The Syrian Christ Part 10

The language of the Oriental is that of sentiment and conviction, and not of highly differentiated and specialized thought. When you say to him, "I think this object is beautiful," if he does not think it is so, he says, "No, it is not beautiful." Although he is expressing his own individual opinion, he does not take the trouble to make that perfectly clear: if an object is not beautiful to him, it _is not_ beautiful.

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From an intellectual and social standpoint, this mode of speech may be considered a serious defect. So do children express themselves. But it should be kept in mind that the Oriental mind is that of the prophet and the seer, and not of the scientist and the philosopher. It is the mind which has proven the most suitable transmissive agency of divine revelation.

When the seer beholds a vision of the things that are eternal, he cannot speak of it as a supposition or a guess, or transmit it with intellectual caution and timidity. "Thus saith the Lord." "The word of the Lord came unto me saying, Son of man, prophesy." When we speak of the deepest realities of life, we do not beset our utterances with qualifying phrases. True love, deep sorrow, a real vision of spiritual things transcend all speculative speech; they press with irresistible might for direct and authoritative expression.

Take for an example Jesus' matchless declaration: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the {186} gospel [glad tidings] to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord."[2] How would this great utterance sound if given in the nice, cautious language of an "up-to-date" thinker?

What force would it carry if put in this form, "It seems to me, although I may be entirely mistaken, that something like what may be termed the 'Spirit of the Lord' is upon me, and I feel that, in my own limited way, I must preach the Gospel"?

Of course reckless, dogmatic a.s.sertions from the pulpit are never wise nor profitable. Ultimately, whether in the realms of science or spiritual experience, the facts are the things which will count.

Nevertheless, it must be admitted that the modern pulpit suffers to a large extent from overcautiousness. By many ministers the facts are evaluated more in an intellectual than in a spiritual sense. Hence that {187} cautiousness in utterance which is seriously threatening the spirit of prophecy and the authority of real spiritual _experience_ in the religious teachers of the present day. Legitimate intellectual caution should never be allowed to degenerate into spiritual timidity, nor the knowledge of outward things to put out the prophetic fire in the soul. There is, no doubt, much food for thought in the following legend. It is said of a preacher, who was apparently determined not to make "rash statements," that in speaking to his people on repentance he had this for his final word: "If you do not repent, as it were, and be converted, in a measure, you will be d.a.m.ned, to a certain extent." The congregation that has such a preacher is d.a.m.ned already! And I perceive some difference between such a preacher and Him who says, "Verily, I say unto you, except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven."[3]

This seeming weakness in Oriental speech {188} and in the Bible is in reality tremendous spiritual strength. Through our sacred Scriptures we hear the voices of those great Oriental prophets who spoke as they saw and felt; as seers, and not as logicians. And it was indeed most fortunate for the world that the Bible was written in an age of instinctive listening to the divine Voice, and in a country whose juvenile modes of speech protected the "rugged maxims" of the Scriptures from the weakening influences of an overstrained intellectualism.

[1] See also Matt. xxvi: 73.

[2] Luke iv: 18.

[3] Matt. xviii: 3.

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PART III

BREAD AND SALT

CHAPTER I

THE SACRED 'AISH

To an Oriental the phrase "bread and salt" is of sacred import. The saying, "There is bread and salt between us," which has been prevalent in the East from time immemorial, is equal to saying, "We are bound together by a solemn covenant." To say of one that he "knows not the significance of bread and salt" is to stigmatize him as a base ingrate.

A n.o.ble foe refuses to "taste the salt" of his adversary--that is, to eat with him--so long as he feels disinclined to be reconciled to him.

Such a foe dreads the thought of repudiating the covenant which the breaking of bread together forms. In the rural districts of Syria, much more than in the cities, is still observed the ancient custom that a man on an important mission should not eat his host's bread until the errand is made known. The covenant of "bread and salt" should not be entered into {192} before the att.i.tude of the host toward his guest's mission is fully known. If the request is granted, then the meal is enjoyed as a fraternal affirmation of the agreement just made. So in the twenty-fourth chapter of the Book of Genesis we are told that Abraham's servant, who had gone to Mesopotamia, "unto the city of Nahor," to bring a wife of his master's kindred to his son Isaac, refused to eat at Laban's table before he had told his errand. With characteristic Oriental hospitality the brother of Rebekah, after hearing his sister's story, sought Abraham's faithful servant, "and, behold, he stood by the camels at the well. And he said, Come in, thou blessed of the Lord; wherefore standest thou without? for I have prepared the house, and room for the camels. And the man came into the house.... And there was set meat before him to eat: but he said, _I will not eat, until I have told mine errand_."[1] The errand having been told, "the servant brought forth jewels of silver, and jewels of gold, and raiment, and {193} gave them to Rebekah.... _And they did eat and drink_, he and the men that were with him."[2]

Of all his enemies, the writer of the forty-first Psalm considered the "familiar friend" who went back on his simple covenant to be the worst.

"Yea," he cries, mournfully, "mine own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, which did eat my bread, hath lifted up his heel against me."

As the son of a Syrian family I was brought up to think of bread as possessing a mystic sacred significance. I never would step on a piece of bread fallen in the road, but would pick it up, press it to my lips for reverence, and place it in a wall or some other place where it would not be trodden upon.

What always seemed to me to be one of {194} the n.o.blest traditions of my people was their reverence for the _'aish_ (bread; literally, "the life-giver"). While breaking bread together we would not rise to salute an arriving guest, whatever his social rank. Whether spoken or not, our excuse for not rising and engaging in the cordial Oriental salutation before the meal was ended, was our reverence for the food (_hirmetel-'aish_). We could, however, and always did, invite the newcomer most urgently to partake of the repast.

At least once each year, for many years, I carried the _korban_ (the bread offering) to the _mizbeh_ (altar of sacrifice) in our village church, as an offering for the repose of the souls of our dead as well as for our own spiritual security. Bread was one of the elements of the holy Eucharist. The ma.s.s always closed with the handing by the priest to the members of the congregation of small pieces of consecrated bread. The Gospel taught us also that Christ was the "bread of life."

The _'aish_ was something more than mere {195} matter. Inasmuch as it sustained life, it was G.o.d's own life made tangible for his child, man, to feed upon. The Most High himself fed our hunger. Does not the Psalmist say, "Thou openest thine hand, and satisfieth the desire of every living thing"? Where else could our daily bread come from?

[1] Verses 30-33.

[2] Verses 53-54. The word "drink," which is frequently used in the Bible in connection with the word "eat," does not necessarily refer to wine drinking. The expression "food and drink" is current in Syria, and means simply "board." An employer says to an employee, "I will pay you so much wages, and your food and drink" (aklek was.h.i.+rbek). The drink may be nothing but water.

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CHAPTER II

"OUR DAILY BREAD"

I have often heard it said by "up-to-date" religionists in this country that the saying in the Lord's Prayer, "Give us this day our daily bread," was at best a beggar's lazy pet.i.tion. It has been suggested that those words should be omitted from the prayer, because they pertain to "material things." And at any rate we can get our daily bread only by working for it.

Yes; and the Oriental understands all that. But he perceives also that by working for his daily bread he does not _create_ it, but simply _finds_ it. The prayer, "Give us this day our daily bread" is a note of pure grat.i.tude to the "Giver of all good and perfect gifts." The Oriental does not know "material things" as the Occidental knows them.

To him organic chemistry does not take the place of G.o.d. He is, in his totality, G.o.d-centered. His center of gravity is the altar and not the factory, and back {197} of his prayer for daily bread is the momentum of ages of mystic contemplation. The Oriental finds kins.h.i.+p, not with those who go for their daily bread no farther than the bakery, but with the writer of this modern psalm:--

"Back of the loaf is the snowy flour, Back of the flour the mill; Back of the mill is the wheat and the shower And the sun and the Father's will."

It is not my purpose to exaggerate the piety and moral rect.i.tude of the Oriental. I am fully aware of the fact that he is lamentably lacking in his efforts to rise to the height of his n.o.blest traditions.

Nevertheless, those who know the Oriental's inner life know also that from seed-time until harvest, and until the bread is placed upon the family board, this man's att.i.tude toward the "staff of life" is essentially religious. In the name of G.o.d he casts the seed into the soil; in the name of G.o.d he thrusts the sickle into the ripe harvest; in the name of G.o.d he scatters his sheaves on the thres.h.i.+ng floor and grinds his grain at the mill; and in the name of {198} G.o.d his wife kneads the dough, bakes the bread, and serves it to her family.

In my childhood days "kneading-day" at our house was always of peculiar significance to me. I had no toys or story-books to engage my attention, and it was with the greatest interest that I watched my mother go through the process of kneading. Her pious words and actions made kneading a sort of religious service.

After making the sign of the cross and invoking the Holy Name, she drew the required quant.i.ty of flour out of a small opening near the bottom of the earthen barrel in which the precious meal was stored. It was out of such a barrel that the widow of "Zarephath which belongeth to Zidon" drew the "handful of meal" she had, and made of it a cake for Elijah, for which favor the fiery prophet prayed that the widow's barrel of meal "shall not waste."

Then my mother packed the flour in the shape of a crescent on one side of the large earthen _maajan_ (kneading basin) which is about thirty inches in diameter. She dissolved the {199} salt in warm water, which she poured in the basin by the embankment of flour. Then with a "G.o.d bless" she took out the leaven--a lump of dough saved from the former baking--which she had buried in flour to keep it "from corruption,"

that is, from overfermentation. This leaven she dissolved carefully in the salt water, and by slowly mixing the meal with this fluid, she "hid" the leaven in the meal. It was this process which Jesus mentioned very briefly in the parable of the leaven in the thirteenth chapter of St. Matthew's Gospel. "The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened."

The kneading done, my mother smoothed the surface of the blessed lump, dipped her hand in water, and with the edge of her palm marked a deep cross the whole length of the diameter of the basin, crossed herself three times, while she muttered an invocation, and then covered the basin and left the dough to rise. The same pious att.i.tude was resumed {200} when the raised dough was made into small loaves, during the baking, and whenever the mother of the family put her hand into the basin where the loaves were kept, to take out bread for her family's needs.

Does it now seem strange, unnatural, or in any way out of harmony with the trend of her whole life, for such a woman to pray, "Give us this day our daily bread"? Shall we receive the gifts and forget the Giver?

However circuitous our way to our daily bread may be, the fact remains that we do feed on G.o.d's own life. "The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof."

The use of iron stoves was unknown to the Syrians in my childhood days; and this modern convenience is now used only by some of the well-to-do people in the large cities. The rank and file of the people, as in the days of ancient Israel, still bake their bread at semi-public ovens, a few of which are found in every village and town. This baking-place is mentioned often in the Bible, but the word "oven" in the English translation is somewhat misleading. It {201} is so because the _tennr_ (translated "oven" in the Bible) is unknown to the English-speaking world, if not to the entire Occident. The _tennr_ is a huge earthen tube about three feet in diameter and about five feet long; it is sunk in the ground within a small, roughly constructed hut.

The women bake their bread at the _tennr_ in turn, certain days being a.s.signed to certain families. The one baking comprises from one hundred to two hundred loaves. The fuel, which consists of small branches of trees, and of thistles and straw, is thrown into the _tennr_ in large quant.i.ties. It is to this that Jesus alludes in the pa.s.sage, "If then G.o.d so clothe the gra.s.s which is to-day in the field, and to-morrow is _cast into the oven_, how much more will he clothe you, O ye of little faith?"

When I recall the sight of a burning _tennr_, I do not find it difficult to imagine what the old theologians meant by the "burning pit." The billows of black smoke, pierced at intervals by tongues of flame issuing from the deep hole, convert the chimneyless hut into an active {202} crater. No one who has seen such a sight can fail to understand what the prophet Malachi meant when he exclaimed, "For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble."[1] And no one who has seen that little hut, virtually plastered with the blackest soot, can fail to understand the full meaning of that pa.s.sage in the fifth chapter of the Book of Lamentations, the tenth verse, which says, "Our skin was black like an oven, because of the terrible famine."