The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1903-04-12

district. Men come to him with their quar-
rels and disputes and embarrassments TO De
judged, even when the cases are not at all
within legal jurisdiction.
"In Arabia and eastern Asiatic Turkey
man cannot become kadi by accident OF
birth and station or by favor of politics or
other influence He must choose the pro-
fesson and train himself to it from early
youth.
when the Oriental boy is twelve years
old he must enter the MedreSe, tneolog-
ical government school, If he wishes to en-
ter either the theological or legal pro-
fession. There he learns the Koran by
heart.
1T is expounded for him infinitely, pas
sage by passage He is known as sofia
while ne is studying. When he knows the
Koran thoroughly so that he can hold his
own in arguments with the teachers he
assumes the name of HafiS and prepares
for the examination. A student rarely
rises to the degree of HATS until he is
twenty years old.
When he passes the examination he
must choose at once between theology and
the law. Having chosen the latter, he faces
i've years OF study even harder than any
that has gone before. During that time he
must make himself proficient in logic, rhet-
oric, morals, philosophy, theology and law.
Then he is ready to pass the examina-
ton which shall entitle him TO become a
Kadi But he is not advanced to that dig
nifty Immediately after he has passed the
examination, for the most important and
distinctive part of the training has still to
and learn their daily life, their temptations
and their sorrows, by hard personal expert
ence.
This stage of his career lasts three
years, and almost all it's conditions are rig
idly prescribed. He must practice in court
during that time, taking the cases OF the
poor.
His income from this source is almost
nominal, and he must keep himself alive by
earning a petty income with all kinds OF
hard, mean toll. So he learns the world
in which he is TO be judge, for he strug-
giles for existence as do the people who Will
come before him some day to be judged.
But though he experiences their priva-
tons and their temptations, he may not
o Halls, the green cloth that thou wearest
around thy fez must be ever unsoiled is the
law.
1T is bitter, hard service. But they
when they emerge. They are what the
Koran demands when it says that only a
human being who has become a true man
shall dare to judge other human beings.
Hans Forster, the Orientalist, who
knows the true Eastern judge better, prob
ably, than does any other European to-
day, tells in a recent work of his talk with
the Kadi of Safed-a talk which illustrates
what have said here about the class
:" Poor judges of the unbelievers," said
the Kadi OF Safed, Hassan Bey, to me,
after he had read several articles from the
planned to him about the duties of our
judges Poor judges of the unbelievers!
How often you must suffer painful hours,
owing to your duties"
THAT was strange to hear from the
lips of a man who had been Kadi hidden
away in that little hamlet in Palestine for
forty years and in that time had heard
little or nothing about European judges.
When L asked him if he had never, for
even a moment, repented his choice of a
profession. the aged man smiled and an
Swered:
mot for a moment. How can one
feel repentance for that which gives him
joy?"
4" And that, truly, is the secret of the
judges of the Orient, concludes Forster.
They are peaceful. I know more than
one. Their profession gives them joy. We
read pretty Arabic stories of the astound-
ing judgments of the Kadis. The stories
are true OF to-day. The Kadis are the
wise men Of the lands of the morning.