Note 69 — Chapter IV · THE SPREAD OF ISLAM AMONG THE CHRISTIAN NATIONS OF AFRICA.

The progress achieved by Islam during this period may be estimated from the testimony of a traveller of the seventeenth century, who tells us that in his time the adherents of this faith were scattered throughout the whole of Abyssinia and formed a third of the entire population.69 During the following century the faith of the Prophet seems steadily to have increased by means of the conversion of isolated individuals here and there. The absence of any strong central government in the country favoured the rise of petty independent chieftains, many of whom had strong Muhammadan sympathies, though (in accordance with a fundamental law of the state) all the Abyssinian princes had to belong to the Christian faith; the Muhammadans, too, aspiring to the dignity of the Abyssinian aristocracy, abjured the faith in which they had been born and pretended conversion to Christianity in order to get themselves enrolled in the order of the nobles, and as governors of Christian provinces made use of all their influence towards the spread of Islam.70 One of the chief reasons of the success of this faith seems to have been the moral superiority of the Muslims as compared with that of the Christian population of Abyssinia. Rüppell says that he frequently noticed in the course of his travels in Abyssinia that when a post had to be filled which required that a thoroughly honest and trustworthy person should be selected, the choice always fell upon a Muhammadan. In comparison with the Christians, he says that they were more active and energetic; that every Muhammadan had his sons taught to read and write, whereas Christian children were only educated when they were intended for the priesthood.71 This moral superiority of the Muhammadans of Abyssinia over the Christian population goes far to explain the continuous though slow progress made by Islam during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries; the degradation and apathy of the Abyssinian clergy and the interminable feuds of the Abyssinian chiefs, have left Muhammadan influences free to work undisturbed. Mr. Plowden, who was English consul in Abyssinia from 1844 to 1860, speaking of the Ḥabāb, three Tigrē tribes dwelling between 16° and 17° 30′ lat., the north-west of Massowah, says that they have become Muhammadan “within the last 100 years, and all, save the latest generation, bear Christian names. They have changed their faith, through the constant influence of the Muhammadans with whom they trade, and through the gradual and now entire abandonment of the country by the Abyssinian chiefs, too much occupied in ceaseless wars with their neighbours.”72 They have a tradition that one of their chiefs named Jāwej rejected Christianity for Islam, in the belief that the latter faith brought good luck and long life; he then said to his priest, “Break in pieces the Tābōt”;73 the priest answered, “I dare not break in pieces the Tābōt of Mary”; so Jāwej seized the Tābōt with his own hands and cut it in pieces with an axe; the Christian priests then adopted Islam, and all their descendants are shayk͟hs of the tribe to the present day.74