Hate Joy Evert More than Puritans Did.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18467, 19 May 1928, Page 19 (Supplement)

Hate Joy Evert More than Puritans Did.

Warring Wahabis Keep British Frontier Guards Busy.

THE quietly sleeping desert camp of a migratory Iraq tribe suddenly awakens with shrieks of horror. The Wahabis have come and Ihe sand is red with blood .... British ’planes swooping down over the desert, dropping bombs on the fanatic Wahabis, make the next scene in the drama which for the past year or so has been occupying the stage on the Iraq frontier. The Wahabi movement in Mohammedan Arabia presents a remarkable parallel to the Puritan movement in Christian England. Like the Puritans, the Wahabis were —and still are—moved by' a spite against the joys of life as well as by' a desire to restore their religion to primitive purity.

Cl) Restoration of Mohammedan belief as taught by the Koran and rejection of other beliefs accepted by the Sunnis on tradition. (2) Denial of spiritual authority to the Turkish Sultan or any other Caliph and of all special respect due to saints, dervishes, descendants of Mohammed, or other persons. (3) Restoration of Koranic observants in prayer, fasting and pilgrim(4) Strict prohibition of- wine, tobacco, music, magic, games of chance, silk and gold in dress and tombstones for the dead. Abd-el-Wahhab had a hard life for p. time. All observers agree that the ordinary' Arab is not a religious person, and except in the first flush of Mohammedanism has taken the faith much more lightly' than other peoples it. conquered. The desert Arabs hardly know what it is about, do not fast in Ramadan, and do not even know the prayers. But in 1742 Abd-el-Wahhab converted Mohammed Ibn Sa’ud, Emir of Deriyeh, then the chief town of Nejd. That was the real start of Wahabism and the beginning of the rise of the Ibn Sa’ud family'. Mohammed Ibn

Sa’ud took it seriously, and with Abd-el-Wahhab’s fanatics at his back conquered all the towns of Nejd and made them Wahabis. His sons and grandsons carried el-Wahhab’s banner over all Eastern Arabia, took Kerbela in Mesopotamia, the holy city of the Shiahs, slaughtered every male inhabitant and razed the tomb of Hussein. They held Damascus to ransom, took Mecca and Medina, and, to show their contempt for saints, plundered the tomb of Mohammed. This last was too much for the Sultan. As his title to the Caliphate rested on possession of the holy cities, he could not endure leaving them in the hands of a sect that denied his Caliphate. Ibrahim Pasha, the best solflier in the Empire, was sent to put the Wahabis down. In 1818 Nejd was subdued, Deriyeh destroj'ed, the Wahabi Emir, Abdallah Ibn Sa’ud, beheaded in Constantinople. As Nejd proved costly to hold, the Turkish power was gradually withdrawn. The lljd Sa’uds came back, and their Wahabi power rose again, though never to such a pitch as before Ibrahim Pasha. The Ibn Sa’uds again became masters of Central and part of Eastern Arabia and enforced Wahabism in its towns. In the desert they have never had any luck until last year, when they converted the Mutcyr tribe. Only in the towns is there Koran reading and fanaticism. And Wahabism id unpopular in the towns of Nejd outside the original Wahabi province of Aared, of which Riyad is the capital. It is enforced most strictly in Aared, where being caught smoking a cigarette means sixty lashes. About 1835 the reigning Ibn Sa’ud appointed one Abdallah Ibn Rashid Governor of Ilayil in Northern Nejd. Abdallah • and his successors, a line of remarkable men, increased in power, became independent of the Wahabi government, absorbed much of its territories, and finally, in 1891, defeated Ibn Sa’ud in the greatest Arabian battle of recent centuries and reduced him to a tributary position. Mohammed Ibn Rashid became ruler of all Nejd from his capital at Ilayil. Wahabism here reached its lowest ebb since the days of Ibrahim Pasha. [ Wahabism has now come back wonderfully under the present Ibn Sa’ud, one of the ablest of an able family. The World War gave him his chance. The Ibn Rashids backed the Turkish horse. Abdul Aziz Ibn Sa’ud took Hayil in 1921 and now carries the Ibn —Rashids with him as prisoners. Similarly he now carries around a variety of other Arabian Emirs. He took Mecca and the Hedjaz a couple of years ago, and is now Sultan of virtually all Arabia. The Wahabi Empire has reached a greater pitch than ever before, and tobacco and music are at their lowest ebb in Arabia.