CHAPTER IX. - REPORT TO H. L. DR. GOBAT, ANGLICAN BISHOP IN JERUSALEM HISTORY OF ANSYREEH RELIGION PRESENT STATE-RESULTS OF VISIT- DESIRE FOR SCHOOLS-EXPENSES OF A SCHOOL-REASONS FOR HOPING FOR SUCCESS. THIS chapter, with a few additions, embodies a report sent to H. L. Dr. Gobat, of the results of my visit to the Ansyreeh. As that report contains no more than is necessary for the reader's information, and may be interesting to him, I have left it in the original form. "Beyrout, October 24, 1852. "MY LORD,-You are aware that a few months ago I started from Beyrout on a tour through Northern Syria, with the view of ascertaining, by personal observation, the feasibility of a mission among the Ansyreeh, or Nusaireeh, an important section of its inhabitants. I had long determined on this, as I had from hearsay come to the conclusion that there would be great reason for encouragement in an attempt to evangelize that people, and I knew that there was no Christian missionary of any church or sect labouring among them. I have since heard that the American missionaries in Syria have long been of opinion that a mission ought to be commenced, and have recommended its formation several times in their reports to their Board of Missions. But as yet no mission has been opened, and I hope that what I shall lay before you will make it evident that not only is a mission desirable, but that it is peculiarly incumbent on the Anglican Church to undertake one. I therefore beg your Lordship's attention to the following statement, in which, though I have endeavoured to be concise, I have inserted much that would have been unnecessary, had not your Lordship informed me that you might possibly send it to England, where, till lately, the very name of the Ansyreeh was unknown to most people. For this reason I will premise a few words with respect to their history, religion, and present state. "Of their early history little. is known; but their physiognomy and religion prove them to be of distinct origin from the other races inhabiting Syria. They are supposed to be the aborigines of the north of Syria, and to have remained in the mountain chain stretching from Mount Cassius to the Lebanon, while successive tides of conquest have swept along the plains on either side. Atno period have they acquired celebrity as a people or sect; unlike their neighbours, the Ismaeleeh, or Assassins, once famous, but who have now nearly disappeared from before them. "With respect to the religion of this people, it would be impossible for any one to speak with minuteness and certainty without having resided among them for a lengthened period. And after all, this is not of much consequence, since the endeavour to evangelize them would not be made by attempting to refute each point of their heterogeneous religion; but by introducing among them the light of science and history, which would come in contact with it, and shake its foundations, at the same time that Christianity would be ready to satisfy the cravings of the soul, which God's Holy Spirit might mercifully awaken. "It is difficult to ascertain exactly all the details of the religion of the Ansyreeh, both because their religion is a secret and ill-digested one, and because there are few or none among them in the present day who understand it so well as to have fixed points of agreement and disagreement. However, there is one thing in which they all seem agreed, and which acts as a kind of freemasonry in binding together the scattered members of their body, namely, secret prayers, which are taught to every male child of a certain age, and are repeated at stated times, in stated places, and accompanied with religious rites. "The known part of their religion is a mixture of Mohammedanism, Christianity, Judaism, Magianism, and Paganism. It is such a one as we should expect to find among people who have never possessed men of talent and education, and have been brought successively into contact with diverse forms of religion, of each new one of which they have received a part, while they have still clung to what preceded it. And since Mohammedanism is the last form, and they are still surrounded by its professors, it is by it that their religion is most strongly tinctured. "Their religion received its Mohammedan tinge, or at least the present form of it, from a man of the name of Nusairee, who came into Syria from Irak at the time when numerous sects arose there in the early ages of Mohammedanism, of which that of the Assassins became the most celebrated.* In It will not be amiss to give a translation of a notice of this people to be found in an Arabic geography, lately printed at the American press in Beyrout, for it embraces the greater part of what is said of their origin in the brief notices of them in other books, these notices being of course all taken from the same sources, though somewhat differing from one another. "The Ansyreeh are a branch of the Karmatians, who took their rise in the deserts of Cufa, a city of the Arabian Irak. Their name is taken from the son of Karmath, who appeared in the year 264 of the Hejrah, and styled his doctrine the knowledge of the Batin (a word meaning the inner part of everything), and hence his sect was called the Batinean. This man sent preachers into different places, and his followers increased greatly in numbers. From this sect arose a man called Nusair, an old man, who was frequent in prayers and fastings, and reckoned a holy man. He chose twelv men of his followers as apostles, to preach his doctrines. |