It Is The Same With The Turks In The
Archipelago, And I Might Adduce Many Examples From Syria And Egypt In
Corroboration Of This Assertion.
If fanaticism has somewhat decreased
within the last twenty years throughout the
[P.206] Turkish empire, the circumstance, I think, may be ascribed
solely to the decreasing energy of the inhabitants, and the growing
indifference for their own religion, and certainly not to a diffusion of
more philanthropic or charitable principles. The text of the Mohammedan
law is precise in inciting its followers to unceasing hatred and
contempt of all those who profess a different creed. This contempt has
not decreased; but animosity gives way to an exterior politeness,
whenever the interest of the Mohammedan is concerned. The degree of
toleration enjoyed by the Christians, depends upon the interest of the
provincial government under which they live: and if they happen to be
favoured by it, the Turkish subject bows to the Christian. In all the
eastern countries which I have visited, more privileges are allowed to
Christians in general than the Moslim code prescribes; but their
condition depends upon the fiat of the governor of the town or district;
as they experienced about seven years since at Damascus, under Yousef
Pasha, when they were suddenly reduced to their former abject state.
Twenty years ago, a Copt of Egypt was in much the same situation as a
Jew is now in Barbary; but at present, when the free-thinking, though
certainly not liberal, Mohammed Aly finds it his interest to conciliate
the Christians, a Greek beats a Turk without much fear of consequences
from the mob; and I know an instance of an Armenian having murdered his
own Muselman servant, and escaped punishment, on paying a fine to
government, although the fact was publicly known. Convinced as the Turks
must now be, in many parts of the East, of the superiority of these
Europeans, whom they cannot but consider as the brethren of their
Christian subjects, their behaviour towards the latter will,
nevertheless, be strictly regulated by the avowed sentiments of their
governors; and it would be as easy for Mohammed Aly by a single word to
degrade the Christians in Egypt, as he found it to raise them to their
present consideration, superior, I believe, to what they enjoy in any
other part of Turkey.
The hatred against Christians is nearly equal in every part of the
Ottoman empire; and if the Moslims sacrifice that feeling, it is not to
the principles of charity or humanity, but to the frown of those who
happen to be in power; and their baseness is such, that they will kiss
[p.207] to-day the hands of him whom they have trodden under foot
yesterday. In examining into the fanatical riots, many of which are
recorded in the chanceries of the European consuls in the Levant, it
will generally be found that government had a share in the affrays, and
easily succeeded in quelling them. The late Sultan Selim, in his
regenerating system, which led him to favour the Christians, found no
opposition from the mass of his people, but from the jealous
Janissaries; and when the latter had prevailed, the demi-Gallicized
grandees of Constantinople easily sunk again into Sunnys. Sometimes,
indeed, a rash devotee, or mad Sheikh or Dervish at the head of a few
partisans, affords an exception to these general statements; and will
insult a Christian placed in the highest favour with the public
authorities, as happened at Damascus in 1811, to the Greek Patriarch,
after Yousef Pasha had been repulsed: but his countrymen, although
cherishing the same principles, and full of the same uncharitableness,
seldom have the courage to give vent to their feelings, and to follow
the example of the Saint. None of those genuine popular commotions,
which were once so frequent in Europe, when the members of the reigning
church saw individuals of a rival persuasion extending their influence,
are now witnessed in the East. Whatever may be thought of it in a moral
point of view, we must respect the energy of a man who enters headlong
into a contention, of at least uncertain issue, and generally
detrimental to his own worldly interests, merely because he fancies or
believes that his religious duty commands his exertions. The Moslim of
the Turkish empire, as far as I have had an opportunity of remarking,
easily suppresses his feelings, his passions, the dictates of his
conscience, and what he supposes agreeable to the will of the Almighty,
at the dictates of his interest, or according to the wish or example of
the ruling power.
In the time of the Sherif, Christians were often ill treated at Djidda;
they could not wear the European dress, or approach the quarter of the
town situated towards the gate of Mekka. But since the arrival of
Mohammed Aly's army, they walk about, and dress as they like. In
December 1814, when two Englishmen passed the gate of Mekka on a walk
round the town, (the first persons, probably, in a
[p.208] European dress, who had ever passed the holy boundary,) a woman
was heard to exclaim, "Truly the world must be near its end, if Kafirs
(or infidels) dare to tread upon this ground!" Even now, if a Christian
dies there, it is not permitted that he should be interred on shore; the
body is carried to a small desert island in the harbour. When, in 1815,
the plague raged in the Hedjaz, an event which had never before been
known, the Kadhy of Djidda, with the whole body of olemas, waited upon
the Turkish governor of the city, to desire him to demolish a windmill
which some Greek Christians from Cairo had built withoutside one of the
gates, by order of Mohammed Aly. They were certain, they said, that the
hand of God had visited them on account of this violation of the sacred
territory by Christians. Some years ago an English ship was wrecked near
Djidda, and among various spoils obtained from the wreck by Sherif
Ghaleb was a large hog, an animal probably never before seen at Djidda:
this hog, turned loose in the town with two ostriches, became the terror
of all the sellers of bread and vegetables; for the mere touching of so
unclean an animal as the hog, even with the edge of the gown, renders
the Moslim impure, and unable to perform his prayers without previous
ablution.
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