The Women of the Arabs Part 7

Whiting had preached in for so many years, and among the girls I had taught, and all the young friends there, but as that was not allowed me, I joined the Church here."

Her devoted friend and loving a.s.sistant teacher Luciyah, was deeply affected by what she learned from Rufka of her new spiritual life, and she too turned her thoughts to divine things, and soon after the arrival of Miss Everett and Miss Carruth in 1868, to take charge of the Seminary, she came out openly on the Lord's side, and in the midst of a fire of domestic persecution, publicly professed her faith in Jesus as her only Saviour.

Miss Carruth, after staying just long enough in the Seminary to win the hearts of teachers and pupils, was obliged to return to her native land, where she is still an efficient laborer in the New England Woman's Boards of Missions.

The year following the departure of Rufka to Egypt was a critical time in the history of the Seminary. Lulu continued in charge of the domestic department, and Mr. Araman managed the business of the school, while Mrs. Salt (a sister of Melita and Salome) aided in several of the cla.s.ses. But the inst.i.tution owed its great success during that year, if not its very existence, to the untiring energy and efficient services of Mrs. Dr. Bliss and Miss Emilia Thomson, daughter of the Rev. Dr.

Thomson. They each gave several hours every day to instruction in the English language, the Scriptures and music, and the high standard of excellence already attained in the Seminary was maintained if not surpa.s.sed.

Their perfect familiarity with the Arabic language gave them a great advantage in the management and instruction of the pupils, and their efforts on behalf of the Inst.i.tution, in maintaining it in full and successful operation during the year previous to the arrival of Miss Everett and Miss Carruth, deserve grateful recognition.

In the winter of 1870 and 1871 Miss Sophia Loring, and Miss Ellen Jackson arrived from America as colleagues of Miss Everett, and under their efficient management aided by Mr. Araman, Luciyah and other native teachers, the Seminary is enjoying a high degree of prosperity.

In March, 1864, the Mission had issued an appeal for funds to erect a permanent home for this Seminary, and in 1866 the present commodious and substantial edifice was erected, a lasting monument of the liberality of Christian men and women in America and England.

Its cost was about eleven thousand dollars, and the raising of this sum was largely due to the liberality and personal services of Mr. Wm. A.

Booth, of New York, who also kindly acted as treasurer of the building fund. The lumber used in its construction was brought from the state of Maine. The doors and windows were made under the direction of Dr. Hamlin of Constantinople, in Lowell, Ma.s.s., the tiles came from Ma.r.s.eilles, the stone from the sandstone quarries of Ras Beirut, the stone pavement partly from Italy and partly from Mt. Lebanon, and the eighty iron bedsteads from Birmingham, England. The cistern, which holds about 20,000 gallons, was built at the expense of a Ma.s.sachusetts lady, and the portico by a lady of New York. The melodeon was given by ladies in Georgetown, D.C., and the organ is the gift of a benevolent lady in Newport, R.I.

Time would fail me to recount the generous offerings of Christian men and women who have aided in the support of this school during the ten years of its history. Receiving no pecuniary aid from the American Board, the entire responsibility of its support fell upon a few members of the Syria Mission. Travellers who pa.s.sed through the Holy Land, sometimes a.s.sumed the support of charity pupils, or interested their Sabbath Schools in raising scholars.h.i.+ps, on their return home, and a few n.o.ble friends in the United States have sent on their gifts from time to time unsolicited, to defray the general expenses of the Inst.i.tution. Its support has been to some of us a work of _faith_, as well as a labor of love. Not unfrequently has the end of the month come upon us, without one piastre in the treasury for paying the teachers' salaries or buying bread for the children, when suddenly, in some unknown and unexpected way, funds would be received, sufficient for all our wants. About two years since the funds were entirely exhausted. More than a hundred dollars would be owing to the teachers and servants on the following day. The accounts were examined, and all possible means of relief proposed, but without avail. At length one of the members of the Executive Committee asked leave to look over the accounts. He did so, and said he could not find any mention of a sum of about thirty Napoleons, which he was sure he had paid into the treasury several months before, as a donation from Mr. Booth of New York, whose son had died in Beirut. The money had _not_ been paid into the school treasury.

The vouchers were all produced, and there was left no resort but prayer.

There was earnest supplication that night that the Lord would relieve us from our embarra.s.sment, and provide for the necessities of the school. The next morning the good brother, above mentioned, recalled to mind his having given that money to Dr. Van Dyck in the Mission Library for the School. Dr. Van Dyck was consulted, and at once replied, "Certainly I received the money. It is securely locked up in the safe where it has been for months awaiting orders." The safe was opened, and the money found to be almost to a piastre the amount needed for obligations of the School.

Since the transfer of the Syria Mission to the board of Missions of the Presbyterian Church, the pecuniary status of the Seminary has been somewhat modified. The Women's Boards of Missions of New York and Philadelphia have a.s.sumed the responsibility of raising scholars.h.i.+ps for its support among the Auxiliary Societies and Sabbath Schools; the salaries of the teachers are provided for by individuals and churches, and several of the old friends of the school retain their interest in it, while the danger of a deficit is guarded against, by the guarantees of the good Christian women who are doing so grand and n.o.ble a work in this age for the world's evangelization. The annual cost of supporting a pupil now is about sixty dollars gold. The number of paying pupils is increasing, and the prospect for the future is encouraging.

In the year 1864, a letter was received from certain Christian women in America, addressed to the girls of the School, and some of the older girls prepared a reply in Arabic, a translation of which was sent to America. It was as follows:

"From the girls of the Beirut School in Syria, to the sisters beloved in the Lord Jesus, in a land very far away. We have been honored in reading the lines which reached us from you, O sisters, distant in body but near in spirit, and we have given glory to G.o.d the Creator of all, who has caused in your hearts true love to us, and spiritual sympathies which have prompted you, dear sisters in the Lord, to write to us. Yes, it is the Lord Jesus who has brought about between us and between you (Arabic idiom) a spiritual intercourse, without the intercourse of bodily presence. For we have never in our lives seen you, nor your country, nor have we spoken to you face to face, and so you likewise have not seen us. Had neither of us the Word of G.o.d, the Holy and Only Book which is from one Father and a G.o.d unchangeable, to tell us that we have one nature, and have all fallen into one transgression, and are saved in one way, which is the Lord Jesus, we could not, as we now can, call you in one union, our sisters. The Lord Jesus calls those who love Him His brethren, and since He is the only bond and link, are we not His sisters, and thus sisters to each other? Truly, O dear sisters, we are thirsting to see you, and we all unite in offering prayers and praises to G.o.d, through His Son Immanuel, the possessor of the glorious Name, praying that we may see you; but we cannot in this world, for we are in the East, and you are in the West, far, very far. But, O dear friends, as we hope for the resurrection from the dead, so after our period in this world is ended, we shall meet by the blessing of G.o.d in those bright courts which are illumined by the light of the Saviour, which need not sun nor moon to give them light,--that holy place which is filled with throngs of angels who never cease to offer glory to G.o.d.

There we may meet and unite with all the saved in praising the Saviour.

There we may meet our friends who have pa.s.sed on before us "as waiting they watch us approaching the sh.o.r.e," as we sing in the hymn. There around the throne of the glorious Saviour, there in the heavenly Jerusalem, our songs will not be mingled with tears and grief, for the Lord Jesus Himself will wipe away all tears from our eyes. There will not enter sin nor its likeness into our hearts sanctified by the Holy Spirit. There this body which shall rise incorruptible, will not return to the state in which it was in this world. In those courts we shall be happy always, and the reason is that we shall always be with the Great Shepherd, as it is said in the Book of Revelation, 'He shall shepherd them and lead them to fountains of living waters and wipe all tears from their eyes.' Our sisters, were it not for the Holy Bible which the Lord has given to His people, we should have no comfort to console us with regard to our friends whom we have lost by means of death. We beg you to help us by offering prayers to the living and true G.o.d that He will make us faithful even unto death,--that He will bless us while on the sea of this life, until we reach the sh.o.r.e of peace without fear or trouble, that we may be ready to stand before the seat of the Lord Jesus the Judge of all, clothed in the robes of His perfect righteousness, which he wove for us on the Cross, and is now ready to give to those who ask Him. Let us then all ask of G.o.d that this our only treasure may be placed where no thief can break in and steal, and no moth shall corrupt.

And may the Lord preserve you!

We love to sing this hymn,

'Holy Bible, Book Divine, Precious treasure, thou art mine!'

and we entreat you that when you sing it, you will let it be a remembrancer from us to you."

In March, 1865, a little girl was brought to the school under somewhat peculiar circ.u.mstances. Years ago, in the days of Mr. Whiting, a Maronite monk named Nejm, became enlightened, left the monastery and was married to a Maronite woman named Zarifeh, by Mr. Whiting. For years the poor man pa.s.sed through the fires of persecution and trial. Even his wife, in her ignorance, though not openly opposing him, trembled with fear every time he read the Scriptures aloud. At the time mentioned above, their little daughter Resha was about five years of age. The Papal Maronite Bishop of Beirut made a visit to Nejm's village, Baabda, to dispense indulgences, in accordance with the Pope's Encyclical letter. Nejm was called upon to pay his portion of the sum a.s.sessed upon the people, but having been a Protestant fifteen years, he refused to pay it. At the instigation of the priests, his wife was then taken from him, and his little Resha, his only child, was carried off by one of the priests to Beirut, and thrust inside the gates of the convent of the French Sisters of Charity. The poor father came to me, well-nigh broken-hearted, pleading for a.s.sistance. I laid the case before His Excellency Daud Pasha, Governor of Lebanon, who was then in Beirut, and drew up a pet.i.tion to the Pasha of Beirut also, on the subject. Nejm went about weeping and wringing his hands, and my feelings became deeply enlisted in his behalf. Three weeks afterwards, after a series of pet.i.tions and visits to the Pasha of Beirut, the girl Resha was removed from the convent and taken by Nejm's enemies to a house near Nahr Beirut, about two miles distant, and just over the border line of the Mountain Pashalic. I then addressed another letter to Daud Pasha, and he promptly ordered her to be restored to her father. The manner in which Nejm, the father, finally secured the child was not a little amusing. He had been searching for his child for several weeks, waiting and watching, until his patience was about exhausted, when he heard that Resha was again in the hands of the priests in Baabda. The mother followed the child, and the priests threatened to kill her, if she informed her husband where the girl was secreted. Daud Pasha was then at his winter palace in Baabda, and Nejm took my letter to him. While awaiting a reply at the door, some one informed him that his daughter was at the fountain. Without waiting further for official aid, he ran to the fountain, took up his daughter, put her on his back, and ran for Beirut, a distance of about four miles, where he brought her to my house, and placed her in my room, with loud e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns of thanks to G.o.d. "Neshkar Allah; El mejd lismoo." Thanks to G.o.d! Glory to His name!

The mother soon followed, and the girl was sent as a day scholar to the Seminary. They are now living in Baabda. The mother, Zarify, united with the Evangelical Church of Beirut, July 21, 1872, giving the best evidence of a true spiritual experience. The little girl is anxious to teach, and it was proposed to employ her as an a.s.sistant in the girls'

school in Baabda, but the tyrannical oppressions of the priesthood upon the family who had offered their house for the school, and the refusal of the Pasha of Lebanon to grant protection to the persecuted, have obliged the brethren there to postpone their request for a school for the present.

Alas for the poor women of Syria! Even when they seek to obtain the consolations of the Gospel by learning to read the Word of life, they are surrounded by priests and Sheikhs who watch their chance to destroy the "Bread of Life!" In March, 1865, a Maronite woman called at the Press to buy a book of poems, to teach her boy to read. "Why not buy a Testament?" asked the bookseller. "I did buy an Engeel Mushekkel," (a voweled Testament.) "Be careful of it then," said Khalil, "for the edition is exhausted, and you cannot get another for months." "It is too late to be careful now, for the book _has been burned_." "Burned? by whom?" "By the Jesuits, who gathered a large pile and burned them." G.o.d grant that as Tyndale's English New Testament, first printed in 1527 was only spread the more widely for the attempts of the Papal Bishop of London to burn it, so the Arabic Bible may receive a new impulse from the similarly inspired efforts of the Bishop's successors!

CHAPTER IX.

LUCIYA SHEKKUR.

The work done for Christ and for Syrian girls in the families of Missionaries in Syria, may well compare with that done in the established inst.i.tutions of learning. Mrs. Whiting was not alone in the work of training native Arab girls in her own home. The same work had been done by other Missionaries before her, and has been carried on with no little success by Mrs. Bird, Mrs. Calhoun and others, up to the present time.

It is an interesting sight to see the Thursday afternoon Women's meeting in the house of Mrs. Calhoun in Abeih, and to know that a large part of that company of bright, intelligent and tidily dressed young native women, who listen so intently to the Bible lesson, and join so heartily in singing the sweet songs of Zion, were trained up either in her own family, or under her own especial influence. By means of her own example in the training of her children, she has taught the women of Abeih, and through them mult.i.tudes of women in other villages, the true Christian modes of family government and discipline, and introduced to their notice and practice many of those little conveniences and habits in the training of children, whose influence will be felt for many generations.

When Mr. and Mrs. Bird removed to Deir el Komr in 1855, they not only opened a large school for the education of girls, with Sada Haleby, one of Dr. De Forest's pupils, as teacher, but received into their own family three young girls, named Luciya, Sikkar and Zihry, all of whom entered upon spheres of usefulness. Zihry became a teacher, in Deir el Komr, and has continued to teach until the present time. She was at one time connected with the Beirut Female Seminary, and is now teaching in the Inst.i.tution of Mrs. Shrimpton, under the auspices of the British Syrian Schools.

Luciya taught in Deir el Komr until the school was overwhelmed in the fires and blood of the Ma.s.sacre year, 1860.

In 1862 she taught in the Sidon School, and afterwards married the Rev.

Sulleba Jerwan, the first native pastor in Hums. In that great city, and amid the growing interest of the young Protestant community, she found a wide and attractive field of labor. She was a young woman of great gentleness and delicacy of nature, and of strong religious feeling, and entered upon the work of laboring among the women and girls of Hums, with exemplary zeal and discretion. She became greatly beloved, and her G.o.dly example and gentle spirit will never be forgotten.

But at length her labors were abruptly cut short. Consumption, a disease little known in Syria, but which afterwards cut down her brother and only sister Sikkar, fastened upon her, and she was obliged, in great suffering, to leave the raw and windy climate of Hums, for the milder air of Beirut. Her two brothers being in the employ of Miss Whately in Cairo, she went, on their invitation, to Egypt, where after a painful illness, she fell asleep in Jesus. Amid all her sufferings, she maintained that same gentle and lovely temper of mind, which made her so greatly beloved by all who knew her.

She has rested from her labors, and her works do follow her. Not long after her sister Sikkar, who had also been trained in Mrs. Bird's family, died in her native village Ain Zehalteh.

Her last end also, was peace, and although no concourse of Druze Sheikhs came barefoot over the snow to her funeral, as they did on the death of the Sitt Selma, in the same village, no doubt a concourse of higher and holier beings attended her spirit to glory.

When Luciya was in Beirut before her departure to Egypt, I used to see her frequently, and I shall never forget the calm composure with which she spoke of her antic.i.p.ated release from the pains and sufferings of life. Christ was her portion, and she lived in communion with him, certain that ere long she should depart and be with him forever.

The poor Moslem women in the houses adjoining her room used to come in, and with half-veiled faces look upon her calm and patient face with wonder. Would that they too might find her Saviour precious to them, in their hours of sickness, suffering and death!

Truly, there is no religion but that of Jesus Christ, that can soften the pillow of suffering, and take away the sting and dread of death.

One of the most serious difficulties in the way of the higher female education in Syria, is the early age at which girls are married. One young girl attended the Beirut Seminary for two years, from eight to ten, and the teachers were becoming interested in her progress, when suddenly her parents took her out of the school, and gave her to a man in marriage. After the festivities of the marriage week were over at her husband's house, she went home to visit her mother, _taking her dolls with her_ to amuse herself!

The Arabic journal "the Jenneh" of Beirut, contained a letter in June, 1872, from its Damascus correspondent, praising the fecundity of Syria, and stating that a young woman who was married at nine and a half, became a grandmother at twenty! Such instances are not uncommon in Damascus and Hums, where the chief and almost the only concern of parents is to marry off their daughters as early as nature will allow, without education, experience or any other qualification for the responsible duties of married life. When the above mentioned letter from Damascus was published, Dr. Van Dyck took occasion to write an article in the "Neshra," the Missionary Weekly, of which he is the editor, exposing the folly and criminality of such early marriages, and demonstrating their disastrous effects on society at large.

Since the establishment of schools and seminaries of a high grade for girls, this tendency is being decidedly checked in the vicinity of Beirut, and girls are not given up as incorrigibly old, even if they reach the age of seventeen.

Dr. Meshakah of Damascus, who has long been distinguished for his learned and eloquent works on the Papacy, is a venerable white-bearded patriarch and his wife looks as if she were his daughter. I once asked him how old she was when married, and he said _eleven_. I asked him why he married her so young? He said that in his day, young girls received no training at home, and young men who wished properly trained wives, had to marry them young, so as to educate them to suit themselves!

Education is rapidly obviating that necessity, and young men are more than willing that girls to whom they are betrothed, should complete their education, lest they be eclipsed by others who remain longer at school. I once called on a wealthy native merchant in Beirut, who remarked that "the Europeans have a thing in their country which we have not. They call it ed-oo-cas.h.i.+on, and I am anxious to have it introduced into Syria." This "ed-oo-cas.h.i.+on" is already settling many a question in Syria which nothing else could settle, and the natives are also learning that something more than mere book-knowledge is needed, to elevate and refine the family. One of the most direct results of female education thus far in Syria has been the abolition from certain cla.s.ses of society of some of those superst.i.tious fears which hara.s.s and torment the ignorant ma.s.ses.

CHAPTER X.

RAHEEL.

No sketch of Woman's Work for Syrian women would be complete which did not give some account of the life and labors of that pioneer in work for Syrian women, Mrs. Sarah L.H. Smith, wife of Dr. Eli Smith. She reached Beirut, January 28, 1834, full of high and holy resolves to devote her life to the benefit of her Syrian sisters. From the first to the very last of her life in Syria, this was the one great object of her toils and prayers. As soon as April 2, she writes, "Our school continues to prosper, and I love the children exceedingly. Do pray that G.o.d will bless this incipient step to enlighten the women of this country. You cannot conceive of their deplorable ignorance. I feel it more and more every day. Their energies are expended in outward adorning of plaiting the hair and gold and pearls and costly array, literally so. I close with one request, _that you will pray for a revival of religion in Beirut_." Again she writes, June 30, 1834, "I feel somewhat thoughtful, this afternoon, in consequence of having heard of the ready consent of the friends of a little girl, that I should take her as I proposed, and educate her. I am anxious to do it, and yet my experience and observation in reference to such a course, and my knowledge of the sinful heart of a child, lead me to think I am undertaking a great thing. I feel, too, that my example and my instruction will control her eternal destiny." This girl was Raheel Ata. Again, August 16: "It is a great favor that so many of the men and boys can read. Alas, our poor sisters! the curse rests emphatically upon them. Among the Druze princesses, some, perhaps the majority, furnish an exception and can read. Their sect is favorable to learning. Not so with the Maronites. I have one scholar from these last, but when I have asked the others who have been here if they wished to read, they have replied most absolutely in the negative, saying that it was for boys, and not for them. I have heard several women acknowledge that they knew no more than the donkeys."

August 23. A Maronite priest compelled two little girls to leave her school, but the Greek priest sent "his own daughter, a pretty, rosy-cheeked girl" to be taught by Mrs. Smith. On the 22d of September, 1834, she wrote from B'hamdun, a village five hours from Beirut, on Lebanon, "Could the females of Syria be educated and regenerated, the whole face of the country would change; even, as I said to an Arab a few days since, to the appearance of the houses and the roads. One of our little girls, whom I taught before going to the mountains, came to see me a day or two since, and talked incessantly about her love for the school, and the errors of the people here, saying that they 'cared not for Jesus Christ, but only for the Virgin Mary.'"

October 8. She says, "A servant woman of Mrs. Whiting, who has now lived long enough with her to love her and appreciate her principles, about a year and a half since remarked to some of the Arabs, that the people with whom she lived did 'not lie, nor steal, nor quarrel, nor do any such things; but poor creatures,' said she, 'they have no religion.'"

On the 22d of October, she wrote again, "Yesterday I went up to Mr.

Bird's to consult about the plan of a _school-house now commenced for females_. I can hardly believe that such a project is actually in progress, and I hail it as the dawn of a happy change in Syria. Two hundred dollars have been subscribed by friends in this vicinity, and I told Mr. B. that if necessary he might expend fifty more upon the building, as our Sabbath School in Norwich had pledged one hundred a year for female education in Syria."