THE BIBLE, THE KORAN, AND THE TALMUD
OR
BIBLICAL LEGENDS OF THE MUSSULMANS
BY DR. G. WEIL
[NEW YORK, 1863]
NOAH, HUD, AND SALIH
AFTER the translation of Idris, the depravity of men waxed so mightily, that
Allah determined to destroy them by a flood. But the prophet Noah, who had in
vain attempted to restore his followers to the path of virtue, was saved: for
Allah commanded him to build an ark for himself and family, and to enter it as
soon as his wife should see the scalding waters streaming from the oven.
1 This was the beginning of the flood; for it was followed by
incessant rains from heaven (as from well-filled leathern bottles into which a
sharp instrument has been plunged), which mingling with the subterraneous waters
that issued forth from all the veins of the earth, produced an inundation which
none save the giant Audj the son of Anak survived. 2
The ark floated during forty days from one end of the earth to the other, passing
over the highest mountains; but when it came to Mount Abu Kubeis, on whose peak
Allah had concealed the black diamond of the Kaaba, that it might serve in the
second building of this blessed temple, it rode seven times round the sacred spot.
At the lapse of six months the ark rested on Mount Djudi in Mesopotamia, and Noah
left it as soon as the dove which he had sent to examine the state of the earth
returned with an olive leaf in its mouth. Noah blessed the dove, and Allah gave
her a necklace of green feathers; but the raven which Noah had sent out before
the dove, he cursed, because, instead of returning to him, it stayed to feast
on a carcass which it found on the earth, 3 wherefore the raven
is no longer able to walk like other birds.
But, spite of the calamities of the flood, which Allah intended to serve forever
as a warning against sin, Iblis soon succeeded in banishing virtue and goodness
from the human family as before. Even Noah’s sons, Cham and Japhet, forgot the
reverence that was due to their father, and left him uncovered when one day they
found him asleep. Cham even derided him, and became on this account the father
of all the black races of mankind. Japhet’s descendants remained white, indeed,
but it was written that none of them should attain to the dignity of a prophet.Sham
(Shem) is the sole ancestor of the prophets, among whom Hud and Salih, who lived
immediately after the flood, attained to high distinction. 4
Hud was sent to the nation of giants which dwelt in Edom, a province of the
Southern Arabia, then governed by King Shaddad, the son of Aad. When the prophet
exhorted this king to the faith and fear of Allah, he inquired, “What shall be
the reward of my obedience?” “My Lord,” replied the prophet, “will give thee in
the life to come, gardens of eternal verdure, and palaces of gold and jewels.”
But the king answered, “I stand not in need of thy promises, for I can even in
this world build me gardens and pleasure-houses of gold, and costly pearls, and
jewels.” He then built Irem, and called it the City of Columns, for each of its
palaces rested on a thousand columns of rubies and emeralds, and each column was
a hundred cubits high. He next constructed canals, and planted gardens teeming
with the finest fruit-trees and the fairest flowers.
When all was completed with prodigal magnificence, Shaddad said, “I am now
in actual possession of all that Hud has promised me for the life to come.” But
when he would have made his entrance into the city, Allah concealed it from him
and his followers, nor has it since been seen by man, save once in the reign of
Maccavia.
The king and his people then wandered through the wilderness in rain and tempest,
and at last sought shelter in caves. But Allah caused them to fall in, and only
Hud escaped.
The destruction of this tribe induced their kinsmen, the Thamudites, who numbered
seventy thousand warriors, to choose the region between Syria and Hedjaz as their
abode, for they also feared to be destroyed, and hoped to secure themselves against
the wrath of Allah by building their houses in the rocks. Djundu Eben Omer, the
king of the Thamudites, built him a palace there, whose splendor had never been
equaled on earth, and the high-priest Kanuch erected a similar one for himself.
But their most costly and most perfect building was the temple. In it there stood
an idol of the finest gold, and adorned with precious stones: it had a human face,
a lion’s figure, a bull’s neck, and a horse’s feet.
One day, when Kanuch, after his prayers, had fallen asleep in the temple, he
heard a voice which said, “Truth shall appear, and delusion shall vanish.” He
sprang to his feet in terror, and rushed toward the idol, but lo! it was lying
on the ground, and beside it lay the crown which had fallen from its head. Kanuch
cried for help; the king and his viziers hastened to the spot, restored the idol
to its place, and replaced the crown on its head. But the occurrence made a deep
impression on the high-priest’s mind. His faith in the idol failed, and his zeal
to serve it cooled.
The king soon discovered the change that had passed within him, and one day
sent both his viziers to apprehend and to examine him. But scarcely had his messengers
left the royal palace when they were struck blind, and were unable to find Kanuch’s
dwelling. Meanwhile, Allah sent two angels, who carried the high-priest to a distant
valley unknown to his tribe, where a shady grotto, supplied with every convenience
of life, was prepared for him. Here he lived peaceably in the service of the one
God, and secure against the persecutions of Djundu, who in vain sent out messengers
in every direction to discover him. The king gave up, at length, all hope of his
capture, and appointed his own cousin, Davud, as high-priest in Kanuch’s stead.
But on the third day after his inauguration, Davud came to the king in haste,
and reported that the idol had again fallen from its place.
The king once more restored it, and Iblis cried from the idol, “Be steadfast
in my worship, and resist all the temptations into which some innovators would
lead you,” On the following feast-day, when Davud was about to offer two fat bulls
to the idol, they said to him, with a human voice, “Why will you offer us, whom
Allah has endued with life, as a sacrifice to a dead mass of gold, which your
own hands have dug from the earth, though Allah has created it? Destroy, O Allah,
so sinful a people!” At these words the bulls fled, nor were the swiftest riders
of the king able to overtake them. Yet it pleased Allah, in his wisdom and long
suffering, to spare the Thamudites still longer, and to send to them a prophet
who should labor by many wonders to convince them of the truth.
Ragwha, the wife of Kanuch, had not ceased to mourn since the flight of her
husband; yet in the third year, Allah sent to her a bird from Paradise, to conduct
her to his grotto. This bird was a raven, but its head was as white snow, its
back was of emerald, its feet were of crimson, its beak was like the clearest
sunbeam, and its eyes shone like diamonds, only its breast was black, for the
curse of Noah, which made all ravens entirely black, had not fallen on this sacred
bird.
It was the hour of midnight when it stepped into Ragwha’s dark chamber, where
she lay weeping on a carpet, but the glance of its eyes lit up the chamber as
if the sun had suddenly risen therein. She rose from her couch, and gazed with
wonder on the beautiful bird, which opened its mouth and said, “Rise and follow
me, for Allah has pitied thy tears, and will unite thee to thy husband.” She rose
and followed the raven, which flew before her, changing the night into day by
the light of its eyes, and the morning star had not yet risen when she arrived
at the grotto. The raven now cried, “Kanuch, arise, and admit thy wife,” and then
vanished.
Within a year after their reunion she gave birth to a son, who was the very
image of Seth, and the light of prophecy shone on his brow. His father called
him Salih (the pious), for he trusted to bring him up in the faith of the one
only God, and in piety of life; but soon after Salih’s birth Kanuch died, and
the raven from Paradise came again to the grotto to take back Ragwha and her son
to the city of Djundu, where Salih grew rapidly in mind and body, to the admiration
of his mother, and of all who came to visit them; and at the age of eighteen he
was the most powerful and handsome, as well as the most gifted youth of his time.
It then came to pass that the descendants of Ham undertook an expedition against
the Thamudites, and were to all appearance on the point of destroying them. Their
best warriors had already fallen, and the rest were preparing for flight, when
Salih suddenly appeared on the battle-field at the head of a few of his friends,
and by his personal valor and excellent manuvres wrested the victory from the
enemy, and routed them completely.
This achievement secured to him the love and gratitude of the more virtuous
part of his tribe, but the king envied him from this day, and sought after his
life. Yet as often as the assassins came to Salih’s dwelling to slay him by the
king’s command, their hands were paralyzed, and were only restored by Salih’s
intercession with Allah. In this wise, the believers in Salih and his invisible
God gradually increased, so that there was soon formed a community of forty men,
who built a mosque, in which they worshiped in common.
One day the king surrounded the mosque with his soldiers, and threatened Salih
and his adherents with death unless Allah should save them by a special miracle.
Salih prayed, and the leaves of the date-tree that grew before the mosque were
instantly changed to scorpions and adders, which fell upon the king and his men,
while two doves which dwelt on the roof of the mosque exclaimed, “Believe in Salih,
for he is the prophet and messenger of Allah.” To this twofold wonder a second
and third one were added, for at Salih’s prayer the tree resumed its former shape,
and some of the Thamudites who had been killed by the serpents returned to life
again.
But the king continued in unbelief, for Iblis spoke from the mouth of the idol,
calling Salih a magician and a demon.
The tribe was then visited by famine, but this also failed to convert them.
When Salih beheld the stubbornness of the Thamudites, he prayed to Allah to destroy
so sinful a people.
But he too, like his father, was carried by an angel to a subterraneous cave
in sleep, and slept there twenty years. On waking, he was about to go into the
mosque to perform his morning devotions, for he imagined that he had slept only
one night; but the mosque lay in ruins; he then went to see his friends and followers,
but some of them were dead; others, in the idea that he had abandoned them or
been secretly slain, had gone to other countries, or returned to idolatry. Salih
knew not what to do.
Then appeared to him the angel Gabriel, and said, “Because thou hast hastily
condemned thy people, Allah has taken from thee twenty years of thy life; and
thou hast passed them sleeping in the cave. 5 But rise and preach
again. Allah sends thee here Adam’s shirt, Abel’s sandals, the tunic of Sheth,
the seal of Idris, the sword of Noah, and the staff of Hud, with all of which
thou shalt perform many wonders to confirm thy words.” On the following day, the
king, and priests, and heads of the people, attended by many citizens, went in
procession to a neighboring chapel, in which an idol, similar to that of the temple,
was worshiped.
Salih stepped between the king and the door of the chapel; and when the king
asked him who he was, for Salih’s appearance had so changed during the twenty
years which he had spent in the cavern that the king did not recognize him, he
answered, “I am Salih, the messenger of the one only God, who, twenty years ago,
preached to thee, and showed thee many clear proofs of the truth of my mission.
But since thou, as I perceive, still persistest in idolatry, I once more appear
before thee in the name of the Lord, and by his permission offer to perform before
thine eyes any miracle thou mayest desire in testimony of my prophetic calling.”
The king took counsel with Shihab his brother, and Davud his high-priest, who
stood near him. Then said the latter, “If he be the messenger of Allah, let a
camel come forth from this rocky mountain, one hundred cubits high, with all imaginable
colors united on its back, with eyes flaming like lightning, with a voice like
thunder, and with feet swifter than the wind.” When Salih declared his readiness
to produce such a camel, Davud added, “Its fore legs must be of gold, and its
hind legs of silver, its head of emerald, and its ears of rubies, and its back
must bear a silken tent, supported on four diamond pillars inlaid with gold.”
Salih was not deterred by all these additional requirements; and the king added,
“Hear, O Salih! if thou be the prophet of Allah, let this mountain be cleft open,
and a camel step forth with skin, hair, flesh, blood, bones, muscles, and veins,
like other camels, only much larger, and let it immediately give birth to a young
camel, which shall follow it every where as a child follows its mother, and when
scarcely produced, exclaim, ‘There is but one Allah, and Salih is his messenger
and prophet.'”
“And will you turn to Allah if I pray to him, and if he perform such a miracle
before your eyes?”
“Assuredly!” replied Davud. “Yet must this camel yield its milk spontaneously,
and the milk must be cold in summer and warm in winter.”
“Are these all your conditions?” asked Salih.
“Still farther,” continued Shihab; “the milk must heal all diseases, and enrich
all the poor; and the camel must go alone to every house, calling the inmates
by name, and filling all their empty vessels with its milk.”
“Thy will be done!” replied Salih. “Yet I must also stipulate that no one shall
harm the camel, or drive it from its pasture, or ride on it, or use it for any
labor.”
On their swearing to him to treat the camel as a holy thing, Salih prayed:
“O God! who hast created Adam out of the earth, and formed Eve from a rib, and
to whom the hardest things are easy, let these rocks bring forth a camel such
as their king has described, for the conversion of the Thamudites.”
Scarcely had Salih concluded his prayer, when the earth opened at his feet,
and there gushed forth a fountain of fresh water fragrant with musk: the tent
which had been erected for Adam in Paradise descended from heaven, and thereupon
the rocky wall which supported the eastern side of the temple groaned like a woman
in travail; a flight of birds descended, and filling their beaks with the water
of the fountain, sprinkled it over the rock, and lo! there was seen the head of
the camel, which was gradually followed by the rest of its body; when it stood
upon the earth, it was exactly as it had been described by the king, and it cried
out immediately, “There is no God but Allah; Salih is his messenger and prophet.”
The angel Gabriel then came down and touched the camel with his flaming sword,
and it gave birth to a young camel which resembled it entirely, and repeated the
confession that had been required. The camel then went to the dwellings of the
people, calling them by name, and, filling every empty vessel with its milk. On
its way all animals bowed before it, and all the trees bent their branches to
it in reverence.
The king could no longer shut his heart to such proofs of God’s almightiness
and Salih’s mission: he fell on the prophet’s neck, kissed him, and said, “I confess
there is but one God, and that thou art his messenger!”
But the brother of the king, as well as Davud, and all the priesthood, called
it only sorcery and delusion, and invented all kinds of calumnies and falsehoods
to retain the people in unbelief and idolatry. Meanwhile, since the camel, by
constantly yielding its milk and praising Allah as often as it went down to the
water, made daily new converts, the chiefs of the infidels resolved to kill it.
But when many days had passed before they ventured to approach it, Shihab issued
a proclamation, that whosoever should kill the mountain camel should have his
daughter Ranjan to wife. Kadbar, a young man who had long loved this maiden, distinguished
as she was for grace and beauty, but without daring to woo her, being only a man
of the people, armed himself with a huge sword, and, attended by Davud and some
other priests, fell upon the camel from behind while it was descending to the
waters, and wounded it in its hoof.
At that moment all nature uttered a frightful shriek of woe. The little camel
ran moaning to the highest pinnacle of the mountain, and cried, “May the curse
of Allah light upon thee, thou sinful people!” Salih and the king, who had not
quitted him since his conversion, went into the city, demanding the punishment
of Kadbar and his accomplices. But Shihab, who had in the mean time usurped the
throne, threatened them with instant death. Salih, flying, had only time to say
that Allah would wait their repentence only three days longer, and on the expiration
of the third day would annihilate them like their brethren the Aaadites. His threat
was fulfilled, for they were irreclaimable. Already on the next day the people
grew as yellow as the seared leaves of autumn; and wherever the wounded camel
trod, there issued fountains of blood from the earth.
On the second day their faces became red as blood; but on the third they turned
black as coal, and on the same day, toward nightfall, they saw the camel hovering
in the air on crimson wings, whereupon some of the angels hurled down whole mountains
of fire, while others opened the subterraneous vaults of fire which are connected
with hell, so that the earth vomited forth fire-brands in the shape of camels.
At sunset, all the Thamudites were a heap of ashes. Only Salih and King Djundu
escaped, and wandered in company to Palestine, where they ended their days as
hermits.
Footnotes
1 The generation of the flood was chastised with scalding
water.Midrash, p. 14.
2 Besides Noah, Og the King of Bashan was saved, for
he seized hold on one of the beams of the ark, and swore to Noah that he and his
posterity would serve him as bondmen. Noah made an opening through the wall of
the ark, and gave Og some food daily, for it is written, “Only Og the King of
Bashan survived of all the giants.”Midrash, p. 14.
3 The Midrash, p. 15, relates the same, and draws from
it the conclusion that no one should seek to accomplish his ends by (unclean)
unlawful means: the raven being unclean (unlawful) but the dove being clean.
4 Hud is probably the Eber of the Scriptures, whom the
Rabbis esteem as a prophet, and the founder of a celebrated school of divinity.
5 The idea of a prophet’s intercession with God is of
Scriptural origin. Abraham and Moses interceded with God, the one for Sodom, the
other for his people; and, according to the Hebrew legend, the Jews, on hearing
Isaiah denouncing the judgments of God, threatened to put him to death, because
he had not sought to turn away His wrath, as Moses had done under similar circumstances.
Our Savior’s parable of the gardener, who begged another year’s respite for the
unfruitful tree, is on the same principle. So is also Christ’s reproof to his
disciples, when they would have called down fire from Heaven. The punishment of
Salih, therefore, however prettily introduced, must, like every other truth of
the Koran, be referred to the knowledge which the Moslem had of the Scriptures.
