The Chaliphate - Muir - The Search For Mecca

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A.D. 833-47] MAGIAN SUR\'I\'ALb Si'^
The risings under Sunbadh the .Magian, the Veiled Prophet, A.ll. 218-
and Babek, as well as the worship of Abu Muslim, are to 11^
be so explained.
Al-Mo'tasim died not long after, in the same month as Mo'tasim's
his old enemy Theophilus, having reigned nearly nine years.
jjr^l^'H"
With an arbitrary, but on the whole a kindly disposition, Jan..
he did nothing to stay the decline of the Caliphate. Of ^^ '^•^''
the Turkish captains on whom he leaned in his later days,
he bitterly complained.^ Had he looked to able Arab chiefs
for support, it was yet possible to have restored vigour to
the body politic. But he went over entirely to the Turks,
and courted the influx of barbarian races, whose fatal }'oke
his successors could not throw off. As proof of his kindness ;ind cliarwe
are told that the palfrey of a poor husbandman having '''^'^'^'
fallen into a quagmire, he helped him up with its burden
again. On this, contrasted with the :— destruction of .\morion,
Gibbon has the following reflection " To a point of honour,
Motassem had sacrificed a flourishing city, 200,000 lives, and
the property of millions. The same Caliph descended from
his horse, and dirtied his robe to relieve the distress of a
decrepit old man, who with his laden ass had tumbled into
a ditch. On which of these actions did he reflect with the
m.ost pleasure, when he was summoned by the angel of
death " ?
Al-Mo'tasim was succeeded by his son Al-\\';ithik, who, Wathikthough
born of a Greek slave-girl, inherited his father's ,27 a.h.'
Persian proclivities, and indeed with even greater intolerance.
He was weak and arbitrary in his administration. The
story of the Barmekis having been related to him, and how
Ar-Rashid had recovered vast sums from their estates, he
exclaimed, What '• a fine example my grandfather hath set
for mc." He immediately proceeded to arraign his ministers
and their secretaries, and having beaten one and threatened
others, despoiled them of vast sums, from 100,000 to 1,000,000
dniJirs each. What a vivid conception does not this give
us of the corruption of the minions at Court, and the caprice
of their Master
'
In bis last days, comparing Al-Ma'mun's able officers witli bib own,
be said to one of bis courtiers:— "See what Afshin bath come to.
Asbnas, a poor crealnre ;
Itakh and Wasif, nothing in ihcm." Vet these
were the men on whom he leaned.
^^'^ rapacity,