Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1909-07-09
TWENTIETH
CENTURY EGYPT

MOnammeQan learning ana culture Is the
university OF El-Azhar In Cairo. More
than thusand years old, deeply incrusted
with reverential tradition. holding to the
ancient faith of the Prophet Of Arabia,
El-Azhar commands the respect Of every
true believer in Islam. Men come here
from Morocco on the west and India on
the east, from Russia at the north and
the Sulu islands at the south, to bring in
the faith and prepare themselves to be-
come teachers and holy men in the
mosques of their distant homes. What
Mecca is to the devotion Of Islam, FL
Azhar is to it's militant spirit. From this
university Islam hopes to accomplish the
Intellectual conquest or the world
The absurdity of these hopes and the
fact that the religion OF Mohammed is
moribund is proved beyond the question
Of a doubt to the occidental who visits
El-Azhar. The university was once
really great institution of learning. Eight
or nine hundred years ago 1t was the
center of that profound Arabic culture
which gave to Europe the groundwork Of
nearly all its present-day science and en-
gineering skill Today. in the brilliancy
of the twentieth century, when science
has scaled to heights before undreamt of,
El-Azhar knows nothing of the great ad-
vance.
It's curriculum consists of the Koran,
the sacred traditions and the sacred law
Of Islam These three branches of learn
ing are expounded to more than ten thou
sand earnest students gathered from the
four corners of the Moslem world. Early
this year the government, with the &C
tive participation of the khedive. attempt
ed to institute some educational reforms
in the university. 1t was proposed to add
mathematics and rudimentary science TO
the course of study. The Ulema, the holy
men who rule the university, objected TO
the innovation but the influence Of the
khedive caused them to give a reluctant
consent.
But the English reformers of the Mos
lem faith had recokened without their
hosts. The ten thousand students OF
EI-Azhar promptly went out on strike,
picketed the sacred precincts of the
mosque and declared boycott on "scab"
holy men and divinity students. The gov
eminent resolved to compel obedience to
its will, and thousands of the striking
students were arrested. So far did the
authorities go that Moslem soldiers and
policemen actually invaded the mosque
without removing their shoes, an unpre-
cedented and horrible proclamation OF tie
sacred law.
Then rose the faithful, young and old,
educated and ignorant. The government
had transgressed the law. The khedive
had been duped by the infdel dogs OF
Christian English. The students were
right. Students harangued the people
from street corners. They declared that
they came to E1-Azhar - learn the faith
of Islam that they might teach and preach
in the Mosques. They were to be holy
men. they did not need to know science.
They were not to be mere clerks and
counter jumpers, what did they need
with arithmetic? They swore they would
not receive any of the infidel Christian
contaminated learning. And all Of this In
sublime ignorance of the fact that all Eu-
rope knows of mathematics 1t learned
from the Arab scholars of that very uni
yersity, nearly a thousand years ago.
The students won. The government
saw that its effort to reform the sacred
university would result in nothing but
trouble and that 1t might precipitate
fanatical agitation against the Christians
Thus ended the great students strike, and
the curriculum at the seat Of learning and
culture of Islam again is restricted to the
Koran, the Hadith Of sacred traditions,
and the Sheriat or sacred law. True, the
compromise effected by the government
provided for an elective course in other
branches of learning, but it would be
worth a students life to defy the will OF
his fellows and take it.
Lord Cromer, the British pro-consul
who ruled over Egypt for a quarter Of
century once asked the head of Ell
Azhar whether his professors taught that
the earth went round the sun, or the sun
round the earth. He replied that he was
not sure, that some nations held one way
and some another, that his general i'm
preston was that the sun went round the
earth, but that he had never paid much
attention to the matter and that the sub
ject was too unimportant to merit Sc
rious discussion by anybody. He did not
have even the holiness of the faith of the
Rev. John Jaspar. of Richmond Va, who
proclaimed that The sun do move"
proved it by the Bible and defied science
Yet Moslem boys and girls are nocxing
to the schools provided by American ms
sionaries. Those younger people who dc
not intend to enter the priesthood have
a keen desire for knowledge, and even the
have permitted the intro
duction of primary school studies into the
''kuttabs,'" or village schools attached to
the mosques. where nothing nut the Ko-
ran was formerly taught. But the same
families which send their sons and daugh-
tiers to a foreign school to get a busi-
ness education will resist with might and
main the introduction Of infidel science
into the great religious institution of FL
Azhar. That university is at once the
strongest citadel of the faith, and the
place where that faith is being slowly
but surely strangled to death
There is a Mohammedan journal pub
Iished in Russia which is devoted to re-
forming Islam and bringing the. Faith OF
the Prophet into touch with the advancing
world. The movement has received no en- \
except from EnrOpeanizee a
Afoslems WHO have been trained in relig-t
Gus thought on the bouIeVards or Paris. !