The Martyrdom of Man by Winwood Reade (mini ebook reader .TXT) đź“•
The Egyptians were islanders, cut off from the rest of the world by sand and sea. They were rooted in their valley; they lived entirely upon its fruits, and happily these fruits sometimes failed. Had they always been able to obtain enough to eat, they would have remained always in the semi-savage state.
It may appear strange that Egypt should have suffered from famine, for there was no country in the ancient world where food was so abundant and so cheap. Not only did the land produce enormous crops of corn; the ditches and hollows which were filled by the overflowing Nile supplied a harvest of wholesome and nourishing aquatic plants, and on the borders of the des
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star idolatry, with the adoration of ancestral shades, prevailed within
Arabia in ancient times, and even now are not extinct. “The servant of the
sun” was one of the titles of their ancient kings. Certain honours are yet
paid to the morning star. But in that country the one-god belief was
always that of the higher class of minds, at least within historic time; it is
therefore not incorrect to term it the Arabian creed. We shall now
proceed to show in what manner that belief, having mingled with foreign
elements, became a national religion, and how from that religion sprang
two other religions which overspread the world.
Long after the building of the Pyramids, but before the dawn of Greek
and Roman life, a Bedouin sheikh named Abraham, accompanied by his
nephew Lot, migrated from the plains which lie between the Tigris and
Euphrates, crossed over the Syro-Arabian desert, and entered Canaan, a
country about the size of Wales lying below Phoenicia between the desert
and the Mediterranean Sea. They found it inhabited by a people of
farmers and vine-dressers, living in walled cities and subsisting on the
produce of the soil. But only a portion of the country was under
cultivation: they discovered wide pastoral regions unoccupied by men,
and wandered at their pleasure from pasture to pasture and from plain to
plain. Their flocks and herds were nourished to the full, and multiplied
so fast that the Malthusian Law came into force; the herdsmen of
Abraham and Lot began to struggle for existence; the land could no
longer bear them both. It was therefore agreed that each should select a
region for himself. A similar arrangement was repeated more than once
in the lifetime of the patriarch. When his illegitimate sons grew up to
man´s estate he gave them cattle and sent them off in the direction of the
east.
At certain seasons of the year he encamped beneath the walls of cities,
and exchanged the wool of his flocks for flour, oil, and wine. He
established friendships with the native kings, and joined them in their
wars. He was honoured by them as a prince, for he could bring three
hundred armed slaves into the field, and his circle of tents might fairly be
regarded as a town. Before their canvas doors sat the women spinning
wool and singing the Mesopotamian airs, while the aged patriarch in the
Great Tent, which served as the forum and the guesthouse, measured out
the rations for the day, gave orders to the young men about the stock, and
sat in judgement on the cases which were brought before him, as king and
father to decide.
He bought from the people of the land a field and a cave, in which he
buried his wife and in which he was afterwards himself interred. He was
succeeded by Isaac as head of the family. Esau and Jacob, the two sons
of Isaac, appear to have been equally powerful and rich.
Up to this time the children of Abraham were Bedouin Arabs—nothing
more. They worshipped Eloah or Allah, sometimes erecting to him a
rude altar on which they sacrificed a ram or kid; sometimes a stone pillar
on which they poured a drink, and then smeared it with oil to his honour
and glory. Sometimes they planted a sacred tree. The life which they led
was precisely that of the wandering Arabs who pasture their flocks on the
outskirts of Palestine at the present day. Not only Ishmael, but also Lot,
Esau, and various Abrahamites of lesser note became the fathers of
Arabian tribes. The Beni-Israel did not differ in manners and religion
from the Beni-Ishmael and Beni-Esau, and Beni-Lot. It was the
settlement of the clan in a foreign country, the influence of foreign
institutions, which made the Israelites a peculiar people. It was the sale
of the shepherd boy—at first a house-slave, then a prisoner, then a
favourite of the Pharaoh—which created a destiny for the House of Jacob,
separated it from the Arab tribes, and educated it into a nationality.
When Joseph became a great man he obtained permission to send for his
father and his brethren. The clan of seventy persons, with their women
and their slaves, came across the desert by the route of the Syrian
caravan. The old Arab, in his course woollen gown and with his staff in
his hand, was ushered into the royal presence. He gave the king his
blessing in the solemn manner of the East, and after a short conversation
was dismissed with a splendid gift of land. When Jacob died his
embalmed corpse was carried up to Canaan with an Egyptian escort and
buried in the cave which Abraham had bought. Joseph had married the
daughter of a priest of Heliopolis, but his two sons did not become
Egyptians; they were formally admitted into the family by Jacob himself
before he died.
When Joseph also died the connection between the Israelites and the
court came to an end. They led the life of shepherds in the fertile
pasturelands which had been bestowed upon them by the king. In course
of time the twelve families expanded into twelve tribes, and the tribe
itself became a nation. The government of Memphis observed the rapid
increase of this people with alarm. The Israelites belonged to the same
race as the hated Hyksos or Shepherd Kings. With their long beards and
flowing robes they reminded the Egyptians of the old oppressors. It was
argued that the Bedouins might again invade Egypt, and in that case the
Israelites would take their side. By way of precaution the Israelites were
treated as prisoners of war, disarmed, and employed on the public works.
And as they still continued to increase it was ordered that all their male
children should be killed. It was doubtless the intention of the
government to marry the girls as they grew up to Egyptians, and so to
exterminate the race.
One day the king´s daughter, as she went down with her girls to the Nile
to bathe, found a Hebrew child exposed on the waters in obedience to the
new decree. She adopted the boy and gave him an Egyptian name. He
was educated as a priest, and became a member of the university of
Heliopolis. But although his face was shaved and he wore the surplice,
Moses remained a Hebrew in his heart. He was so overcome by passion
when he saw an Egyptian illusing an Israelite that he killed the man upon
the spot. The crime became known: there was a hue and cry; he escaped
to the peninsula of Sinai, and entered the family of an Arab sheikh.
The peninsula of Sinai lies clasped between two arms of the Red Sea. It
is a wilderness of mountains covered with a thin, almost transparent
coating of vegetation which serves as pasture to the Bedouin flocks.
There is one spot only—the oasis of Feiran—where the traveller can tread
on black, soft earth and hear the warbling of birds among the trees, which
stand so thickly together that he is obliged as he walks to part the
branches from his face. The peninsula had not escaped the Egyptian
arms; tablets may yet be seen on which are recorded in paintings and
hieroglyphics five thousand years old the victories of the Pharaohs over
the people of the land. They also worked mines of copper in the
mountains, and heaps of slag still remain. But most curious of all are the
Sinaitic inscriptions, as they are called—figures of animals rudely
scrawled on the upright surface of the black rocks and mysterious
sentences in an undeciphered tongue.
Among the hills which crown the high plateau there is one which at that
time was called the Mount of God. It was holy ground to the Egyptians,
and also to the Arabs, who ascended it as pilgrims and drew off their
sandals when they reached the top. Nor is it strange that Sinai should
have excited reverence and dread; it is indeed a weird and awful land.
Vast and stern stand the mountains, with their five granite peaks pointing
to the sky; avalanches like those of the Alps, but of sand, not of snow,
rush down their naked sides with a clear and tinkling sound resembling
convent bells; a peculiar property resides in the air; the human voice can
be heard at a surprising distance, and swells out into a reverberating roar;
and sometimes there rises from among the hills a dull booming sound like
the distant firing of heavy guns.
Let us attempt to realise what Moses must have felt when he was driven
out of Egypt into such a harsh and rugged land. Imagine this man, the
adopted son of a royal personage, the initiated priest, sometimes turning
the astrolabe towards the sky, perusing the papyrus scroll, or watching the
crucible and the alembic; sometimes at the great metropolis enjoying the
busy turmoil of the street, the splendid pageants of the court, reclining in
a carpeted gondola or staying with a noble at his country house. In a
moment all is changed. He is alone on the mountain-side, a shepherd´s
crook in his hand. He is a man dwelling in a tent; he is married to the
daughter of a barbarian; his career is at an end. Never more will he enter
that palace where once he was received with honour, where now his name
is uttered only with contempt. Never more will he discourse with grave
and learned men in the peaceful college gardens, beneath the willows that
hang over the Fountain of the Sun. Never more will he see the people of
his tribe whom he loves so dearly, and for whom he endures this
miserable fate. They will suffer, but he will not see them; they will
mourn, but he will not hear them—or only in his dreams. In his dreams he
hears them and sees them, alas, too well. He hears the whistling of the
lash and the convulsive sobs and groans. He sees the poor slaves toiling
in the field, their hands brown with the clammy clay. He sees the
daughters of Israel carried off to the harem with struggling arms and
streaming hair, and then—O lamentable sight!—the chamber of the
woman in labour—the seated shuddering, writhing form—the mother
struggling against maternity—the tortured one dreading her release—for
the kings´s officer is standing by the door, and as soon as the male child
is born its life is at an end.
The Arabs with whom he was living were also children of Abraham, and
they related to him legends of the ancient days. They told him of the
patriarchs who lay buried in Canaan with their wives; they told him of
Eloah, whom his fathers had adored. Then, as one who returns to a long
lost home, the Egyptian priest returned to the simple faith of the desert, to
the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob. As he wandered on the
mountain heights he looked to the west and he saw a desert: beyond it lay
Egypt, the house of captivity, the land of bandage. He looked to the east
and he saw a desert: beyond it lay Canaan, the home of his ancestors, a
land of peace and soon to be a land of hope. For now new ideas rose
tumultuously within him. He began to see visions and to dream dreams.
He heard voices and beheld no form; he saw trees which blazed with fire
and yet were not consumed. He became a prophet; he entered the ecstatic
state.
Meanwhile the king had died; a new Pharaoh had mounted on the throne;
Moses was able to return to Egypt and to carry out the great design which
he had formed. He announced to the elders of
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