There is the print of Abraham's footstep; there is the holy well Zemzem, identified by a bold stretch of geography, with the spring that rose miraculously from the earth to quench the thirst of Hagar and Ishmael in the wilderness, There too is the black stone, once white, but which has changed its hue, either from the sins of mankind or from the kisses of the faithful. This was one of the stones of Paradise which fell down with Adam; being taken up at the deluge, it was brought to Abraham by the angel Gabriel as a sacred ornament for his restored temple.

Such are the legends. By whomsoever founded, there is no doubt that the Kaaba has been more than once rebuilt both before and since the time of Mahomet. To what faith soever it was first dedicated, there is no doubt that he found it the great centre of worship and place of pilgrimage for the idolaters of Arabia. There they came to worship and to sacrifice to the 360 graven and molten images which had accumulated within it; there they compassed the temple seven times naked, as putting away the encumbrance of their sins; there they ran backward and forward seven times between Mounts Safa and Merwa, to commemorate Hagar seeking water for her son; there they threw seven stones in the valley of Mina, to commemorate those which Abraham threw at the Devil, when he sought to disturb the patriarch in his offering of Ishmael. For Ishmael, as might be expected, takes a higher place than Isaac in Mahometan reverence, and he, and not his younger half-brother, is held to have been the real intended victim. That all these rites themselves formed part of the ancient Sabian worship cannot be doubted; but we may very well suppose that the legendary

ABRAHAH'S INVASION OF MECCA.

27

explanations of them were the device of Mahomet or his commentators.

The Sabian creed however was by no means the universal religion of Arabia. Many Jews had settled in the peninsula, and had made numerous proselytes among the native inhabitants. Other tribes had largely embraced Magianism. Christianity also had made extensive and rapid advances. It was chiefly known in the Jacobite form, that prevalent in Egypt and Ethiopia; but some few were Nestorians, and Arabia also produced heretics of its own, including some who worshipped the Virgin Mother of Christ as a sort of goddess, with an offering of cakes. Two months before the birth of Mahomet, a miracle alone, it is said, saved the Kaaba from being converted into a Christian church. The great kingdom of the Hamyarites had at one time professed Judaism, and the Christians were cruelly persecuted. Its subjection to Abyssinia, which has been already mentioned, was the consequence of an invasion of the Abyssinian monarch to avenge the wrongs of his Christian brethren. Abrahah, the vassal King of Hamyar, was a zealous Christian. He erected a splendid church in his capital, Senaa, not without a political motive, like that of Jeroboam, that its attractions might draw away pilgrims from Mecca, and thereby draw away influence from the rulers of that city. An idolater of Mecca contrived to enter the church by night, and besmeared it with filth. Abrahah's demands for redress were rejected by the Koreish, who ruled at Mecca, and the army with which he then proceeded to enforce his claims was discomfited before the holy city.

Had the expedition of Abrahah succeeded, the whole destiny of the East might have been different.

Mahomet might have been brought up as a Christian, and he would thereby have lost the main inducement which led to his prophetic career. His spirit would not have been moved within him to see his native city wholly given to idolatry. No wonder then that such an event is, perhaps unconsciously, adorned in the Moslem traditions with marvels in proportion to its importance. The tale is briefly alluded to in the Koran,1 and is greatly expanded by its commentators. It was no human hand which smote Abrahah and rescued the Kaaba. The elephants which he brought in his army stood awe-struck and immoveable before the holy place. Presently appeared a flock of green birds, each of whom let fall three stones-from its bill and its two feet-on the army of Abrahah, each stone being marked with the name of the soldier whom it slew. Lest their bodies should prove offensive to the Meccans, a flood swept them into the sea. Abrahah, alone, fled to the court of his Abyssinian suzerain, and recounted his calamity. Asked by the King what manner of bird had wrought such destruction, he pointed to one over head. It had followed him from Mecca, and reserved its fire till this moment. But it too carried a stone, which, like the rest, had its billet, and Abrahah fell down lifeless before the whole Abyssinian court. The inventors of this tale do not seem to have perceived the inconsistency of representing God as fighting for infidels, and working miracles to prevent His temple, desecrated by idolatry, from being transferred to a creed which, according to Mahomet's own showing, was then the last manifestation of His will.

1 Chap. cv. "the Elephant," (Sale, ii. 503.)

2 The Koran says merely that "God sent against them flocks of birds, which cast down upon them stones of baked clay."

RELIGIOUS CONDITION OF ARABIA.

29

Idolatry then was the prevailing religion of Arabia, but Judaism, Christianity, and Magianism numbered many votaries. It should be observed that none of the Arabian religions presented the same obstacles to Mahomet's teaching which the early Christians found in the polytheism of Greece and Rome. The cornerstone of his creed is the proposition, “There is but one God." Now to the worshippers of Zeus and Athene, the notion of a single, personal, almighty Being was something unheard of and unintelligible. Here and there a philosopher or two had grasped the merest approximation to the idea. But all the Arabian creeds recognized it more or less clearly. With Jews and Christians there was of course no difficulty. The Sabians recognized one supreme God, though they associated idols with His worship. The Magian idea of "Time without Bounds" was perhaps too shadowy to be practical; but all that was needed was to confess that Ahriman was not the coequal rival of Ormuzd, but one of his creatures in rebellion against him.1

There can be no doubt that the coming of Mahomet took place at a time when there was a great religious movement going on in Arabia. Some of the pagan Arabs had cast off all religion, and had become positive infidels. Others were seeking after something better, and were making approximations, more or less close, to clearer views of the divine nature.2

Such was the condition of Arabia and the two great Empires between which it lay, during the early part of the seventh century. A very hasty glance will suffice for a survey of those countries which lay beyond

1 See Elphinstone's History of India, i. 512.

2 See a deeply affecting narrative on this head in the powerful article on "Mahometanism" in the Christian Remembrancer, January, 1855, p. 105.

the power of Persia and Rome. In the extreme East, India slumbered on in its immemorial religious and social state; hardly any trace remained of the Macedonian invasion, or of the Greek kingdom of Bactria to which it gave rise. In the extreme West the Gothic monarchs of Spain had taken advantage of the eastern wars of Heraclius to annex the Byzantine province, and thus to reunite the whole peninsula. In Gaul the Merovingian dynasty was running its course of crime, dissension, and weakness. Northern Europe was still chiefly Pagan, but the first step to its conversion was taken, in Augustine's mission to England, about fifteen years before the first preaching of Mahomet. In northern Asia the Turkish and Mongolian tribes had not commenced those migrations through Persia which were afterwards of such infinite moment to the Mahometan world; they rather poured to the north of the Caspian and Euxine Seas into those north-eastern parts of Europe where everything was unsettled. Huns, Avars, Chazars, passed through what is now Russia and northern Turkey to trouble the Roman frontier on the Danube; and the æra of the more permanent settlement of the Bulgarians is not far remote. Heraclius had permitted Slavonians to occupy the Illyrian provinces, there to grow up in time into the valiant Christians of Servia and Montenegro and the Mahometan oligarchy of the neighbouring Bosnia. In short, the Roman and Persian Empires seemed the only settled governments in the world; beyond their limits was little but barbarism, anarchy, and national migrations; and Rome and Persia alike, exhausted by their long conflict, seemed too weak to resist the attacks of a fresh and vigorous invader. It was indeed a moment for Mahomet and his Saracens to change the face of the world.