Rensselaer Union, Volume 8, Number 48, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 August 1876 — Mohammedan Women. [ARTICLE]

Mohammedan Women.

In any serious question of reform among Mohammedans, the position of women must occupy a prominent place. We are not now speaking of polygamy, but of the seclusion of women, tire abnegation of their influence, and, as a corollary of this, the rearing of the entire populatio nin frivolity, ignorance and vice. The Koran bids men “respect women, of whom they are born;” but a few isolated precepts like this are powerless against Us general tenor. The Turkish women shuffle unnoticed through the streets in their yellow slippers, or sit for hours in the meadows of the “sweet waters,” their gleaming like a parti-col-ored bed of tulips. If their owner is a man of mark they are taken for an airing in a gilded coach, or they are huddled like sheep by their black wardens into a separate pen on the little steamers, which pant busily across the Golden Horn. The life of a Turkish woman is vapid and meaningless; she is as ignorant as a child —yet even the Grand Vizierat is often at the disposal of harem intrigue. And if we would discover the canker which lies at the root of Turkish society, we must seek it in the practice which condemns the children of both sexes to the vicious atmosphere of the harem during the most plastic years of life. The origin of this treatment of women we shall find not in the dictates of Oriental jealousy , but in the teaching of the Koran. The divine book by no means ignores the existence of woman. It lays down most careful and minute rules for her walk in life. But it treats her rather as an adjunct to man than as an independent, responsible being. Obedience is the cornerstone —obedience to him who rules over her. Home is her proper place, but if she goes abroad she must veil her face and breast; nay, some say, even her hands. “Speak unto thy wives and thy daughters ana the wives of the true believers,” says the Koran, “that they cast their outer garments over them when they walk abroad—believing women must not discover their ornaments; . . . and let them throw their veils over their bosoms.” It is in such light matters as these that we see the difficulty of a change in the current of Eastern thought. It is not merely the inveterate habit of centuries, though this is stronger than law, but also a matter of religion. The Spanish lady may exchange her mantilla for a Paris bonnet, with a sigh perhaps at the despotism of fashion; but if her Turkish-sister lays aside her yaJimak she infringes solemn ordinances of her religion and degrades herself in thesight of all. If, however, as we have seen, the Koran awards a very modest place in the scheme of society to woman, it does not, as many have supposed, absolve her from responsibilities here or exclude her from participation in the life to come. This would be manifest, even though no other duty had been enjoined than performing the pilgrimage to Mecca, which Is of such paramount importance that it is declared that a man might as well die a Jew or a Christian as neglect it. It has been erroneously supposed that the Koran allows women no souls. But it expresslj- states that the devout Mussulman, in addition to his seventy-two celestial brides, shall be allowed the company of any of his wives in Paradise of whom he. may not have grown tired on earth. The Prophet, too, finding that his interrogator on one occasion was not satisfied with the declaration that there would be no old women in heaven, hastened to add that he only meant by this that all would be restored to youth. Though, to be sure, when he was permitted to take a bird’seye view of heaven and hell, he saw that most of the inhabitants of the latter place were women. The absence of women from mosques has probably led hasty observers to the above conclusion. But this is only due to the desire that they should not distract the attention of the male worshipers.—Prater's Magazine.

Two people got married yesterday, and they acted sensibly indeed. AU day long they were fixing up their house. The woman vowed she wouldn’t marry till she “seed everything fixed.” Hand in band they were as busy as bees walking these streets and buying provisions and furniture for the house. And at last, whan all was done, the woman walked down and peeped in and stud, “Now, John, I’ll marry you,” and they went and were married, and marched straight down into a snug little home. There wasn't a Saratoga trank or a single unpaid tailor’s biU in the whole ceremony.-* Raleigh {N. C.) Standard.