Chapter XXX: Caliphate of Othman. General Review

A.H. XXIV.-XXXV. A.D. 645–656.

[Sidenote: Dynastic issues of the Caliphate.]

Having now traced the progress of Islam to its firm establishment in the world, I do not propose to pursue the history of its conquests and further spread, otherwise than in a very brief and general way; but shall confine what remains of this work chiefly to a review of the facts bearing on the dynastic issues of the Caliphate.

[Sidenote: Causes of Othmân’s unpopularity:]

The reign of Othmân lasted twelve years. It is usual to say that the first six were popular, and the last six the reverse; that is to say, that, during the latter half, the tide turned, and, discontent ripening into sedition, the storm burst at length with fatal force upon the aged Caliph. This is true if we look at the outward appearance. But in reality the causes of unpopularity were busily at work from the very beginning. These were twofold: _first_, antagonism between the Arab nation at large and the Coreish; _secondly_, jealousy between the house of Hâshim, and that of Abd Shems (the Omeyyads) to which Othmân and Muâvia belonged.

[Sidenote: I. Antagonism between Arab tribes at large and Coreish.]

The Arab soldiery, flushed with the glory and the fruits of victory, were scattered all over the empire. In Syria, they were held in check by the powerful hand of Muâvia, whose authority was strengthened by the larger settlement there than elsewhere of influential citizens from Mecca and Medîna. In every other province, conscious of their power, the Arab tribes were rapidly getting the bit between their teeth. Their arrogant and factious spirit found its focus at Kûfa and Bussorah in both of which cities, indeed, it had already ominously shown itself during the reign of Omar; for even he had not been able effectually to curb it there. Impatience of control on the part of the Arabs was based partly on the spread of Islam having been due to the prowess of their arms; and partly on the brotherhood of the faith, in virtue of which all believers, and specially those of Arab blood, stood on the common ground of civil equality. The Caliph, it is true, as successor to the Prophet, was absolute, uncontrolled by any constitutional authority whatever. But even he, yielding to the sentiment, not only took counsel on all critical occasions with the leading men around him, but, as a rule, held himself bound by the popular voice at large, and enjoined the same upon his lieutenants in the provinces. And so it was that in the recall of Sád, the arraigning of Abu Mûsa, and other concessions to the clamour of the citizens of Bussorah and Kûfa, Omar had already set a baneful lesson to his successor, and given to those constituencies a foretaste of power which they were not slow to take advantage of. Thus the turbulent spirit grew from day to day--a spirit of opposition to all authority, and of impatience in particular of the pretensions of the Coreish.

[Sidenote: II. Aly and the house of Hâshim jealous of Othmân and the house of Omeyya.]

The second cause, though less threatening to Islam, was more insidious, and fraught with greater danger to the Caliphate and the person of Othmân himself. Had the Coreish rallied loyally around the throne, the Arab factions might have been nipped in the bud. But the weakness of Othmân, and the partiality with which he favoured his own friends and relatives, stirred the jealousy of the house of Hâshim, which began vaunting the claims of Aly and the Prophet’s family, and depreciating the Omeyyad branch to which the Caliph belonged. That branch, unfortunately for the Omeyyads, had been the tardiest to recognise the mission of Mahomet; and the kinsmen on whom Othmân now lavished his favours had been the most inveterate in their opposition to it. Every unfavourable expression uttered by the Prophet during that period of bitter enmity was now raked up against them, and used to blacken their names, and to cast discredit on a government which promoted them to power and honour. Thus the Coreish were divided; rivalry paralysed their influence, and Othmân lost the support which would otherwise have enabled him to check the machinations of the Arab malcontents. Still worse, Aly and his party lent themselves to the disloyal policy of the Bedouin faction, which was fast sapping the foundations of the Caliphate, and which, as Aly should have foreseen, would in the end recoil against himself.[440]

[Sidenote: Factious spirit diverted by military service.]

It was not, however, till the later part of Othmân’s reign that these influences, though early at work, assumed dangerous prominence. Their retardation was in great measure due to the military operations, which, busily pursued in all directions by the Moslem arms, diverted attention from domestic trouble. Campaigns were annually prosecuted, with more or less vigour, throughout the twelve years of Othmân’s Caliphate. A very brief outline of them will suffice.

[Sidenote: Operations in _Persia_.]

In Persia, as we have seen, the Mussulman invasion had resulted hitherto rather in the dispersion of great armies than in the effectual reduction of the country. Most of the provinces resented the first imposition of tribute, and rose against their new masters, one after another, in repeated and sometimes long-continued rebellion. Expeditions were time after time equipped from Kûfa and Bussorah to crush these risings, from the Caspian Sea and the Oxus to the shores of the Indian Ocean, and even as far as Kabul.[441] It was not till near the close of Othmân’s reign that the Moslem yoke was firmly settled on the neck of Persia. [Sidenote: A.H. XXXI. A.D. 652.]In the eighth year of his Caliphate, Yezdegird died; and thereafter, though in a desultory and sporadic fashion opposition might still survive, anything like national or dynastic antagonism was at an end. Success, indeed, did not invariably attend the Moslem arms. The progress, on the whole, was steadily forward; but there were reverses, and these sometimes of a serious type. In the year A.H. 32, the Turks on the western shore of the Caspian had an advantage, in which the Arab leaders and a great body of the veterans were slain. To retrieve the disaster, Othmân ordered levies from Syria to cross Mesopotamia and reinforce the Kûfan army. Bad blood bred between the two; the Syrians refused to serve under the captain of the rival body; and an altercation ensued which nearly led to bloodshed. This, adds the historian, was the first symptom of the breach between the Kûfans and the men of Syria, which subsequently broke out into prolonged hostilities. About the same time, a whole army was lost in deep snow upon the heights of Kermân, only two men escaping to tell the tale. There were also very serious reverses in Turkestan. But Arabia continued to cast forth its swarms of fighting tribes in such vast numbers, and the wild fanaticism of the faith still rolled so rapidly onward, that these and similar disasters soon disappeared in the swelling tide of conquest.

[Sidenote: _Syria_, _Asia Minor_, and _Armenia_. A.H. XXV. A.D. 646.]

Excepting raids of little import, Syria had for some time past enjoyed rest,[442] when suddenly in the second year of this Caliphate, Muâvia was startled by the approach of an army from Asia Minor, which he had not the means to oppose. Othmân ordered troops to pass over from the eastern provinces, and eight thousand volunteers soon joined the Syrian army. Thus reinforced, the Arabs repulsed the Byzantine attack. Following up their success, they overran Asia Minor, and, piercing the heart of Armenia, joined their comrades on the Persian border within sight of the Caspian. Thence they penetrated as far north as Tiflis, and even to the shores of the Black Sea. Thereafter hostilities were renewed for a long period every summer; and eventually, aided by naval expeditions from the ports of Africa, the Syrian generals pushed forward their conquests in the Levant and Asia Minor, enlarged their coasts, and strengthened their border.

[Sidenote: _Africa._ A.H. XXV. A.D. 646.]

In Africa, I have already noticed the desperate attack made early in the reign of Othmân on Alexandria from seaward. The Byzantine forces, for a little while, regained possession of the city, but (as we have before related) were finally driven out by Amru; and against the Moslem power in Egypt no further attack was made. The Imperial arms, however, were still active in Africa; and along the northern shores of the Mediterranean, strong Arab columns were long actively engaged. Among the chiefs who had joined the Egyptian army was Abu Sarh,[443] already noticed as the foster-brother of Othmân. He did not bear an enviable reputation in Islam; for having been employed by Mahomet as amanuensis to record his early revelations, he had proved in some way unfaithful to the trust; and on the capture of Mecca, was in consequence proscribed from the amnesty, and only at the intercession of Othmân escaped being put to death. [Sidenote: Abu Sarh supersedes Amru in Upper Egypt. A.H. XXVI. A.D. 647.] Possessed of administrative ability, he had been appointed by Omar to the government of Upper Egypt. But some years after, he fell out with Amru, in whom was vested the supreme control of the province; and each appealed to Othmân. Amru was declared to be in fault, and the Caliph deposed him altogether from the civil charge of Egypt. Amru objected. ‘To be over the army,’ he said, ‘and not over the revenue, was but holding the cow’s horns, while another milked her.’ He repaired angrily to Othmân, who, after some words of bitter altercation, transferred the entire administration, civil and military, into the hands of Abu Sarh. The act was unfortunate for the Caliph. It threw Amru into the ranks of the disaffected party at Medîna; while the bad repute of ‘the renegade’ Abu Sarh, though he was an able warrior, gave point to the charges of partiality and nepotism now rife against Othmân.[444]

[Sidenote: Conquest in Northern Africa. A.H. XXVI. A.D. 647.]

Abu Sarh, left thus in sole command, carried his arms vigorously along the coast beyond Tripoli and Barca, and threatened Carthage and the far west. The Byzantine Governor, Gregory, reinforced by the Emperor, advanced against him with an army, we are told, of one hundred and twenty thousand men. Othmân, warned of the danger, strengthened Abu Sarh by a large contingent of Arab troops; and with them marched a numerous company of veterans and ‘Companions,’ including the sons of Abu Bekr, of Abbâs, and of Zobeir. The field was long and hotly contested; and Abu Sarh, to stimulate his men, promised the hand of Gregory’s daughter, with a large dower, to the warrior who should slay her father. The enemy was at last discomfited with great slaughter, and a citizen of Medîna gained the lady for his prize. He carried her off on his camel to Medîna; and the martial verses which he sang by the way are still preserved.[445] In this campaign, Othmân incurred much odium by granting Abu Sarh a fifth of the royal share of the booty as personal prize. The rest was sent as usual to Medîna; and here again Othmân is blamed for allowing Merwân his cousin to become the purchaser of the same at an inadequate price.[446]

[Sidenote: Naval operations, forbidden by Omar.]

But it is as the first commander of a Moslem fleet that Abu Sarh is chiefly famous, in which capacity he both added largely to the conquests of Islam, and also by his pre-eminence contributed anew to the obloquy Cast on his master’s name. Muâvia had for a long time keenly missed the support of a fleet, and had sought permission of Omar to embark his soldiery in ships. ‘The isles of the Levant,’ he wrote, ‘are so close to the Syrian shore, that you might almost hear the barking of the dogs and the cackling of the hens: give me leave to attack them.’ But Omar dreaded the sea, and wrote to consult Amru, who answered thus:--‘The sea is a boundless expanse, whereon great ships look but tiny specks; there is nought saving the heavens above and the waters beneath; when the wind lulls, the sailor’s heart is broken; when tempestuous, his senses reel. Trust it little, fear it much. Man at sea is an insect floating on a splinter, now engulfed, now scared to death.’ On receipt of this alarming account, Omar forbade Muâvia to have anything to do with ships. ‘The Syrian sea, they tell me, is longer and broader than the dry land, and is instant with the Lord, night and day, seeking to swallow it up. How should I trust my people on the bosom of the cursed infidel? Remember Alâ. Nay, my friend, the safety of my people is dearer to me than all the treasures of Greece.’

[Sidenote: But undertaken by Othmân.]

Nothing, therefore, was attempted by sea in the reign of Omar. But on his death, Muâvia renewed the petition, and, at his reiterated request, Othmân at last relaxed the ban, on condition that the service should be voluntary. [Sidenote: Cyprus occupied. A.H. XXVIII. A.D. 649.] The first fleet equipped against Cyprus, in the twenty-eighth year of the Hegira, was commanded by Abu Cays as admiral; it was joined by Abu Sarh with a complement of ships manned by Egyptians, and carried a body of Arab warriors from Alexandria. Cyprus was taken easily, and a great multitude of captives carried off. The Cypriots agreed to pay the same revenue as they had done to the Emperor; but, unable as yet to guarantee their protection, the Caliph remitted the ordinary poll-tax. Of Abu Cays we are told that he headed fifty expeditions by land and by sea, but was killed at the last, while engaged in exploring a Grecian sea-port.[447]

[Sidenote: Naval victory off Alexandria. A.H. XXXI. A.D. 652.]

Three years after the fall of Cyprus, driven now from the harbours of Africa, and seriously threatened in the Levant, the Byzantines gathered a fleet of five or six hundred vessels of war, and defied the Arabs at sea. Abu Sarh was appointed to take up the challenge. He manned every available ship in the ports of Egypt and Africa; and his squadron, though much inferior in weight and equipment to the enemy’s, was crowded with valiant warriors from the army. The Byzantine fleet came in sight near Alexandria. The wind lulled, and both sides lay for a while at anchor. The night was passed by the Moslems in recitation of the Corân and prayer, while the Greeks kept up the clangour of their bells. In the morning, a fierce engagement took place. The Arab ships grappled with their adversaries, and a hand-to-hand encounter with sword and dagger ensued. The slaughter was great on both sides; but the Greeks, unable to withstand the wild onset of the Saracens, broke and dispersed. Constantine, who had been in command, sailed away to Syracuse, where the people, infuriated at the defeat, despatched him in his bath.[448]

[Sidenote: Obloquy cast on Othmân in this affair.]

In this expedition, the discontent against Othmân, notwithstanding the splendid victory, for the first time found open and dangerous expression among some of the leading Companions. Mohammed son of Abu Bekr, and Mohammed son of Abu Hodzeifa (afterwards leaders in rebellion), murmured against the Caliph for appointing Abu Sarh admiral. ‘Othmân hath changed the ordinances of his predecessors,’ they said, ‘and made captain of the fleet a man whom the Prophet proscribed, and desired to have put to death; and such like men also hath he put in chief command at Kûfa and Bussorah, and elsewhere.’ The clamour reaching the ears of Abu Sarh, he declared that none of these men should fight in his line of battle. Excluded thus from the victory, they were the more incensed. Spite of the threats of Abu Sarh, the inflammatory language spread, and men began to speak openly and unadvisedly against Othmân.[449]

[Sidenote: Caliph’s outlook darkens.]

The clouds were louring, and the horizon of the unfortunate Caliph darkening all around.