by Ameen Rihani
“It is also said that they discovered and first navigated the Atlantic Ocean, my Phœnicians; that they worked gold mines in the distant isle of Thasos and opened silver mines in the South and Southwest of Spain. In Africa, we know, they founded the colonies of Utica and Carthage. But we are told they went farther than this. And according to some historians, they rounded the Cape, they circumnavigated Africa. And according to recent discoveries made by an American archæologist, they must have discovered America too! For in the ruins of the Aztecs of Mexico there are traces of a Phoenician language and religion. This, about the discovery of America, however, I can not verify with anything from Sanchuniathon. But might they not have made this discovery after the said Sanchuniathon had given up the ghost? And if they did, what can We, their worthless descendants do for them now? Ah, if we but knew the name of their Columbus! No, it is not practical to build a monument to a whole race of people. And yet, they deserve more than this from us, their descendants.
“These dealers in tin and amber, these manufacturers of glass and purple, these developers of a written language, first gave the impetus to man’s activity and courage and intelligence. And this activity of the industry and will is not dead in man. It may be dead in us Syrians, but not in the Americans. In their strenuous spirit it rises uppermost. After all, I must love the Americans, for they are my Phoenician ancestors incarnate. Ay, there is in the nature of things a mysterious recurrence which makes for a continuous, everlasting modernity. And I believe that the spirit which moved those brave sea-daring navigators of yore, is still working lustily, bravely, but alas, not joyously—bitterly, rather, selfishly, greedily—behind the steam engine, the electric motor, the plough, and in the clinic and the studio as in the Stock Exchange. That spirit in its real essence, however, is as young, as puissant to-day as it was when the native of Byblus first struck out to explore the seas, to circumnavigate Africa, to discover even America!”
And what in the end might Khalid discover for us or for himself, at least, in his explorations of the Spirit-World? What Colony of the chosen sons of the young and puissant Spirit, on some distant isle beyond the seven seas, might he found? To what far, silent, undulating shore, where “a written language is the instrument only of the lofty expressions and aspirations of the soul” might he not bring us? What Cape of Truth in the great Sea of Mystery might we not be able to circumnavigate, if only this were possible of the language of man?
“Not with glass,” he exclaims, “not with tear-bottles, not with purple, not with a written language, am I now concerned, but rather with what those in Purple and those who make this written language their capital, can bring within our reach of the treasures of the good, the true, and the beautiful. I would fain find a land where the soul of man, and the heart of man, and the mind of man, are as the glass of my ancestors’ tear-bottles in their enduring quality and beauty. My ancestors’ tear-bottles, and though buried in the earth ten thousand years, lose not a grain of their original purity and transparency, of their soft and iridescent colouring. But where is the natural colour and beauty of these human souls, buried in bunks under hatches? Or of those moving in high-lacquered salons above? …
“O my Brothers of the clean and unclean species, of the scented and smelling kind, of the have and have-not classes, there is but one star in this vague dusky sky above us, for you as for myself. And that star is either the last in the eternal darkness, or the first in the rising dawn. It is either the first or the last star of night. And who shall say which it is? Not the Church, surely, nor the State; not Science, nor Sociology, nor Philosophy, nor Religion. But the human will shall influence that star and make it yield its secret and its fire. Each of you, O my Brothers, can make it light his own hut, warm his own heart, guide his own soul. Never before in the history of man did it seem as necessary as it does now that each individual should think for himself, will for himself, and aspire incessantly for the realisation of his ideals and dreams. Yes, we are to-day at a terrible and glorious turning point, and it depends upon us whether that one star in the vague and dusky sky of modern life, shall be the harbinger of Jannat or Juhannam.”
CHAPTER V
PRIESTO-PARENTAL
IF WE REMEMBER THAT THE NAME OF KHALID’S cousin is Najma (Star), the significance to himself of the sign spoken of in the last Chapter, is quite evident. But what it means to others remains to be seen. His one star, however, judging from his month’s experience in Baalbek, is not promising of Jannat. For many things, including parental tyranny and priestcraft and Jesuitism, will here conspire against the single blessedness of him, which is now seeking to double itself.
“Where one has so many Fathers,” he writes, “and all are pretending to be the guardians of his spiritual and material well-being, one ought to renounce them all at once. It was not with a purpose to rejoin my folk that I first determined to return to my native country. For, while I believe in the Family, I hate Familism, which is the curse of the human race. And I hate this spiritual Fatherhood when it puts on the garb of a priest, the three-cornered hat of a Jesuit, the hood of a monk, the gaberdine of a rabbi, or the jubbah of a sheikh. The sacredness of the Individual, not of the Family or the Church, do I proclaim. For Familism, or the propensity to keep under the same roof, as a social principle, out of fear, ignorance, cowardice, or dependence, is, I repeat, the curse of the world. Your father is he who is friendly and reverential to the higher being in you; your brothers are those who can appreciate the height and depth of your spirit, who hearken to you, and believe in you, if you have any truth to announce to them. Surely, one’s value is not in his skin that you should touch him. Are there any two individuals more closely related than mother and son? And yet, when I Khalid embrace my mother, mingling my tears with hers, I feel that my soul is as distant from her own as is Baalbek from the Dog-star. And so I say, this attempt to bind together under the principle of Familism conflicting spirits, and be it in the name of love or religion or anything else more or less sacred, is in itself a very curse, and should straightway end. It will end, as far as I am concerned. And thou my Brother, whether thou be a son of the Morning or of the Noontide or of the Dusk,—whether thou be a Japanese or a Syrian or a British man—if thou art likewise circumstanced, thou shouldst do the same, not only for thine own sake, but for the sake of thy family as well.”
No; Khalid did not find that wholesome plant of domestic peace in his mother’s Nursery. He found noxious weeds, rather, and brambles galore. And they were planted there, not by his father or mother, but by those who have a lien upon the souls of these poor people. For the priest here is no peeled, polished affair, but shaggy, scrubby, terrible, forbidding. And with a word he can open yet, for such as Khalid’s folk, the gate which Peter keeps or the other on the opposite side of the Universe. Khalid must beware, therefore, how he conducts himself at home and abroad, and how, in his native town, he delivers his mind on sacred things, and profane. In New York, for instance, or in Turabu for that matter, he could say in plain forthright speech what he thought of Family, Church or State, and no one would mind him. But where these Institutions are the rottenest existing he will be minded too well, and reminded, too, of the fate of those who preceded him.
The case of Habib Ish-Shidiak at Kannubin is not yet forgotten. And Habib, be it known, was only a poor Protestant neophite who took pleasure in carrying a small copy of the Bible in his hip pocket, and was just learning to roll his eyes in the pulpit and invoke the “laud.” But Khalid, everybody out-protesting, is such an intractable protestant, with neither Bible in his pocket nor pulpit at his service. And yet, with a flint on his tongue and a spark in his eyes, he will make the neophite Habib smile beside him. For the priesthood in Syria is not, as we have said, a peeled, polished, pulpy affair. And Khalid’s father has been long enough in their employ to learn somewhat of their methods. Bigotry, cruelty, and tyranny at home, priestcraft and Jesuitism abroad,—these, O Khalid, you will know better by force of contact before you end. And you wil
l begin to pine again for your iron-loined spiritual Mother. Ay, and the scelerate Jesuit will even make capital of your mass of flowing hair. For in this country, only the native priests are privileged to be shaggy and scrubby and still be without suspicion. But we will let Shakib give us a few not uninteresting details of the matter.
“Not long after we had rejoined our people,” he writes, “Khalid comes to me with a sorry tale. In truth, a fortnight after our arrival in Baalbek—our civility towards new comers seldom enjoys a longer lease—the town was alive with rumours and whim-whams about my friend. And whereso I went, I was not a little annoyed with the tehees and grunts which his name seemed to invoke. The women often came to his mother to inquire in particular why he grows his hair and shaves his mustaches; the men would speak to his father about the change in his accent and manners; the children teheed and tittered whenever he passed through the town-square; and all were of one mind that Khalid was a worthless fellow, who had brought nothing with him from the Paradise of the New World but his cough and his fleece. Such tattle and curiosity, however, no matter what degree of savage vulgarity they reach, are quite harmless. But I felt somewhat uneasy about him, when I heard the people asking each other, “Why does he not come to Church like honest folks?” And soon I discovered that my apprehensions were well grounded; for the questioning was noised at Khalid’s door, and the fire crackled under the roof within. The father commands; the mother begs; the father objurgates, threatens, curses his son’s faith; and the mother, prostrating herself before the Virgin, weeps, and prays, and beats her breast. Alas, and my Khalid? he goes out on the terrace to search in the Nursery for his favourite Plant. No, he does not find it; brambles are there and noxious weeds galore. The thorny, bitter reality he must now face, and, by reason of his lack of savoir-faire, be ultimately out-faced by it. For the upshot of the many quarrels he had with his father, the prayers and tears of the mother not availing, was nothing more or less than banishment. You will either go to Church like myself, or get out of this house: this the ultimatum of Abu-Khalid. And needless to say which alternative the son chose.
“I still remember how agitated he was when he came to tell me of the fatal breach. His words, which drew tears from my eyes, I remember too. ‘Homeless I am again,’ said he, ‘but not friendless. For besides Allah, I have you.—Oh, this straitness of the chest is going to kill me. I feel that my windpipe is getting narrower every day. At least, my father is doing his mighty best to make things so hard and strait.—Yes, I would have come now to bid you farewell, were it not that I still have in this town some important business. In the which I ask your help. You know what it is. I have often spoken to you about my cousin Najma, the one star in my sky. And now, I would know what is its significance to me. No, I can not leave Baalbek, I can not do anything, until that star unfolds the night or the dawn of my destiny. And you Shakib—’
“Of course, I promised to do what I could for him. I offered him such cheer and comfort as my home could boast of, which he would not accept. He would have only my terrace roof on which to build a booth of pine boughs, and spread in it a few straw mats and cushions. But I was disappointed in my calculations; for in having him thus near me again, I had hoped to prevail upon him for his own good to temper his behaviour, to conform a little, to concede somewhat, while he is among his people. But virtually he did not put up with me. He ate outside; he spent his days I know not where; and when he did come to his booth, it was late in the night. I was informed later that one of the goatherds saw him sleeping in the ruined Temple near Ras’ul-Ain. And the muazzen who sleeps in the Mosque adjacent to the Temple of Venus gave out that one night he saw him with a woman in that very place.”
A woman with Khalid, and in the Temple of Venus at night? Be not too quick, O Reader, to suspect and contemn; for the Venus-worship is not reinstated in Baalbek. No tryst this, believe us, but a scene pathetic, more sacred. Not Najma this questionable companion, but one as dear to Khalid. Ay, it is his mother come to seek him here. And she begs him, in the name of the Virgin, to return home, and try to do the will of his father. She beats her breast, weeps, prostrates herself before him, beseeches, implores, cries out, ‘dakhilak (I am at your mercy), come home with me.’ And Khalid, taking her up by the arm, embraces her and weeps, but says not a word. As two statues in the Temple, silent as an autumn midnight, they remain thus locked in each other’s arms, sobbing, mingling their sighs and tears. The mother then, ‘Come, come home with me, O my child.’ And Khalid, sitting on one of the steps of the Temple, replies, ‘Let him move out of the house, and I will come. I will live with you, if he will keep at the Jesuits.’
For Khalid begins to suspect that the Jesuits are the cause of his banishment from home, that his father’s religious ferocity is fuelled and fanned by these good people. One day, before Khalid was banished, Shakib tells us, one of them, Father Farouche by name, comes to pay a visit of courtesy, and finds Khalid sitting cross-legged on a mat writing a letter.
The Padre is received by Khalid’s mother who takes his hand, kisses it, and offers him the seat of honour on the divan. Khalid continues writing. And after he had finished, he turns round in his cross-legged posture and greets his visitor. Which greeting is surely to be followed by a conversation of the sword-and-shield kind.
“How is your health?” this from Father Farouche in miserable Arabic.
“As you see: I breathe with an effort, and can hardly speak.”
“But the health of the body is nothing compared with the health of the soul.”
“I know that too well, O Reverend” (Ya Muhtaram).
“And one must have recourse to the physician in both instances.”
“I do not believe in physicians, O Reverend.”
“Not even the physician of the soul?”
“You said it, O Reverend.”
The mother of Khalid serves the coffee, and whispers to her son a word. Whereupon Khalid rises and sits on the divan near the Padre.
“But one must follow the religion of one’s father,” the Jesuit resumes.
“When one’s father has a religion, yes; but when he curses the religion of his son for not being ferociously religious like himself—”
“But a father must counsel and guide his children.”
“Let the mother do that. Hers is the purest and most disinterested spirit of the two.”
“Then, why not obey your mother, and—”
Khalid suppresses his anger.
“My mother and I can get along without the interference of our neighbours.”
“Yes, truly. But you will find great solace in going to Church and ceasing your doubts.”
Khalid rises indignant.
“I only doubt the Pharisees, O Reverend, and their Church I would destroy to-day if I could.”
“My child—”
“Here is your hat, O Reverend, and pardon me—you see, I can hardly speak, I can hardly breathe. Good day.”
And he walks out of the house, leaving Father Farouche to digest his ire at his ease, and to wonder, with his three-cornered hat in hand, at the savage demeanour of the son of their pious porter. “Your son,” addressing the mother as he stands under the door-lintel, “is not only an infidel, but he is also crazy. And for such wretches there is an asylum here and a Juhannam hereafter.”
And the poor mother, her face suffused with tears, prostrates herself before the Virgin, praying, beating her breast, invoking with her tongue and hand and heart; while Farouche returns to his coop to hatch under his three-cornered hat, the famous Jesuit-egg of intrigue. That hat, which can outwit the monk’s hood and the hundred fabled devils under it, that hat, with its many gargoyles, a visible symbol of the leaky conscience of the Jesuit, that hat, O Khalid, which you would have kicked out of your house, has eventually succeeded in ousting YOU, and will do its mighty best yet to send you to the Bosphorus. Indeed, to serve their purpose, these honest servitors of Jesus will even act as spies to the criminal Government of Abd’ul-Hamid. Rea
d Shakib’s account.
“About a fortnight after Khalid’s banishment from home,” he writes, “a booklet was published in Beirut, setting forth the history of Ignatius Loyola and the purports and intents of Jesuitism. On the cover it was expressly declared that the booklet is translated from the English, and the Jesuits, who are noted for their scholarly attainments, could have discovered this for themselves without the explicit declaration. But they did not deem it necessary to make such a discovery then. It seemed rather imperative to maintain the contrary and try to prove it. Now, Khalid having received a copy of this booklet from a friend in Beirut, reads it and writes back, saying that it is not a translation but a mutilation, rather, of one of Thomas Carlyle’s Latter-Day Pamphlets entitled Jesuitism. This letter must have reached them together with Father Farouche’s report on Khalid’s infidelity, just about the time the booklet was circulating in Baalbek. For in the following Number of their Weekly Journal an article, stuffed and padded with execrations and anathema, is published against the book and its anonymous author. From this I quote the following, which is by no means the most erring and most poisonous of their shafts.