Studies in a Mosque - The Search For Mecca

140 STUDIES IN A MOSQUE.
like tliat of the Seven Sleepers of Bphesus, or of
Abraham and the Idols— grows weary of reading the
same dreary anecdotes of the same venerated patri-
archs over and over again. It was in the nature of
Mohammad's unsystematic preaching that he should
constantly repeat himself. The practice is not con-
fined to the legends of the prophets, for almost every
simile and every threat and every doctrine occurs
again and again in the Koran. It is, of course,
possible, and indeed probable, when we consider the
time that elapsed before the Koran was collected
as a whole, that many of these repetitions are due to
different oral reports of the same speech, and that
Mohammad's hearers sometimes confused one oration
with another and inserted the words belonging to the
one in the wrong chapter, whilst other traditionists
placed them in the right one. Whatever the source
of the repetition, it forms a serious obstacle to the
progress of the reader.
The manner in which the legends of former prophets
are used may be seen from a single extract. Mo-
hammad's argument is very simple :
Formerly apostles
were sent to other nations ; they preached what I am
preaching to you now,—extorted the people to wor-
ship but one God, and to work righteousness; but
their people rejected them and turned to idols; so
God sent down upon them a terrible punishment :
even so will it be with you, if ye reject my words.
" Ye walk in tbe very steps of those who were destroyed
for unbelief," says Mohammad; "how many
a generation before them have We destroyed!
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