Mahdists

“ Undismayed by what should have been a salutary lesson at El-Teb, the Mahdists began to preach a strenuous crusade against the infidel. It became necessary, therefore, to again set in motion the force which had returned to Suakin, and to march on Tamaai, where the Arabs had concentrated their forces. ”

“ The people are naturally credulous and excitable, and in the entire absence of any education or learning there has been nothing to restrain them. Almost any holy man can gain some kind of a following—at any rate for a time. But the Mahdi was more than an ordinary prophet, and the times were ripe for rebellion. ”

“ Already various Mahdis had made their appearance; several had been highly successful, and two, in mediæval times, had founded dynasties in Egypt. But who could tell whether all these were not impostors? Might not the twelfth Imam be still waiting, in mystical concealment, ready to emerge, at any moment, at the bidding of God? There were signs by which the true Mahdi might be recognised—unmistakable signs, if one could but read them aright. He must be of the family of the prophet; he must possess miraculous powers of no common kind; and his person must be overflowing with a peculiar sanctity. ”

“ Neither your courage nor your honest purpose, nor the inspiration which has hitherto guided you, will bring you success. I know enough to be able to assure you that every honest Mohammedan in Egypt and North Africa and Arabia sympathizes with the Mahdi’s cause, not necessarily believing him to have a divine mission, but as representing ideas of liberty and justice and religious government, which they acknowledge to be divine. ”

“ Much was done by England to develop the natural resources of the country, and all went well until the rebellion of the Mahdi in 1881.
The Mahdi claimed to be a Moslem prophet.
The prevailing religion of Egypt and its provinces is Mohammedanism.
Now the Mohammedans believe that a great prophet, or Mahdi, will come to lead them. Under his generalship they expect to gain possession of the whole world.
More than one ambitious man has come forward and claimed to be the Mahdi. ”

“ All these innovations the Mahdi justified by the divinity of his mission. He announced that he was the last of the prophets, and that the end of the world was near; further, he said that during his lifetime the prophet Jesus would appear, and that the whole world would become Moslem; he therefore urged the people to repentance and prayer, and do all in their power to further the Jehad (or holy war) . Why should they seek after riches when in a very short time the world would cease to exist? It is easy to see how such teaching as this must eventually result in famine and destruction. ”

“ The Mahdi, seeing that he could defy the Government with impunity, was encouraged to believe in his mission, and the various sects of dervishes throughout the country began to think that Mahomet Ahmed might really be the true Mahdi. The Mahdi himself, though he did not venture to leave the shelter of the Gheddeer hills, occupied himself in fomenting the rebellion by his emissaries and adherents. ”

“ The Baggara tribes of Kordofan, cattle-owners and slave-traders, the most warlike and vigorous of the inhabitants of the Sudan, threw in their lot with the Mahdi. Their powerful Emirs, still smarting from the blows of Gordon, saw that the opportunity for revenge had come. A holy war was proclaimed against the Egyptian misbelievers. The followers of the Mahdi, dressed, in token of a new austerity of living, in the 'jibbeh', or white smock of coarse cloth, patched with variously shaped and coloured patches, were rapidly organised into a formidable army. ”

“ Your nation are unbelievers, and I shall never ally myself with them. With God's help, I shall defeat my enemies through my brave Ansar, and the hosts of angels sent to me by the Prophet." Shouts of acclamation from thousands upon thousands of throats greeted this speech; and, when order had been restored, the Mahdi said to Pain, "You affirm that you love our faith, and acknowledge that it is the true one; are you a Mohammedan?" ”

“ The Mahdi has left us, and has entered into heaven, where everlasting joys await him. It is for us to obey his precepts, and to support one another, just as the stones and walls of a house go to make a building. The good things of this life are not lasting. Seize, therefore, with both hands the good fortune which is yours, of having been the friends and adherents of the [372] Mahdi, and never deviate in the slightest degree from the path which he has shown you. You are the friends of the Mahdi, and I am his Khalifa. Swear that you will be faithful to me. ”

“ The Mahdi was well versed in the art of winning over people. His unruffled smile, pleasant manners, generosity and equable temperament, though at times somewhat severe, all tended to enhance the popular idea of him. He attributed the execution of Said Pasha and Ali Bey Sherif to the Khalifa Abdullah, and when the two little sons of the latter were brought to him, the smiling hypocrite wept for their father's fate. The popular belief in him and his cause almost amounted to worship: women especially raved about him and thought him the most handsome of men. ”

“ He thus was an Imamite, but stood quite apart from the welter of conflicting Shi‘ite sects—the Seveners, Twelvers, Zaydites and the rest—as far as do the present Sharifs of Morocco with their Alid-Sunnite position. The Mahdi, it is to be remembered, is awaited by Sunnites as by Shi‘ites, and is guarded against error as much as an Imam, since he partakes of the general isma which in divine things belongs to prophets. Such a leader, then, could claim from the people absolute obedience and credence. ”

“ Neither am I at all surprised at what you say of the growth of the Mahdist element in and around Ishmael, though that is a pity in itself and a deadly misfortune in relation to the Government. Of course it is the old wretched story over again—the moment a man arises who has anything of the divine in him, an apostle of the soul of humanity, a flame-bearer in a realm of darkness, the world jumps on him, body and soul, and he finds he has brought not peace but a sword. ”

“ Several people used to say to us, "Our position is a most miserable one! You Christians have nothing to reproach yourselves with on the score of religion, but with us Moslems such a state of affairs as the present is too dreadful to contemplate, and we know no rest." A great number of people now repeat, in the privacy of their own homes, the daily prayers, although they have gone all through them in the mosque; but as they do not believe in the Mahdi, they consider the prayers said in his mosque to be valueless. ”

“ Jesus ranks above all the prophets of the old dispensation, but below those of the new, inaugurated by Mahomet. In the final struggle He will be but the servant and auxiliary of a more august personage—the Mahdi. The literal meaning of the word Mahdi is not, as the newspapers generally assert, 'He who leads,' a meaning more in consonance with European ideas, but 'He who is led.' ... If he leads his fellow-men it is because he alone is the 'well-guided one,' led by God—the Mahdi. The word Mahdi is only an epithet which may be applied to any prophet, or even to any ordinary person ”

“ The Mahdi further incited his people to fight by assuring them that the gates of paradise were open to all those martyrs who should fall, and that each of them should be attended by forty lovely houris when they entered its portals. He also roused their feelings of cupidity by representing, in the most exaggerated terms, the value of the treasure locked up within the Mudirieh, and told them that victory was assured, for God and his Prophet had decreed that they should annihilate their enemies with simple sticks; this he said because he knew that only a few of his followers had firearms. ”

“ Partaking of some of the dates he offered me, I took leave of him and returned to the rekuba, whence, in accordance with the Khalifa's order, we proceeded to the mosque, and stayed till sunset, as we did the previous day. Again the Mahdi preached renunciation, urging his hearers to be ready for the Jehad, so as to enter into the future joys of Paradise. Again and again, the faithful devotees, half intoxicated with fanaticism, shouted his praises; whilst we poor wretches, enduring agonies in our cramped position, imprecated in our hearts Mahdi, Khalifa, and his whole crew of base hypocrites. ”

“ He told me that he had just seen Sheykh Ahmed, from the zawia at Qasr Dakhl—whose guest I had been at his ezba—who had told him that if the revolution in Turkey succeeded and the Sultan really were deposed, the Senussi Mahdi would reappear and invade Egypt. The Mahdi, it may be mentioned, is the great Moslem prophet, who according to Mohammedan prophecies, is to arise shortly before the end of the world, to convert the whole of mankind to the faith of Islam. ”

“ I have endeavoured to show how, on the Mahdi's first [623] rise to power, the entire country was with him heart and soul. How, on his death, real fanaticism gradually waned, and gave place to a temporary power wielded, under the cloak of religion, with reckless severity by the Khalifa and his western Arabs, who, taking the place of the Egyptian garrisons they had destroyed, ruled the unfortunate populations with a rod of iron, and with such oppression and tyranny as to make them long for a return to any form of government which would give them rest and peace. ”

“ MAHDI (Arab. “he who is guided aright”) , a title assumed by the third Abbasid caliph (see Caliphate: Abbasids, § 3) . According to Moslem traditionists Mahomet declared that one of his descendants, the imam of God, who would fill the earth with equity and justice, would bear the name of al-mahdi. ”

“ Those who were well off shunned us,—riches are the curse of this world,—and those who have them will be deprived of the joys of Paradise. The people whose countries we crossed did not give us much help; but the little he got the Mahdi graciously offered to the pilgrims, whom he considered as his guests. When I heard the women and children weeping, I felt sometimes that my heart would break; but when I gazed at the Mahdi's face I trusted in God and became at rest. Patience, Abdel Kader, is the highest virtue. ”

“ It was, however, certain that with the small force we at that time possessed in the country, an attempt to invade Egypt by the Senussi accompanied, as it was almost certain it would have been, by a rising engineered by them among the natives of the Nile Valley, would have caused a considerable amount of trouble.
The appearance of a Mahdi—if he is not scotched in time—may set a whole country in a ferment. Not infrequently some local religious celebrity will proclaim himself the Mahdi and gain perhaps a few followers; but his career is usually shortlived. ”

“ I then argued that it was most unlikely that the white Moslems would ever accept a black Mahdi; and that, moreover, according to the traditions, the Mahdi would appear in Mecca. He replied, "God is the Lord of all," by which he meant to say that God can make a black Mahdi.
We had a long conversation about the Mahdi, and it seemed to me that Sheikh Idris did not believe in him, but had merely joined him in the hope of gain and rewards. Idris also added, "By what right should we be ruled by the Turks? can we not govern ourselves?" ”

“ Of the 40,000 inhabitants of Khartoum he calculated that two-thirds were willing—were perhaps anxious—to become the subjects of the Mahdi. 'These people are not worth any great sacrifice,' he bitterly observed. The Egyptian officials were utterly incompetent; the soldiers were cowards. All his admiration was reserved for his enemies. The meanest of the Mahdi's followers was, he realised, 'a determined warrior, who could undergo thirst and privation, who no more cared for pain or death than if he were stone'. ”

“ His credit daily increased among the credulous and passionate inhabitants of the Desert. The Almoravide soldiers shrank from an encounter with a foe whose white standard seemed to be invested with the mystic qualities of a talisman. The Mahdi, renouncing in a measure his character of affected humility, now assumed the pomp of a sovereign. He surrounded himself with a splendidly appointed bodyguard. His throne was approached by suppliants for favor with the debasing and complicated ceremonial of Oriental despotism. ”

“ What splendid work is being done in Egypt, both in the Army and Civil Service, and by men of whom little is heard, and not the least likely to blow their own trumpets. It seems there is a general opinion that the power of Mahdism,—an unknown quantity—is a serious menace to the whole country, and that the position has been brought about, in great measure, by the vacillation of the Home Government, and its almost criminal neglect of its proper responsibility. ”

“ Early the following morning Abdel Nur was brought before the judges, who asked him if he had really spoken against Mahdiism. Seeing that he was now lost, he thought this a good opportunity, in the presence of such a large audience, to prove his assertion; he declared that the true Mahdi should not die in Omdurman, and that true Mahdiism would not be confined to the Sudan alone; that the people having been once deceived, the paths of wickedness should be avoided, the paths of truth followed, and the oppression of the Moslems abandoned once and for all. ”

“ An Arab does not leave his beast like that, Excellency. These men here are not Arabs, but the fierce, half-savage people from high up the country, who have descended the river, killing and destroying, till wherever they stop the land is turned into a waste. Time back, when the great general was sent up to Khartoum, we said ‘Now there will be peace, and the savage followers of the Mahdi will be driven back into the wilds; people will dare to live again and grow their corn and pasture their flocks and herds;’ but, alas! ”