“Truth shuns beauty, knowing that she ensnares like a woman,” Mohammed replied.
Would Jesus have spoken thus? Mohammed spoke as a man of worldly experience, and with something of the bitterness which is the heritage of all who have known the joy and the profound disillusion of sex. No. These were not the words of Jesus!
“Woman is the mother and mistress of man. She must be faithful and obedient to him,” Mohammed added.
“How true, Prophet of Allah! But what has Jesus said of woman? Did he not accept a gift of the courtesan and forgive the woman taken in adultery?”
Mohammed clenched his fist. “Against those of your women who commit adultery, call four witnesses among yourselves, and if these bear witness, then keep the woman in the house till death release her, so God has ordered.”
“The words of the Prophet are full of wisdom.”
“And God has also commanded this to the wives of the Prophet: O wives of the Prophet, whosoever of you shall commit a manifest wickedness, the punishment thereof shall be double!”
“Jesus forgave Mary instead of punishing her. Was he a true prophet?” I asked.
His eyes blazed, his heavy lips pouted.
No, he was not Jesus, or if Jesus, so changed that he remembered neither himself nor me.
“Prophet of Allah,” I said, “is it true that Europe is nearly all Christian?”
“It is, Cartaphilus.”
“The boundaries between Europe and Asia are no longer very formidable. I have heard that even the great wall that encircles the Celestial Empire yields to the hoofs of horses and camels.”
“They who wait to be attacked are already half conquered,” added Abu-Bekr.
“If Christianity has conquered Europe and converted the descendants of Attila– —”
“May his name be cursed!” exclaimed Abu-Bekr.
“Then,” I continued, “is Arabia safe?”
Mohammed listened intently, smoothening his black beard. His large chest rose and sank quickly.
“Christianity is the religion of woman, Prophet of Allah…woman glorified and forgiven.”
“Woman is the servant of man!” Mohammed exclaimed.
“Christianity belittles man. It condemns the sword. It sanctifies the eunuch!”
“What!” Mohammed stood up. Only then did I realize how tall and masculine he was, as compared to the Nazarene. He waved his clenched fist. “Christianity shall never pollute the East!”
“The East, then, shall continue to feel the joy of the senses. The East shall continue to sing of the lips and breasts of women; of the prowess of men in battle. The East shall exclaim forever ‘Allah is the only God and Mohammed is His Prophet!’ ”
Abu-Bekr raised my hands to his lips. “Stranger, your words are sweeter than honey, and your thought deeper than the ocean. You have opened the door wide, and let the light of truth fall at the feet of the Prophet—who was born in the desert and whose advent the ancient and sacred books of your great country announce.”
“Prophet of Allah, what is the symbol of Christianity…a cross…a man wriggling upon a tree, helpless and ridiculed! And to what purpose this suffering? Is it that a man may receive forever in Paradise an incomparable reward? Shall his joy make up for his agony?” I laughed. “The Paradise of the Christians knows neither man nor woman, but vague sexless wraiths, wandering aimlessly and disconsolately about, remembering how much more agreeable was the earth, even when enduring pain.”
“Who can accept such a religion?” asked Abu-Bekr.
“It is the creed of eunuchs and of women!”
Mohammed, his eyes burning with a curious mixture of passion and dream, stood gazing into the distance. Was he wrestling with himself to overcome the final doubt? Did he see beyond the walls of the room, his followers, lovers of the sword and lovers of woman, in endless phalanxes, march against the West, conquering the Nazarene,—the soft preacher of mercy and self-denial?
Closing his eyes, he spoke: “The sincere servants of God shall have a certain provision in Paradise…they shall be honored; they shall be placed in gardens of pleasure, leaning on couches opposite one another; a cup shall be carried around unto them filled from a limpid fountain, for the delight of those who drink. Near them shall lie the virgins of Paradise, refraining their looks from beholding any besides their spouses, having large black eyes, and resembling the eggs of an ostrich covered with feathers.”
He breathed rapidly, and tottered. We grasped him in our arms, and stretched him gently upon the couch. Two spots of foam dotted the corners of his mouth, and whitened his beard.
His breathing became gradually regular again. He opened his eyes. “Thus speaks Allah,—may his name be praised through Mohammed, his Prophet.”
“Allah is the only God and Mohammed is His Prophet,” we answered.
Mohammed stood up again and exclaimed: “Every spot of the earth that believes not in Allah and Mohammed shall from now on be darul harb,—a place of endless conflict!”
Mohammed turned toward the East and knelt. We did likewise.
“Thy will be done, Allah, God of the world.”
“Allah is the only God and Mohammed is His Prophet.”
XXXIII: KOTIKOKURA LOSES A FRIEND—MECCA GLOWS LIKE A RUBY—THE PROPHET CONQUERS—“I MUST GO, CARTAPHILUS”
KOTIKOKURA came running toward me. “Ca-ta-pha! Ca-ta-pha! The tortoise…the tortoise!”
“What about the tortoise, my friend?”
“Gone…gone! Ca-ta-pha!”
“Did you not watch your sweetheart, Kotikokura?”
He nodded violently as if to frantically deny my aspersion.
“Then how could the tortoise be gone?”
“Gone, Ca-ta-pha! Gone!”
Kotikokura seemed so disturbed that I promised I would help him search for it. We looked through the streets, in deserted gardens, in abandoned houses. Kotikokura called out from time to time: “Salome! Salome!” I asked many people if they had seen a tortoise. Most of them had never heard of such an animal, and my description only made them smile. “Can such an animal live?” they asked. One old woman hissed through her toothless mouth, “Tortoise? I saw one when I was a child. A tortoise lives forever…and always changes masters.”
“Were you ever in Persia?” I asked.
She walked away, grumbling.
Kotikokura’s eyes filled with tears.
“Salome deserts even her favorites, it seems, Kotikokura.”
“Salome,” he muttered.
I could not tell whether he meant the woman or the tortoise.
“Salome does not matter just now, Kotikokura. We are called by more important affairs. Christianity must be destroyed!”
Kotikokura grumbled, “Salome.”
“Mohammed, the true Prophet of Allah, shall vanquish the Man on the Cross.”
“Salome.”
“And we shall live, Kotikokura! We need no longer tremble before the name of Jesus! We shall live!”
“Salome.”
“Comfort yourself. We shall meet her again, Kotikokura. We have passed the bend of the road. Once more the path before us is endless…”
“Oh, that I had a daughter who might find favor in your eyes, Cartaphilus!” exclaimed Abu-Bekr, as I crossed the threshold. “Alas! My two remaining daughters are aged, and already married.”
“Cartaphilus considers you as a father, nevertheless, Abu-Bekr.”
He embraced me.
“Abu-Bekr,” I said, “does not blood always speak?”
“More powerful is blood than swords and spears.”
“And more enduring than rock, Abu-Bekr.”
He nodded.
“I am a Hindu, Abu-Bekr…but my ancestors came from a far-off country.”
“Arabia?” he asked, anxiously.
“From Arabia, also, but more recently from Palestine. My ancestors were Jews, Semites as your people, speaking a language akin to yours and worshiping the same God.”