"Quarterly Review" for Oct. 1869, and is also printed at the end of the New York (Harper) ed. of R. Bosworth Smith's Mohammed. Reports of the General Missionary Conference at Allahabad, 1873. J. MÜHLEISEN ARNOLD (formerly chaplain at Batavia): Islam: its History, Character, and Relation to Christianity. Lond., 1874, 3d ed. GUSTAV. RÖSCH: Die Jesusmythen des Islam, in the "Studien und Kritiken." Gotha, 1876. (No. III. pp. 409-454). MARCUS DODS: Mohammed, Buddha, and Christ. Lond. 2d ed. 1878. CH. A. AIKEN: Mohammedanism as a Missionary Religion. In the “Bibliotheca Sacra," of Andover for 1879, p. 157. ARCHBISHOP TRENCH: Lectures on Mediaval Church History (Lect. IV. 45-58). London, 1877. HENRY H. JESSUP (Amer. Presbyt. missionary at Beirut): The Mohammedan Missionary Problem. Philadelphia, 1879. EDOUARD SAYOUS: Jésus Christ d'après Mahomet. Paris 1880. § 39. Statistics and Chronological Table. ESTIMATE OF THE MOHAMMEDAN POPULATION (According to Keith Johnston). 610. Mohammed received the visions of Gabriel and began his career as a prophet. (Conversion of the Anglo-Saxons). 622. The Hegira, or the flight of Mohammed from Mecca to Medina. Beginning of the Mohammedan era. 632. (June 8) Death of Mohammed at Medina. 632. Abū Bekr, first Caliph or successor of Mohammed 636. Capture of Jerusalem by the Caliph Omar. 640. Capture of Alexandria by Omar. 711. Tharyk crosses the Straits from Africa to Europe, and calls the mountain Jebel Tharyk (Gibraltar). 732. Battle of Poitiers and Tours; Abd-er-Rahman defeated by Charles Martel; Western Europe saved from Moslem conquest. 786-809. Haroun al Rashid, Caliph of Bagdad. Golden era of Mohammedanism. (Correspondence with Charlemagne). 1063. Allp Arslan, Seljukian Turkish prince. 1096. The First Crusade. Capture of Jerusalem by Godfrey of Bouillon. 1187. Saladin, the Sultan of Egypt and scourge of the Crusaders, conquers at Tiberias and takes Jerusalem, (1187); is defeated by Richard Cour de Lion at Askelon, and dies 1193. Decline of the Crusades. 1288-1326. Reign of Othman, founder of the Ottoman (Turkish) dynasty. 1453. Capture of Constantinople by Mohammed II., "the Conqueror," and founder of the greatness of Turkey. (Exodus of Greek scholars to Southern Europe; the Greek Testament brought to the West; the revival of letters.) 1492. July 2. Boabdil (or Abou Abdallah) defeated by Ferdinand at Granada; end of Moslem rule in Spain. (Discovery of America by Columbus). 1517. Ottoman Sultan Selim I. conquers Egypt, wrests the caliphate from the Arab line of the Koreish through Motawekkel Billah, and transfers it to the Ottoman Sultans; Ottoman caliphate never acknowledged by Persian or Moorish Moslems. (The Reformation.) 1521-1566. Solyman II., "the Magnificent," marks the zenith of the military power of the Turks; takes Belgrade (1521), defeats the Hungarians (1526), but is repulsed from Vienna (1529 and 1532). 1571. Defeat of Selim II. at the naval battle of Lepanto by the Christian powers under Don John of Austria. Beginning of the decline of the Turkish power. 1683. Final repulse of the Turks at the gates of Vienna by John Sobieski, king of Poland, Sept. 12; Eastern Europe saved from Moslem rule. 1792. Peace at Jassy in Moldavia, which made the Dniester the frontier between Russia and Turkey. 1827. Annihilation of the Turko-Egyptian fleet by the combined squadrons of England, France, and Russia, in the battle of Navarino, October 20. Treaty of Adrianople, 1829. Independence of the kingdom of Greece, 1832. 1856. End of Crimean War; Turkey saved by England and France aiding the Sultan against the aggression of Russia; Treaty of Paris; European agreement not to interfere in the domestic affairs of Turkey. 1878. Defeat of the Turks by Russia; but checked by the interference of England under the lead of Lord Beaconsfield. Congress of the European powers, and Treaty of Berlin; independence of Bulgaria secured; AngloTurkish Treaty; England occupies Cyprus-agrees to defend the frontier of Asiatic Turkey against Russia, on condition that the Sultan execute fundamental reforms in Asiatic Turkey. 1880. Supplementary Conference at Berlin. Rectification and enlargement of the boundary of Montenegro and Greece. § 40. Position of Mohammedanism in Church History. While new races and countries in Northern and Western Europe, unknown to the apostles, were added to the Christian Church, we behold in Asia and Africa the opposite spectacle of the rise and progress of a rival religion which is now acknowledged by more than one-tenth of the inhabitants of the globe. It is called "Mohammedanism" from its founder, or "Islâm," from its chief virtue, which is absolute surrender to the one true God. Like Christianity, it had its birth in the Shemitic race, the parent of the three monotheistic religions, but in an obscure and even desert district, and had a more rapid, though less enduring success. But what a difference in the means employed and the results reached! Christianity made its conquest by peaceful missionaries and the power of persuasion, and carried with it the blessings of home, freedom and civilization. Mohammedanism conquered the fairest portions of the earth by the sword and cursed them by polygamy, slavery, despotism and desolation. The moving power of Christian missions was love to God and man; the moving power of Islâm was fanaticism and brute force. Christianity has found a home among all nations and climes; Mohammedanism, although it made a most vigorous effort to conquer the world, is after all a religion of the desert, of the tent and the caravan, and confined to nomad and savage or half-civilized nations, chiefly Arabs, Persians, and Turks. It never made an impression on Europe except by brute force; it is only encamped, not really domesticated, in Constantinople, and when it must withdraw from Europe it will leave no trace behind. Islâm in its conquering march took forcible possession of the lands of the Bible, and the Greek church, seized the throne of Constantine, overran Spain, crossed the Pyrenees, and for a long time threatened even the church of Rome and the German empire, until it was finally repulsed beneath the walls of Vienna. The Crusades which figure so prominently in the history of medieval Christianity, originated in the desire to wrest the holy land from the followers of "the false prophet," and brought the East in contact with the West. The monarchy and the church of Spain, with their architecture, chivalry, bigotry, and inquisition, emerged from a fierce conflict with the Moors. Even the Reformation in the sixteenth century was complicated with the Turkish question, which occupied the attention of the diet of Augsburg as much as the Confession of the Evangelical princes and divines. Luther, in one of his most popular hymns, prays for deliverance from "the murdering Pope and Turk," as the two chief enemies of the gospel'; and the Anglican Prayer Book, in the collect for Good Friday, invokes God "to have mercy upon all Turks," as well as upon "Jews, Infidels, and Heretics." 2 The danger for Western Christendom from that quarter has long since passed away; the "unspeakable" Turk has ceased to be unconquerable, but the Asiatic and a part of the East European portion of the Greek church are still subject to the despotic rule of the Sultan, whose throne in Constantinople has been for more than four hundred years a standing insult to Christendom. Mohammedanism then figures as a hostile force, as a real Ishmaelite in church history; it is the only formidable rival which Christianity ever had, the only religion which for a while at least aspired to universal empire. And yet it is not hostile only. It has not been without beneficial effect upon Western civilization. It aided in the development of chivalry; it influenced Christian architecture; it stimulated the study of mathematics, chemistry, medicine (as is indicated by the technical terms: algebra, chemistry, alchemy); and the Arabic translations and commentaries on Aristotle by the Spanish 1 "Erhalt uns, Herr, bei deinem Wort, Und steur' des Papst's und Türken Mord." The words "all Jews, Turks, Infidels, and Heretics," were inserted by the framers of the Prayer Book in the first edition (1547); the rest of the collect is translated from the old Latin service. In the middle ages the word “infidel" denoted a Mohammedan. The Mohammedans in turn call Christians, Jews, and all other religionists, "infidels" and "dogs." Moors laid the philosophical foundation of scholasticism. Even the conquest of Constantinople by the Turks brought an inestimable blessing to the West by driving Greek scholars with the Greek Testament to Italy to inaugurate there the revival of letters which prepared the way for the Protestant Reformation. Viewed in its relation to the Eastern Church which it robbed of the fairest dominions, Mohammedanism was a well-deserved divine punishment for the unfruitful speculations, bitter contentions, empty ceremonialism and virtual idolatry which degraded and disgraced the Christianity of the East after the fifth century. The essence of true religion, love to God and to man, was eaten out by rancor and strife, and there was left no power of ultimate resistance to the foreign conqueror. The hatred between the orthodox Eastern church and the Eastern schismatics driven from her communion, and the jealousy between the Greek and Latin churches prevented them from aiding each other in efforts to arrest the progress of the common foe. The Greeks detested the Latin Filioque as a heresy more deadly than Islâm; while the Latins cared more for the supremacy of the Pope than the triumph of Christianity, and set up during the Crusades a rival hierarchy in the East. Even now Greek and Latin monks in Bethlehem and Jerusalem are apt to fight at Christmas and Easter over the cradle and the grave of their common Lord and Redeemer, unless Turkish soldiers keep them in order!1 But viewed in relation to the heathenism from which it arose or which it converted, Mahommedanism is a vast progress, and 1 Archbishop Trench, l. c. p. 54: "We can regard Mohammedanism in no other light than as a scourge of God upon a guilty church. He will not give his glory to another. He will not suffer the Creator and the creature to be confounded; and if those who should have been witnesses for the truth, who had been appointed thereunto, forsake, forget, or deny it, He will raise up witnesses from quarters the most unlooked for, and will strengthen their hands aud give victory to their arms even against those who bear his name, but have forgotten his truth." Similarly Dr. Jessup, l. c. p. 14: "The Mohammedan religion arose, in the providence of God, as a scourge to the idolatrous Christianity, and the pagan systems of Asia and Africa—a protest against polytheism, and a preparation for the future conversion to a pure Christianity of the multitude |