Abu Bakr — Insurrections — War with Persia and the Romans — Abu Bakr's death — Omar — Conquest of Chaldaea and Mesopotamia — Persia, Defeat of the Romans —Conquest of Syria, Palestine, and Egypt — Death of Omar.
The hold which the personality of the Prophet had acquired over the minds of his followers is shown by the fact that none of them would at first believe that he was dead. They could hardly realise that the man who in the course of a years had changed the whole aspect of Arabia was subject to the same laws as other human beings. Had he lived in a less historical age, or had his words with reference to himself been less rationalistic, like other great men, he too, probably, would have received divine honours. The commotion among the people was allayed by the venerable Abu Bakr, who, having ascertained that their Teacher was really dead and not in a swoon, as some had asserted, addressed the crowd thus: "Mussulmans, if you adored Mohammed, know that Mohammed is dead ; if it is God that you adore, know that He liveth. He never dies. Forget not this verse of the Koran, ' Mohammed is only a man charged with a mission ; before him there have been men who received the heavenly mission and died ; ' — nor this verse, ' Thou too, Mohammed, shalt die as others have died before thee.' " It was then that a wail went up from the assembled multitude that their great Master was gone from among them.
And now arose the question as to who was to succeed in the government of the Commonwealth. Hashmites and Prophet’s close adherents wanted to see Ali as his successor, but the Prophet had laid down no definite rule for his succession. Among the Arabs, the chieftaincy of a tribe is not hereditary, but elective; and all the members of the tribe have a voice in the election of their chief. The election is made on the basis of seniority among the surviving male members of the deceased chieftain's family. This old tribal custom was followed in the choice of a successor to the Prophet, for the urgency of the times admitted of no delay.
Abu Bakr, who by virtue of his age and the position he had held at Mecca occupied a high place in the estimation of the Arabs, was urgently elected to the office of Khalifa (Caliph) or Vicegerent of the Prophet. He Abu Bakr was recognised as a man of wisdom and moderation, and his election was accepted with their usual devotion to the Faith by Ali and the chief members of Mohammed's family.
"Behold me," said the Patriarch, after the multitude had sworn allegiance to him, "behold me charged with the cares of Government. I am not the best among you ; I need all your advice and all your help. If I do well, support me; if I mistake, counsel me… As I obey God and His Prophet, obey me : if I neglect the laws of God and the Prophet, I have no more right to your obedience."
No sooner had it become noised abroad that the of the Prophet was dead than the unruly spirit of the Arab broke faith ; whilst a great fear fell upon the earnest followers of the new Faith. Some of the tribes who had only recently abandoned idolatry, reverted at once to their evil ways, and several impostors who had appeared in distant provinces in the lifetime of the Prophet began harrying the Moslems. Within a little time the Faith had become almost confined to the city of Medina, and again a single town had to contend
against the idolatrous hordes of the Peninsula.
The rising of the tribes was due, firstly, to the strict rules of morality enforced by Islam, and, secondly, to their unwillingness to pay the poor-tax. Though hemmed in on all sides, the Moslems did not lose heart; and faith and enthusiasm again led them to victory. The first care of the Caliph, after the funeral ceremonies of the Prophet, was to organise the administration and stand on guard against the rebels. Mohammed had shortly before his death issued orders for the despatch of an expedition into Syria to seek reparation for the murder of the Moslem envoy. With that object troops had been collected in the neighbourhood of Medina. The expedition now became doubly necessary by the defection of the northern tribes, who had fallen away after the compaign of Mota, where the faithful Zaid had lost his life. To give effect to his Master's last wishes, and to restore order on the northern frontier, Abu Bakr, though hard pressed, sent forward the troops. And when the Moslems were departing, the aged Caliph addressed them as follows —"See," said he, addressing Osama, the son of Zaid, who was placed at the head of the expedition, " see that thou avoidest treachery. Depart not in any ways from the right. Thou shalt mutilate none, neither shalt thou kill child or aged man, nor any woman. Injure not the date-palm, neither burn it with fire, and cut not down any tree wherein is food for man or beast. Slay not the flocks or herds or camels, saving for needful sustenance. Ye may eat of the meat which the men of the land shall bring unto you in their vessels, making mention thereon of the name of the Lord. And the monks with shaven heads, if they submit, leave them unmolested. Now march forward in the name of the Lord, and may He protect you from sword and pestilence ! "
Whilst Osama was away in the north, Medina was attacked by the rebels, but they were beaten back. Osama also gained a victory over the Syrians, and shortly after returned to the help of Abu Bakr, who was now able to send out troops to reduce the insurgent tribes to order. The principal work of subjection was entrusted to Khalid, son of Walid, a valiant soldier and a skilled general. Some of the tribes gave in their adhesion without fighting ; others were unyielding, and with them were fought great battles, in which both sides suffered severely. At the battle of Yemama the formidable tribe of the Band Hanifa were thoroughly defeated, and their leader, the impostor Mosailima, was killed.
After this the insurgents gradually submitted, and were received back into Islam. This brought the Moslems into collision with the wandering tribes subject to Hira, a semi- Arab kingdom which at that time acknowledged the suzerainty of Persia. From Hajar, the north-east corner of Arabia which borders on Chaldaea (Babylonia), then held by the Persians, and westward of the lower branch of the Euphrates, lies that waterless tract, a continuation of the Arabian Peninsula, far away to the Dead Sea, and the high lands of Hauran and ancient Tadmor towards the north. Over this vast tract roamed the nomadic hordes. They were chiefly Christians. Those on the Syrian side, like the Ghassan, were subject to the Byzantines ; those on the east, like the Band Taghlib, owed allegiance to Persia. All these were connected by ties of blood and friendship with the neighbouring Arabian tribes. The delta of the Euphrates itself was inhabited by settled Arabs, who had abandoned the pastoral life of their kinsmen of the desert and taken to the cultivation of the soil. Naturally, the conflict between the Moslems and the insurgents on the eastern shores of the Persian Gulf reacted on the neighbouring tribes subject to Persia. Raids from the north were followed by reprisals. The region watered by the two great rivers, the Tigris and the Euphrates, has from time immemorial formed the prize of monarchs struggling for empire. On one side the Tigris (Dajla) issuing from the mountains of Armenia, on the other the Euphrates (Furat) taking its rise in the heights of Taurus, roll down towards the Persian Gulf, joining their waters a few hundred miles before they reach the sea. Here they lose their names as well as their identity, and receive the designation of the Shatt ul-Arab. The upper portion of the region enclosed by the two rivers was in ancient times known as Mesopotamia, and lower part, a flat alluvial country, was called Babylonia and Chaldaea ; to the Arabs, it was known as Irak Arab.- Many flourishing cities have existed by the side of these famous rivers. Ancient Nineveh (not far from modern Mosul), the seat of the mighty Assyrian monarchs, was situated on the Tigris ; so was Madain, the capital of the Persian sovereigns ; so is Bagdad, the metropolis of the Caliphs in the Middle Ages. On the Euphrates were situated ancient Babylon, Hira, Kufa, built by the Arabs, Kirkessia (ancient Circesium) and Rakka. To the east of the Zagros mountains, beyond the Tigris, lies the country called by the Arabs Irak Ajam, the centre of Persia. The pacification of the Peninsula having been completed, Khalid and Mosanna (Mothanna), the generals operating in Hejr, took in hand the repression of the raids from the Hirite side. The Persian governor of Chaldaea offered The battle on the frontier, and was defeated with heavy loss,and Hira, after a short resistance, capitulated to the Moslems, and were guaranteed in their possessions, subject to a fixed land-tax. The peasantry were not interfered with, and were left in the safe enjoyment of their fields and lands.
The conquest of Hira opened the eyes of the Persian Government to the gravity of the danger, A young and rising power, animated with a national ' sentiment in the shape of religious enthusiasm, was now seated at their door. Had they been wise, they would have strengthened their internal defences, and re-organised their empire, which was rent by domestic quarrels. They might even have come to terms with the Saracens. Still, the Persian Empire was rich and powerful. It comprised within its dominions the whole of Modern Iran, Iraq, and all the inferior provinces of Central Asia to the confines of Tartary and India, besides Babylonia and Mesopotamia.A large army was sent to drive the Saracens out of Chaldaea.
About this time the Caliph was obliged to send Khalid into Syria with half of the troops. The other general, Mothanna, was thus left alone with a small force to make head against the Persian host. Withdrawing his advanced posts, he proceeded in haste to Medina to ask for reinforcements, but found the aged Caliph dying.
Abu Bakr died after reign of only two years and a half, on the 22nd of Jamadi II., 13 a.h. He is described as "a man of a very fair complexion, thin countenance, of slender build, and with a stoop." Before he became a disciple of the Prophet, he wielded great authority over the Koraish as one of their chief magistrates, and his wealth as a merchant, and his sagacity as a chief, gave him great consequence among the Meccans.
Like his Master, Abd Bakr was extremely simple in his Habits; gentle but firm, he devoted all his energies to the administration of the new-born State and to the good of the people. He would sally forth by night to help the distressed and relieve the destitute. For a time, after his election, he continued to maintain himself with his own private income, but finding that in looking after his property and business he was not able to pay sufficient attention to the affairs of the State, he consented to receive 6000 dirhems annually from the Treasury. On his death-bed, however, he was so troubled at having taken public money that he directed one of his properties to be sold, in order to refund to the State the sum he had received.
Such were the simple, honest ways of the immediate disciples of Mohammed. Before his death, Abu Bakr nominated Omar as his successor in the Caliphate, and his appointment was accepted by the people.
Omar's accession to the Caliphate was of immense value to Islam. He was a man of strong moral fibre and a keen sense of justice, possessed of great energy and force of character. His first act, after re-organising the internal administration of Arabia, was to hurry on reinforcements to the help of Mothanna. These troops were under Abu Obaid, who, on arrival on the scene of action, assumed the chief command. Without listening to the prudent advice of Mothanna, he gave battle to the Persians at a place where he was unable to manoeuvre, and incurred a heavy defeat, in which he was killed. The Persians, however, did not press their advantage, and were ultimately out-generalled and defeated with great loss by Mothanna, at a place called Buwaib, on the western branch of the Euphrates. Mothanna again re-occupied the country and re-entered Hira.
About this time a new sovereign had been raised to the throne of Persia. Young, energetic, and ambitious, Yezdgard was bent not only on driving the Saracens from Hira, but also on conquering their country. With this object he sent forward into Chaldasa an army consisting of 100,000 men, which marching southward was to overwhelm the Moslems, and oust them from their possessions. The Saracens under Mothanna, wholly unable to cope with this enormous force, again abandoned Chaldcea, and retired to the borders of the desert, where they awaited reinforcements from Medina.
Whilst the Moslems were thus waiting for the Persian attack, they lost their great general, who was stricken down by the Chaldaean fever. Saad, son of Wakkas, who brought the additional troops sent forward by the Caliph, assumed chief command over the whole Saracenic army, which now amounted to 30,000. The battle that followed was hotly contested. It lasted for three days, and was distinguished by heroic feats on both sides. On the third day the Persian host broke. Defeated with terrible loss, their general killed, they fled towards the north. The battle of Kadessia practically decided the fate of both Chaldaea and Mesopotamia : Chaldaea was re-occupied without opposition, and the Hirites, who had torn up the treaties made with Mothanna, were punished for their defection by the imposition of a higher tax.
After receiving the submission of the towns and villages in the neighbourhood of Hira, Saad turned towards Babil (Babylon), where the broken remnants of the Persian host had re-assembled under Firuzan, Hurmuzan, and Mihran. They were beaten and dispersed. Mihran escaped to Madain, the Persian capital; Hurmuzan fled to his government of Ahwaz, beyond the Persian range ; and Firuzan betook himself to Nehawand, where were the treasures of the Persian king. A permanent hold over Chaldsea was, however, impossible, so long as it was dominated by Madain, where Mihran lay encamped with a large Persian army. Saad was therefore compelled to march upon the royal city. Like the Bagdad of Mansur, fifteen miles higher up the river, it was built on both sides of the Tigris. The western portion, called Seleucia, was founded by the Seleucidae, the descendants of Alexander's great general ; the eastern part, called Ctesiphon, was built by the Persian monarchs. The two conjointly were called Madain (or the Two Cities). The palaces of the kings and nobles were luxurious and beautiful, and the first sight of them considerably impressed the simple Saracens. After a siege of some duration, Madain opened its gate, and its capitulation was followed by the submission of the entire country lying to the west of the Tigris. A Service of Thanksgiving, at which the whole army assisted, was held in the palace of the Chosroes.
Saad, as the civil and military head of Persia, made Madain his head- quarters. He established himself in the royal palace, where the offices were located, and " cathedral service " was held every Friday in the Grand Hall. From here he conducted the administration of the province. But it was not long before another conflict was forced upon the Moslems. The Persian king, who was stationed at Holwan on the western side of the mountains, sent forward a large force to recapture Madain. This army was met at Jalula, about fifty miles to the north-east of the capital, and defeated with terrible loss. Holwan itself was captured and strongly garrisoned. When the spoils of Jalula and Madain arrived at Medina, the Caliph was found weeping. Asked his reason, he replied that he saw in those spoils the future ruin of his people, and he was not wrong ; for the unprecedented success of the Saracens led eventually to the loss of those qualities of frugality, austerity, and self-sacrifice that in the beginning so materially contributed to their victories.
After the capture of Holvan, a treaty of peace was concluded with the Persian king, by which the Persian Range was made the boundary between the two empires ; and the Caliph now issued peremptory injunctions that the Saracens were under no circumstance to go beyond that limit. The country at the head of the Persian Gulf, as far as the range of hills on the eastern side, had been already reduced to order, and the sea-port of Obolla had fallen into the hands of the Moslems. Nothing attests so clearly the capacity of Omar as a wise and just ruler, or the ability of the council with which he was assisted, as the energy with which the Moslems applied themselves to the regeneration of this province, and the development of its resources. A great cadastral survey was set on foot under the advice of Ali, a new system of assessment was introduced, the burdens of the peasantry were lightened and they were secured in the possession of their lands. The tax imposed on the large land-holders by the Persian monarchs was revised, a complete network of canals was made for purposes of irrigation, and an order was issued for giving advances to the cultivators when needed. The sale of land was strictly prohibited, to safeguard against the eviction of the native peasantry. The Crown domains of the Persian kings, the royal hunting forests, the abandoned possessions of fugitive princes and land-holders, and property appertaining to the fire-temples whence the priests had fled, became State property, and were administered by agents appointed from Medina. The army had clamoured for the distribution, as spoils of war, of these lands as well as of the plains of Chaldaea, called the Sawdd but the Caliph, guided by Ali and Ibn Abbas, firmly rejected the demand. The income from the State domains, after defraying the public charges, was distributed among the Arab settlers.
But neither the prudence of the Caliph nor the moderation of his generals was of avail in preventing a fresh conflict with the Persians. Yezdgard was chafing under Persians, the loss of his capital and two of his best provinces. His governors were out of hand, and his army was clamorous for a fresh advance against the Saracens. Hurmuzan, the governor of Ahwaz, repeatedly attacked the Arab settlements ; as often as he was beaten back, he sued for peace, but always broke it at the first opportunity.
About this time two new cities were built in Irak. 17 a. h. Bussorah (Basra) on the Shatt ul-Arab, peopled chiefly 638 a. c. by the northern Arabs, took the place of Obolla, and became the sea-port of Irak. Kufa on the western bank of the Euphrates, three miles south of Hira, was peopled 18 a. h. by Arabs of the Yemenite stock, and took the place of Madain, which was abandoned as unhealthy. Both cities were laid out on regular lines. A square was made, with the principal mosque in the centre, and the governor's mansion close by. The streets were straight, wide, and spacious ; the bazaars commodious, and the public gardens numerous.
At last, wearied beyond endurance by the incessant raids of the Persians, and apprehending a serious attack from their king, who had collected a large army towards the north, the Saracens in Mesopotamia sent a deputation to the Caliph for permission to repel the threatened danger. Omar inquired of the deputation the cause of the frequent risings on the part of the Persians. "Maybe," said he, "the Moslems treat the Zimmis badly, that they break their faith persistently and rebel against us." "Not so," they answered, "we do not deal with them otherwise than with honesty and good faith." " How can that be ?" naturally asked the Caliph. "Is there not one honest man among them?" Then answered the leader of the deputation, " Thou hast forbidden us. Commander of the Faithful, to enlarge our boundaries ; and their king is in their midst to stir them up. Two kings can in no wise exist together, until the one expel the other. It is not that we have treated them harshly, but that their king has incited them to rise against us after having made submission. And so it will go on, until thou shalt remove the barrier and leave us to go forward and expel their king. Not till then will their hopes and machinations cease."
These views were also enforced by Hurmuzan, who had been brought as a prisoner to Medina, and had adopted Islam. It now became clear to Omar that the ban against an advance towards the east must be withdrawn. In self-defence, nothing was left but to crush the Chosroes, and take entire possession of his realm.
The Persians had responded with alacrity to the call of their sovereign for a final and desperate blow at the intruders of the Desert, who had ousted him from his capital and wrested from him some of his fairest provinces. The army raised by Yezdgard for this last struggle far exceeded any he had had before. The news of the Persian preparations caused great excitement in Medina, and the Caliph at once hurried off reinforcements towards the frontier. A general of the name of Noman, who was then engaged with the Persian raiders in the south, was placed in command of the Saracenic forces. The battle, which took place at Nehawand, at the foot of the Elburz, decided the fate of Asia, and is called the Victory of Victories. The Persians, who outnumbered the Saracens by six to one, were defeated with terrible loss. Their king fled from place to place, until he was killed some years later by one of his own men, like Darius the Short-handed at a distant village on the confines of Turkestan. Persia thus passed under Moslem domination. As in Mesopotamia, the Caliph took immediate measures to settle the peasantry securely in their possessions. They were released from the galling oppression of the large land-holders; their assessments were revised and placed on a stable basis; the broken aqueducts were restored and new ones built. The land-holders or dehkans kept their estates, subject to the payment of a fixed tax. Liberty of conscience was allowed to every one, and the Moslems were ordered not to interfere with the religion of the people. Those who adhered to their old faith received the designation of Zimniis (the protected people or Hege-men). The sole inducement to proselytism, if inducement it can be called, consisted in the fact that whereas Moslems, who were liable at any time to be called to serve in the army, contributed only a tithe to the State, the Zimmis paid a higher tax in consideration of being exempted from military service. The bulk of the people, without any such compulsion as is used by some modern nations for the conversion of unorthodox communities, adopted Islam. Among these converts and the Arab settlers intermarriages became frequent, numbers of Persians were introduced into the tribal brotherhood of the Arabs as Mawalids (friends or clients), and many of those who had rendered eminent services, or were otherwise distinguished, were inscribed in the State Register as recipients of allowances. For a long time, however, as under Alexander of Macedonia, the priests were a source of trouble and danger. Often they incited to rebellion the people who still conformed to the old faith. In the repression of these outbreaks cruelties were committed on both sides. The wise and conciliatory policy, however, of the Abbasside Caliphs, and the general diffusion of Islam, removed in time all causes of disaffection.
War with Romans:
Very soon after the accession of Abu Bakr to the the Caliphate the Saracens came into conflict with the Romans. The entire country to the west of Mesopotamia and Chaldasa belonged then to the Eastern Roman Empire. Palestine and Syria were, like Irak, inhabited by people of the Arab race ; and the Syrian Desert, was roamed over by Arabs; they thus came within the legitimate sphere of the Islamic Commonwealth. The punitive expedition of Osama had set ablaze the Syrian tribes, and naturally led to retaliatory raids. The Romans at the same time massed a large army at Balca, not far from the frontier. The Caliph had no choice but to repel the Romans, and reduce the tribes to subjection. It was a measure necessary in the interests of his empire. His appeal for levies was answered with enthusiasm, and as the troops arrived at Medina he hurried them towards the north. The Romans held some strongly garrisoned places in Palestine, such as Cesarea on the sea, Jericho, Jerusalem, Ascalon, Gaza, and Jaffa. The township of Zoghar (Seger), or ancient Pentapolis, and all the region which stretched from the southern extremity of the Dead Sea to the Arabian Gulf, was a dependency of Palestine. North of the line mentioned above was the Province of Jordan. To the north of Palestine lay that beautiful and interesting country called Syria by the Romans, and Barr ush-Sham (the land to the left), or simply Sham by the Arabs, with the historical cities of Damascus, Hems (Emessa), Aleppo (Chalybon), Antioch, etc., all held by strong Roman garrisons. East of the valley of the Jordan, and south of the Lake of Tiberias, were the high-lands of Hauran. The first army sent into Syria by ''Abu Bakr met with a disastrous repulse. The old Patriarch, instead of being dispirited, threw fresh energy into the organisation of the levies ; and the new army that was hurried to the theatre of war was divided into four corps, which were directed to operate under the command of four generals, in different parts of the country. The gentle and kind-hearted Abu Obaidah was in command of the division of Hems, with head-quarters at Jabia, and was accompanied by a large number of Medinites and the Companions of the Prophet. The Palestine division was under the command of Amr, the son of al-Aas, famous for his conquest of Egypt. The division intended for Damascus was under the command of Yezid, son of Abii Sufian, the old enemy of Islam, and now fighting under its banners. The army of Yezid was composed principally of the Meccans and of the Arabs of the Tehama, and included several notables of Mecca, most of whom had fought against the Prophet before the fall of the city. Tempted now by the rich spoils of Syria, they had joined as volunteers the army under Yezid.
Between the Meccans and the Arabs of the Tehama on one side, and the Medinites on the other, there existed bitter hostility, the consequences of which were perceptible in later times. The fourth division, under Shorabhil, operated in the valley of the Jordan. Another corps, under Muawiyah, the second son of Abu Sufian, who afterwards usurped the Caliphate, formed a reserve. Whilst Amr, the son of al-Aas, advancing upon Lower Palestine, threatened Gaza and Jerusalem, the three armies under Abu Obaidah, Shorabhil, and Yezid, echeloned as above, and mutually supporting each other, menaced Bosra, Damascus, and the Tiberiade. But the forces at their disposal barely exceeded 35,000, and, considering the power and resources of the Empire against which they were directing the attack, seemed hardly adequate to the task. The Roman Empire of Constantinople, even after it had been shorn of several of its European dependencies, was colossal. Its resources, its wealth, and its supply of fighting material were unlimited. It included the spacious Peninsula of Lesser Asia, encompassed by three seas and studded with rich maritime cities; Syria, Phoenicia, and Palestine; Egypt, the granary of the surrounding nations ; together with "the long sleeve of the Mantle," the vast strip of territory extending from the Egyptian coast to the Atlantic, and including the once renowned dominions of Cyrene and Carthage.
In order to repel the invaders Heraclius came in person to Hems, and from there sent forward four separate armies to crush the Arab generals. At the first news of this move on the part of the Romans, the Moslem Ameers, having consulted with each other by a rapid exchange of messengers, decided to concentrate all their forces on one point, and accordingly all the four divisions united in the month of April 634 at Jaulan, near the river Yermuk. Upon this the Romans on their side drew together all their corps. The Yermuk is an obscure river, which, rising in the high-lands of Hauran, falls into the Jordan a few miles south of the Lake of Tiberias. About thirty miles above its junction with the Jordan, it forms on the northern side a semi-circular loop, which encloses a vast plain suited for the encampment of a large army. The banks of the Yermuk are rugged and steep ; at the neck of the loop there is a ravine, which forms the entrance to the flat space inside. This spot is called Wakusa, famous in the annals of Islam. The Romans considered this, protected, as it appeared to them, on all sides, as a natural camping-ground ; and their forces marched into 634 a.c. it without any thought of the Saracens. These quickly perceived the enemy's mistake, and crossing towards the northern side of the river, a little higher up, took up their position immediately by the side of the ravine, ready to strike the moment the Romans issued from within. The two armies watched each other for two months, until the Caliph, getting tired of the waiting game, sent Khalid, the son of Walid, from Chaldaea into Syria. Marching across the desert, Khalid joined the Moslems before the Romans knew of his approach. The army of Heraculius numbered 240,000, whilst the Saracens were only 40,000 all told. But the Romans had already lost heart, having been beaten in several attempts to issue from the trap in which they had been caught. At last, on the morning of the last day of Jamadi II. (30th August 634), inspirited by the priests, the Roman army issued from its camp to give battle to the Saracens. That eventful fight is now known as the battle of Yermuk. The Romans were defeated with fearful slaughter, a part of their army was driven into the river and drowned, and the whole of Southern Syria lay at the feet of the Saracens.
Abii Bakr died about this time — in fact, the news of death was brought to the camp before the battle began, but was not published by Khalid until the fight was won. Omar, who never approved of Khalid's ferocity, deposed him from the chief command, and made the wise and far-seeing Abii Obaidah the General-in-Chief.
Khalid worked under Abii Obaidah, and the Syrian cities one by one capitulated to the Moslems. Damascus, Hems, Hama (Epiphania), Kinnisrin (Chalcis), Aleppo, and other important towns, opened their gates to Abii Obaidah. At last this general presented himself before Antioch, the rival of Constantinople and the capital of the Roman East. It was held by a large garrison, augmented by the fragments of those that had fled from other places. The population was considerable, though enervated by luxury and pleasure. One slight battle outside the city, in which the Moslems were victors, so disheartened the citizens that after a siege of a few days they proffered their subjection. Whilst Abii Obaidah had thus subjugated the greater part of Northern Syria, the operations of Amr, the son of al-Aas, were no less successful in Palestine. The Roman governor, named Artabin, had assembled a large army for the defence of the Province, and had placed bodies of troops at Jerusalem, Gaza, and Ramleh, whilst he himself, with the mass of his forces, was installed at Ajnadin, a village situated to the east of Jerusalem, between Ramleh and Bait(u)-Jibrin. The Saracen generals, after detaching troops to hold in check Jerusalem, Gaza, Ramleh, and Caesarea, now advanced upon Artabin. The battle that followed was as disastrous to the Romans as the day of Yermuk. Their army was entirely destroyed ; only a few escaped with their chief, and found a refuge within the walls of Jerusalem. As the fruit of this victory, the Saracens obtained without difficulty the submission of the towns of Jaffa and Nabliis (Neapolis). Ascalon, Gaza, Ramleh, and Acre (Ptolemais), Berytus, Sidon, Laodicea, Apamea, and Gobula opened their gates without a fight. Jerusalem alone, garrisoned by a heavy force, resisted for a time. After a siege of some duration, the Patriarch sued for peace, but refused to surrender the place to any but the Caliph in person. Omar acceded to the request, and travelling with a single attendant, without escort and without any pomp or ceremony, arrived at Jabia, where he was met by a deputation from Jerusalem.
To them he accorded the free exercise of their religion, and the possession of their churches, subject to a light tax. He then proceeded with the deputation towards Jerusalem, where he was received by Sophronius the Patriarch. The chief of Islam and the head of the Christians entered the sacred city together, versing on its antiquities. Omar declined to perform his devotions in the Church of the Resurrection, in which he chanced to be at the hour of prayer, but prayed on the steps of the Church of Constantine ; "for," said he to the Patriarch, "had I done so, the Mussulmans in a future age might have infringed the treaty, under colour of imitating my example." A deputation from Ramleh received the same considerate terms ; whilst the Samaritan Jews, who had assisted the Moslems, were guaranteed in their possessions without the payment of any tax.
The depredations of the Armenian and the Kurdish tribes in Mesopotamia led to punitive expeditions, which ended in the subjugation of Kurdistan and Armenia. The Romans, however, again assumed the offensive. Hardly had the spring of 638 begun, than Heraclius, joining hands with the still unconquered people in the east, poured a large army into Syria. The cities, which had capitulated to the Moslems, now opened their gates to him, and the Christian Arab tribes also gave in their adhesion. An army from Egypt, landed on the sea-board, re-occupied Northern Palestine. The position of the Saracens was thus threatened in all directions. But daring, dash and generalship, combined with enthusiasm and trust in their cause, were on their side. Though outnumbered in some places as twenty to one, they broke the coalition with heavy loss. The son of Heraclius was defeated, and barely escaped with a few troops. The country once more submitted to Moslem rule. Only one place in Northern Syria remained in the Roman hands. Caesarea on the coast, assisted from Egypt by the sea, defied the Moslems for a time, but the flight of Constantine, the son of Heraclius, broke the spirit of its defenders, and Caesarea surrendered under the guarantee of protection.
The subjugation of the country was now complete, and "Syria bowed under the sceptre of the Caliphs seven hundred years after Pompey had deposed the last of the Macedonian kings." After their last defeat, the Romans recognised themselves hopelessly beaten, though they still continued to raid into the Moslem territories. In order to erect an impassable barrier between themselves and the Saracens, they converted into a veritable desert a vast tract on the frontiers of their remaining Asiatic possessions. All the cities in this doomed tract were razed to the ground, fortresses were dismantled, and the population carried away further north. And what has been deemed to be the work of Saracenic hordes, was really the outcome of Byzantine barbarism. This short-sighted measure, however, was of no avail, for Ayaz, who now commanded in Northern Syria, passed the mountains of Taurus, and reduced under Moslem rule the province of Cilicia, with its capital Tarsus, the ancient monument of the Assyrian kings. He even carried the Saracenic armies as far as the Black Sea. His name became one of terror to the Romans in Asia Minor.
About this time the Saracens, with their usual energy, turned their attention to the creation of a fleet ; and it was not long before they rode masters of the sea. The Roman navy fled before them to the Hellespont, and the islands of the Greek Archipelago were successively invaded and reduced. The frequent incursions into Syria from the Egyptian side, and the harassment to which the sea-board was subjected by the Romans, led the Caliph, after some hesitation, to authorise an expedition into the land of the Pharaohs. Amr, the son of al-Aas, started with only 4000 men, and in the course of three weeks cleared the country of the Byzantines. The Romans, flying from other parts of Egypt, took refuge in Alexandria, which was well fortified. After a siege of some duration, the city capitulated on favourable terms.
The whole of Egypt, up to the borders of Abyssinia on the south and Libya on the west, became subject to Moslem domination. As in other countries, immediately it was conquered, Tneasures were taken to improve the condition of the peasantry. The soil was left in the hands of the cultivators ; the old irrigation works, which had been neglected or which had fallen into ruin, were restored ; and the ancient canal connecting the Mediterranean with the Red Sea was cleared out. The Egyptian Christians, who were called Copts and belonged to the Melchite sect, were treated with marked favour, in consequence of their good-will towards the Moslems. Taxation was regulated upon a fixed and moderate scale, and trade was fostered by light customs dues. In 645 a.c. Alexandria was recaptured by the Romans. It was, however, finally reduced by the Saracens a year later. The story about the burning of the Alexandrian Library under the orders of the Caliph Omar is without any foundation. Such an act of vandalism was totally opposed to the tolerant and liberal spirit of that great ruler. As a matter of fact, a large part of this library was destroyed in the siege which Julius Caesar underwent in that city ; and the remainder was lost in the reign of the Emperor Theodosius, in the fourth century of the Christian era. This Emperor, who was a devout Christian and hated works written by pagans, had ordered the destruction and dispersion of the splendid remnant of the Philadelphian Library, which order was so zealously carried out that little or nothing remained of it in the seventh century for the Moslems to destroy. After the conquest of Egypt, Amr became involved in a war with the tribes towards the west, which ended in the reduction of the coast as far as Barca.
In the eighteenth year of the Hegira, Northern Arabia and Syria were visited by a severe famine and pestilence, in which 25,000 people are said to have perished. Some of the best and most prominent men among the Moslems, including Abii Obaidah, Yezid, and Shorabhil, fell victims to the epidemic. The wail which went up from the land called the Caliph forth again from Medina. He was then nearly seventy years of age, but he bravely undertook the journey to Syria, as before, with a single attendant. He visited the Bishop of Ayla, guaranteed afresh the privileges of the Christians, and by his presence and speeches revived the spirit of the people.
On his return to Medina, the Caliph devoted himself to organising the administration of the new Empire, and planning the development of its resources. But the hand of an assassin put an end to all his plans. A foreigner,who bore the Caliph some grudge, inflicted on him a fatal wound from which he never recovered. Before his death he appointed an electorate, consisting of six men, to choose his successor.
The death of Omar was a real calamity to Islam. The Stern but just, far-sighted, thoroughly versed in the character of his people, he was especially fitted for the leadership of the unruly Arabs. He had held the helm with a strong hand, and severely repressed the natural tendency to demoralisation among nomadic tribes and semi-civilised people when coming in contact with the luxury and vices of cities. He had established the Diwan, or department of finance, to which was entrusted the administration of the revenues; and had introduced fixed rules for the government of the provinces. He was a man of towering height, strong build, and fair complexion. Of simple habits, austere and frugal, always accessible to the meanest of his subjects, wandering about at night to inquire into the condition of the people without any guard or court— such was the greatest and most powerful ruler of the time.
No comments:
Post a Comment