearken to his words, and when he offered them the promises
of God, they said, “What better dwellings can He give us than those
which we have made?” And when he spoke to them of God’s threatenings,
they mocked and said, “Who can resist us who are so strong?”
For fifty years did the prophet Hud speak to the Adites, and their
reply to his exhortations is preserved in the Koran, “O Hud, you
produce no evidence of what you advance; we will not abandon our gods
because of your preaching. We mistrust your mission. We believe that
one of our gods bears a hatred against you.”
Hud replied, “I take God to witness, and you also be witnesses, that I
am innocent of your polytheism.”[270]
The words of the Adites, “We believe that one of our gods bears a
hatred against thee,” signified that they believed one of their gods
had driven him mad.
During the fifty years that Hud’s mission lasted, the Adites believed
neither in God nor in the prophet, with the exception of a very few,
who believed in secret.
At the end of that time God withheld the rain from heaven, and
afflicted the Adites with drought. All the cattle of Ad died, and the
Adites fainted for lack of water. For three years no rain fell.
Hud said to the Adites, “Believe in God, and He will give you rain.”
They replied, “Thou art mad.” But they choose three men to send to
Mecca with victims; for the infidels believe in the sanctity of Mecca,
though they believe not in the One true God.
But Eber said, “Your sacrifices will be unavailing, unless you first
believe.”
The three deputies started for Mecca with many camels, oxen, and sheep,
as sacrifices. And when they reached Mecca they made friends with the
inhabitants of that city, and were received with hospitality. They
passed their days and nights in eating and drinking wine, and in their
drunkenness they forgot their people, and the mission on which they
had been sent. The inhabitants of Mecca ordered musicians to sing the
afflictions of the Adites, to recall to the envoys the purpose of their
visit. Then Lokman and Morthed, two of the deputies, declared to Qaïl,
the third, that they believed in Allah; and they added, “If our people
had believed the words of the prophet Hud, they would not have suffered
from drought,” and Lokman and Morthed were not drunk when they said
these words.
Qaïl replied, “You do not partake in the affliction of our nation. I
will go myself and will offer the victims.”
He went and led the beasts to the top of a mountain to sacrifice them,
and turning his face to heaven, he said, “O God of heaven, hearken unto
my prayer, and send rain on my poor afflicted people.”
Instantly there appeared three clouds is the blue sky: one was red, one
was black, the third was white; and a voice issued from the clouds,
saying, “Choose which shall descend upon thy people.”
Then Qaïl said within himself, “The white cloud, if it hung all day
over my nation, would not burst in rain; the red cloud, if it hung over
them night and day, would not drop a shower; but the black cloud is
heavy with water.” So he chose the black cloud.
And a voice cried, “It is gone to fall upon the people.”
Qaïl returned full of joy, thinking he had obtained rain; but that
cloud was big with the judgments of God. Qaïl told what he had done to
his companions, Lokman and Morthed, but they laughed at him.
Now the cloud, when it arrived over the land of Ad, was accompanied by
a wind. And the Adites looked up rejoicing, and cried, “The rain, the
rain is coming!”
Then the cloud gaped, and a dry whirlwind rolled out from it, and swept
up all the cattle that were in the land, and raised them in the air,
spun them about, and dashed them lifeless on the ground.
But the Adites said, “Fear not; first comes wind, then comes rain.” And
they rushed out of their houses into the fields. Hud thought they were
coming forth to ask his assistance; but they sought him not. Then the
whirlwind caught them up and cast them down again. Now each of these
men was like a palm-tree in statue, and they lay shattered and lifeless
on the sand.
Hud was saved, along with those who had believed his word.
Now when the envoys at Mecca heard what had befallen their people, they
went all three to the summit of the mountain, and Lokman and Morthed
said to Qaïl, “Believe.” But he answered, raising his face and hands
to heaven: “O God of heaven, if thou hast destroyed my people, slay me
also.”
Then the whirlwind came, and rushed on him, and caught him up and cast
him down, and he was dead.
But Lokman and Morthed offered their sacrifice, and a voice from heaven
said, “What is your petition?”
Lokman answered: “O Lord, grant me a long life, that I may outlive
seven vultures.” Now a vulture is the longest-lived of all birds; it
lives five hundred years.
And the voice replied, “However long thy life may be, death will close
it.”
Lokman said, “I know; that is true.”
Then his prayer was granted. And Lokman took a young vulture and fed it
for five hundred years, and it died; then he took a second, and at the
expiration of five hundred years it died also; and so on till he had
reached the age of three thousand five hundred years, and then he died
also.
Morthed made his request, and it was, “O Lord, give me wheat bread,”
for hitherto in Ad he had eaten only barley bread. So Allah gave
Morthed so much wheat, that he was able to make bread thereof all the
rest of his life.
Hud lived fifty years with the faithful who had received his doctrine,
and his life in all was one hundred and fifty years. The prophet
Saleh appeared five hundred years after Hud; he was sent to the
Thamudites.[271]
But there is another version of the story given by Weil.
Hud promised Schaddad, king of the Adites, a glorious city in the
heavens, if he would turn to the true God. But the king said, “I need
no other city than that I have built. My palace rests on a thousand
pillars of rubies and emeralds; the streets and walls are of gold, and
pearl, and carbuncle, and topaz; and each pillar in the house is a
hundred ells long.”
Then, at Hud’s word, God let the city and palace of Schaddad fade away
like a dream of the night, and storm and rain descended, and night
fell, and the king was without home in the desert.[272]
Of Lokman we must relate something more. He was a great prophet; some
say he was nephew of Job, whose sister was his mother; others relate
that he was the son of Beor, the son of Nahor, the son of Terah.
One day, whilst he was reposing in the heat of the day, the angels
entered his room and saluted him, but did not show themselves. Lokman
heard their voices, but saw not their persons. Then the angels said to
him,--
“We are messengers of God, thy Creator and ours; He has sent us unto
thee to announce to thee that thou shalt be a great monarch.”
Lokman replied, “If God desires what you say, His will can accomplish
all things, and doubtless He will give me what is necessary for
executing my duty in that position in which He will place me. But if
He would suffer me to choose a state of life, I should prefer that
in which I now am,”--now Lokman was a slave,--“and above all would I
ask Him to enable me never to offend Him; without which all earthly
grandeur would be to me a burden.”
This reply of Lokman was so pleasing to Allah, that He gave him the
gift of wisdom to such a degree of excellence, that he became capable
of instructing all men; and this he did by means of a great multitude
of maxims, sentences, and parables to the number of ten thousand, each
of which is more valuable than the whole world.[273]
When Lokman did not know any thing with which others were acquainted,
he held his tongue, and did not ask questions and thus divulge his
ignorance.
As he lived to a great age, he was alive in the days King David. Now
David made a coat of mail, and showed it to Lokman. The sage had seen
nothing like it before, and did not know what purpose it was to serve,
but he looked knowing and nodded his head. Presently David put the
armor upon him, and marched, and said, “It is serviceable in war.”
Then Lokman understood its object; so his mouth became unsealed and he
talked about it.
Lokman used to say, “Silence is wisdom, but few practise it.”[274]
Thalebi relates, in his Commentary on the Koran, that Lokman was a
slave, and that having been sent along with other slaves into the
country to gather fruit, his fellow-slaves ate them, and charged Lokman
with having done so. Lokman, to justify himself, said to his master,
“Let every one of us slaves be given warm water to drink, and you will
soon see who has been the thief.”
The expedient succeeded; the slaves who had eaten the fruit vomited it,
and Lokman threw up only warm water.
The same story precisely is told of Æsop.
Lokman is always spoken of as black, with thick lips. He is regarded by
the Arabs much as is Bidpay by the Indians, and Æsop by the Europeans,
as the Father of Fable.
XXII.
THE PROPHET SALEH.
The prophet Saleh was the son of Ad, son of Aram, son of Shem, and is
not to be confused with Saleh, son of Arphaxad.
The Mussulmans say that he was sent to convert the Thamudites.
The Thamudites were in size and strength like their brethren the
Adites, but they inhabited the rocks, which they dug out into spacious
mansions. They had in the midst of their land an unfailing supply of
sweet and limpid water. They were idolaters. Saleh came armed with the
command of Allah to these men, and he preached to them that they should
turn from the worship of stocks and stones to that of the living God
who made them.
Now Saleh had been born among the Thamudites, but he had never been an
idolater. When he was young, the natives of the land had laughed at
him, and said, “He is young and inexperienced; when he is old, and has
grown wiser, he will adore our gods.”
When Saleh grew old, he forbade the Thamudites to worship idols, and he
spoke to them of the true and only God.
But they said, “What miracle can you work, to prove that your mission
is from God?”[275]
Then he said, “Oh, my people, a she-camel that shall come from God
shall be to you for a sign. Let her go and eat on the earth, and do her
no injury, that a terrible retribution fall not upon you.”[276]
Now Saleh had asked them what miracle they desired, and they had
answered, “Bring out of the rock a camel with red hair, and a colt of a
camel also with red hair; let them eat grass, and we will believe.”
Saleh said to them, “What you ask is easy,” and he prayed.
Then the rock groaned and clave asunder, and there came out a she-camel
with her foal, and their hair was red, and they began to eat grass.
Then the Thamudites exclaimed, “He is a magician!” and they would not
believe in him.
The camel went to the perpetual fountain, and she drank it up, so that
from that day forward from their spring they could get no water, and
they suffered from thirst.
The Thamudites went to Saleh and said, “We need water!”
Saleh replied, “The fountain shall flow one day for you, and one day
for the camel.”
So it was agreed that the camel should drink alternate days with the
people of the land, and that alternate days each should be without
water whilst the other was drinking.
Then Saleh said, for he saw that the people hated the camel and her
foal, “Beware that you slay not these animals for the day that they
perish, great shall be your punishment.”
The she-camel lived thirty years among the Thamudites, but God revealed
to Saleh that they were bent on slaying the camel, and he said, “The
slayer will be a child with red hair and blue eyes.”
Now the Thamudites ordered ten midwives to attend on the women in their
confinement, and if a child were born with the signs indicated by the
prophet, it was to be destroyed instantly.
Nine children had thus been killed, and the parents conceived a deadly
animosity against Saleh the prophet, and formed a design to slay him.
One of the chiefs among the Thamudites had a son born to him with red
hair and blue eyes, and the nurses would have destroyed it, but the
nine men spake to the father of the child, and they banded together,
and saved the infant.
Now when this child had attained the age of eleven, he became great and
handsome; and each of the parents whose children had been put to death,
when he saw him, said, “Such an one would have been my son, had not he
been slain at the instigation of Saleh.” And they combined to put the
prophet to death. They said among themselves, “We will kill him outside
the city, and returning, say we were elsewhere when he was murdered.”
Having formed this project, they left the city and placed themselves
under a rock, awaiting his exit from the gates But God commanded the
rock, and it fell and crushed them all.
Next day their corpses were recovered, but the Thamudites were very
wroth, and said, “Saleh has slain our children, and now he slays our
men;” and they added, “We will be revenged on his camel.”
But no one could be found to undertake the execution of this deed,
save the red-haired child. He went to the fountain where the camel was
drinking, and with one kick he knocked her over, and with another kick
he despatched her.
But the foal, seeing the fate of her mother, ran away, and the boy with
the red hair and blue eyes ran after her.
Saleh, seeing what had taken place, cried, “The judgment of God is
about to fall.”
The people were frightened, and asked, “What shall we do?”
“The judgment of God will not fall as long as the colt remains among
you.”
Hearing this, the whole population went in pursuit of the young
camel. Now it had fled to the mountain whence it had sprung, and the
red-haired boy was close on its heels. And when the young camel heard
the shouting of the inhabitants of the city, and saw the multitude in
pursuit, it stood before the rock, turned round, uttered three piercing
cries and vanished.
The Thamudites arrived and beat the rock, but they could not open it.
Then said Saleh, “The judgment of God will fall; prepare to receive it.
The first day your faces will become livid, the second day they will
become black, and the third day red.”