Beacon Lights of History, Volume 05 | Page 6

parts of the sea." This is the one truth
that Moses sought to plant in the minds of the Jews,--a truth always
forgotten when there is slavery to epicurean pleasures or a false
philosophy.
Now I maintain that Mohammed, in seeking to impress his degenerate
countrymen with the idea of the one supreme God, amid a most
degrading and almost universal polytheism, was a great reformer. In
preaching this he was neither fanatic nor hypocrite; he was a very great
man, and thus far a good man. He does not make an original revelation;
he reproduces an old truth,--as old as the patriarchs, as old as Job, as
old as the primitive religions,--but an exceedingly important one, lost
sight of by his countrymen, gradually lost sight of by all peoples when
divine grace is withheld; indeed practically by people in Christian lands
in times of great degeneracy. "The fool has said in his heart there is no
God;" or, Let there be no God, that we may eat and drink before we die.
Epicureanism, in its pleasures or in its speculations, is virtually atheism.
It was so in Greece. It is so with us.

Mohammed was now at the mature age of forty, in the fulness of his
powers, in the prime of his life; and he began to preach everywhere that
there is but one God. Few, however, believed in him. Why not
acknowledge such a fundamental truth, appealing to the intellect as
well as the moral sense? But to confess there is a supreme God, who
rewards and punishes, and to whom all are responsible both for words
and actions, is to imply a confession of sinfulness and the justice of
retribution. Those degraded Arabians would not receive willingly such
a truth as this, even as the Israelites ever sought to banish it from their
hearts and minds, in spite of their deliverance from slavery. The uncles
and friends of Mohammed treated his mission with scorn and derision.
Nor do I read that the common people heard him gladly, as they
listened to the teachings of Christ. Zealously he labored for three years
with all classes; and yet in three years of exalted labor, with all his
eloquence and fervor and sincerity, he converted only about thirteen
persons, one of whom was his slave. Think of such a man declaring
such a truth, and only gaining thirteen followers in three years! How
sickened must have been his enthusiastic soul! His worldly relatives
urged him to silence. Why attack idols; why quarrel with his own
interests; why destroy his popularity? Then exclaimed that great hero:
"If the sun stood on my right hand, and the moon on my left, ordering
me to hold my peace, I would still declare there is but one God,"--a
speech rivalled only by Luther at the Diet of Worms. Why urge a great
man to be silent on the very thing which makes him great? He cannot
be silent. His truth--from which he cannot be separated--is greater than
life or death, or principalities or powers.
Buffeted and ridiculed, still Mohammed persevered. He used at first
only moral means. He appealed only to the minds and hearts of the
people, encouraged by his few believers and sustained by the fancied
voice of that angel who appeared to him in his retreat. But his earnest
voice was drowned by discordant noises. He was regarded as a lunatic,
a demented man, because he professed to believe in a personal God.
The angry mob covered his clothes with dust and ashes. They
demanded miracles. But at this time he had only truths to
declare,--those saving truths which are perpetual miracles. At last
hostilities began. He was threatened and he was persecuted. They laid

plots to take his life. He sought shelter in the castle of his uncle, Abu
Taleh; but he died. Then Mohammed's wife Cadijeh died. The priests
of an idolatrous religion became furious. He had laid his hands on their
idols. He was regarded as a disorganizer, an innovator, a most
dangerous man. His fortunes became darker and darker; he was hated,
persecuted, and alone.
Thus thirteen years passed away in reproach, in persecution, in fear. At
last forty picked men swore to assassinate him. Should he remain at
Mecca and die, before his mission was accomplished, or should he fly?
He concluded to fly to Medina, where there were Jews, and some
nominal converts to Christianity,--a new ground. This was in the year
622, and the flight is called the Hegira,--from which the East dates its
era, in the fifty-third year of the Prophet's life. In this city he was
cordially welcomed, and he soon found himself surrounded with
enthusiastic followers. He built a mosque, and openly performed the
rites of the new religion.
At this era