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in a most miserable condition, and it is easy to deduce therefrom the degree of
the sciences and cultivation which prevails there. They present to the
enlightened man, especially if he should have visited the schools in civilized
countries, or still more if he has been educated there, a most striking and
melancholy spectacle. In many streets you will find small, damp, and dark
cellars, having no windows, and in which the light is only admitted through the
door, which always stands open. In these there is spread on the floor a large,
miserable straw mat, and on this are seen sitting, with their legs bent under
them, in a circle, ten to fifteen boys, from five to twelve or even fifteen
years old. In the middle stands a teacher with a long stick. Nearly every boy
has before him a small wooden board, on which are drawn a few Arabic letters;
and in this manner do they receive the rudiments of their education, which
actually amounts to no more than a very little knowledge of reading and writing
the Arabic; wherefore you will find but few citizens here who are able to read
and write their native language.* Whoever, now, is able to do this is considered
as belonging to the higher classes. The chief object of the education in the
schools here described is to teach the scholars to say by heart the formula of
prayers, or rather to sing them, as they are nearly all recited in a singing
tone. You can hear even at a
great distance the tumultuous and loud shrieking of these boys. One thing is
quite curious to remark, that all these boys, as well at their prayers as their
other exercises, keep up a constant shaking backward and forward, שאקלין
זיך as is often done by our Jews when praying or
studying. This habit is also observed in adult Mahomedans during their
devotions, and it appears therefore that it must be an old oriental custom.
* And there are therefore in many streets small shops, in
which are seated learned persons, who form a sort of Arabic writing office,
where any one can be served for a compensation, in case he wants Arabic reading
and writing done.
It may readily be imagined that the teachers themselves
have no necessity for any high scientific and moral cultivation, in order to
impart the required amount of instruction; and I can assure the reader that I
have met in these institutions with teachers who were quite blind or otherwise
crippled; and it would appear that if such an unfortunate being is no longer
able to earn his bread by begging in the public streets, he endeavours to
accomplish this by becoming a teacher. I even found these schools kept in a
large cellar, so to say, a vault, in the middle of which there is a Wely, or the
monument of a saint, a pious dervish, or of a sheich. The scholars sit, or
rather lie around this grave, and obtain their education, as a memento mori.
The constant loud cries of these boys once excited my curiosity as I was
passing by, to see what it all meant, and I looked through a small window into
the place whence the sounds issued. I can assure the reader that a shuddering
seized me at what I saw. A damp, heated atmosphere, an almost sepulchral odour,
rose towards the spot where I was standing, and I could hardly observe the
scholars, as my stepping up to the window had deprived them of the only light
which they had. I could not prevail on myself to remain a few minutes even to
take a closer observation of this most dreary schoolroom, and for my own part I
would rather stay in a common stable, than in this subterranean, frightful
school, held in the receptacle of the dead.
Is it then wonderful that these Mahomedans are so far behind the Europeans? whence are they to learn anything of
scientific culture? Their reading is confined to the written Koran, since
printed books, which come from Kafers only, from unbelievers, are held in no
esteem by them. To show what idea of geography they have, I may state that a
very learned dervish, who had made many journeys, told me that he had travelled
from Sudan (Central Africa), in a few weeks by land to the East Indies, as they
are not far from each other.
The Mahomedan in general ridicules the European, that he
displays so much interest for such stupid and useless stuff. If he sees a
foreign scholar or traveller showing some curiosity in behalf of a scientific
subject, or making a measurement, a calculation, or a drawing, he exclaims, in a
tone of derision, "Heida mushnem,"--he is mad. They tell
me often that they can have no idea, what interest such things can have for any
man, that he should make long and distant voyages by sea and land, to obtain
information of such nonsensical subjects. What can I answer them? Shall I give
an idea of colours to one who is born blind? an explanation of sounds to one
born deaf, of which he can form no conception? One can say with truth of the
Mahomedans with Solomon, "I say that an untimely birth is better than he.
For he cometh in with vanity, and departeth in darkness, and his name shall be
covered with darkness." (Eccles. vi. 3, 4.)
Jews and Muslims in
Palestine |
