I Have Seen The Latter, Which Is Kept In The Sinai
Convent At Cairo, But I Do Not Believe It
To be an authentic document.
None of the historians of Mohammed, who have recorded the transactions
of almost every day
Of his life, mention his having been at Mount Sinai,
neither in his earlier youth, nor after he set up as a prophet, and it
is totally contrary to history that he should have granted to any
[p.547] Christians such privileges as are mentioned in this Firmahn, one
of which is that the Moslems are bound to aid the Christian monks in
rebuilding their ruined churches. It is to be observed also that this
document states itself to have been written by Ali, not at the convent,
but in the mosque of the Prophet at Medina, in the second year of the
Hedjra, and is addressed, not to the convent of Mount Sinai in
particular, but to all the Christians and their priests. The names of
twenty-two witnesses, followers of Mohammed, are subscribed to it; and
in a note it is expressly stated that the original, written by Ali, was
lost, and that the present was copied from a fourth successive copy
taken from the original. Hence it appears that the relation of the
priests is at variance with the document to which they refer, and I have
little doubt therefore that the former is a fable and the latter a
forgery. Notwithstanding the difficulties to which the monks must have
been exposed from the warlike and fanatical followers of the new faith
in Syria, Arabia, Egypt, and the Desert, the convent continued
uninjured, and defended itself successfully against all the surrounding
tribes by the peculiar arms of its possessors, patience, meekness, and
money.
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