Such An Attempt, However, Is Full Of
Difficulties:
The Arabic is a language in which, like Italian, it is
almost impossible not to rhyme.
[FN#40] It
Will not be necessary to inform the reader more than once
that all these several divisions of prayer ended with the Testification
and the Fatihah.
[FN#41] Faruk,-the separator,-a title of Omar.
[FN#42] When the number of the Ashab or "Companions" was thirty-nine,
they were suddenly joined by Omar, who thus became the fortieth.
[FN#43] It is said that Mohammed prayed long for the conversion of Omar
to Al-Islam, knowing his sterling qualities, and the aid he would lend
to the establishment of the faith.
[FN#44] This foolish fanaticism has lost many an innocent life, for the
Arabs on these occasions seize their sabres, and cut down every Persian
they meet. Still, bigoted Shi'ahs persist in practising and applauding
it, and the man who can boast at Shiraz of having defiled Abu Bakr's,
Omar's, or Osman's tomb becomes at once a lion and a hero. I suspect
that on some occasions when the people of Al-Madinah are anxious for an
"avanie," they get up some charge of the kind against the Persians. So
the Meccans have sometimes found these people guilty of defiling the
house of Allah-at which Infidel act a Shi'ah would shudder as much as a
Sunni. This style of sacrilege is, we read, of ancient date in Arabia.
Nafil, the Hijazi, polluted the Kilis (Christian church) erected by
Abrahah of Sanaa to outshine the Ka'abah, and draw off worshippers from
Meccah. The outrage caused the celebrated "affair of the Elephant."
(See D'Herbelot, Bibl. Or., v. "Abrahah.")
[FN#45] Burckhardt, with his usual accuracy, asserts that a new curtain
is sent when the old one is decayed, or when a new Sultan ascends the
throne, and those authors err who, like Maundrell, declare the curtain
to be removed every year. The Damascus Caravan conveys, together with
its Mahmil or emblem of royalty, the new Kiswah (or "garment") when
required for the tomb. It is put on by the eunuchs, who enter the
baldaquin by its Northern gate at night time, and there is a
superstitious story amongst the people that they guard their eyes with
veils against the supernatural splendours which pour from the tomb. The
Kiswah is a black, purple, or green brocade, embroidered with white or
with silver letters. A piece in my possession, the gift of Omar
Effendi, is a handsome silk and cotton Damascus brocade, with white
letters worked in it-manifestly the produce of manual labour, not the
poor dull work of machinery. It contains the formula of the Moslem
faith in the cursive style of the Suls character, seventy-two varieties
of which are enumerated by calligraphists. Nothing can be more elegant
or appropriate than its appearance. The old curtain is usually
distributed amongst the officers of the Mosque, and sold in bits to
pilgrims; in some distant Moslem countries, the possessor of such a
relic would be considered a saint.
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