The Chaliphate - Muir - The Search For Mecca

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i84 'OMAR [chap. XXV.
A.II. 17-23. Relaxation of manners is significantly marked by
Use oFwine. frequent notices of drunkenness. There are not wanting
instances even of Governors deposed because of it. 'Omar
was rigorous in imposing the legal penalty. He did not
shrink from commanding stripes to be inflicted, even on
his own son and his boon companions, for the use of wine.
At Damascus, the scandal grew to such a height that
Abu 'Obeida had to summon a band of citizens, with the
hero Dirar at their head, for the offence. Hesitating to
enforce the law, he begged of 'Omar that the penitent
offenders might be forgiven. An angry answer came
" Gather an assembly," he wrote in the stern language of
his early days, " and bring them forth. Then ask, Is
ivine lawful or forbidden ? If they shall say forbidden,
lay eighty stripes on each ; if lanfil, behead them every
one." They confessed that it was forbidden, and submitted
to the ignominious punishment.
Influence of. Weakness for wine may have been a relic of the da}-s
concubinage
^yj^gj-^ ^hg poet sang, " Burv me under the roots of the
on the family. ° ^
. . .
juicy vine." But there were domestic influences altogether
new at work in the vast accession of captive women, Greek,
Persian, and Egyptian, to the Muslim hariuis. The Jews
and Christians might retain their ancestral faith, whether
as concubines, or married to their masters. With their
ancestral faith they, no doubt, retained much also of the
habits of their fatherland ; and the same may be said
both of them and of the Heathen and Parsee slave-girls,
even when adopting outwardly the Muslim faith. The
countless progeny of these alliances, though ostensibly
bred in the creed and practice of Islam, must have
inherited much of the mother's life and nationality who
nursed and brought them up. The crovvded Iiarlni, with
its sanction of servile concubinage, was also an evil school
for the rising generation. Wealth, luxury, and idleness
were under such circumstances provocative of licence and
indulgence, which too often degenerated into intemperance
and debauchery.
Prevailing For, apart from war and faction, Muslim life was idle
laxity of
^j-jj inactive. There was little else to relieve its sanctimanners.
monious voluptuousness. The hours not spent in the
Jiarini were divided between listless converse in the City