Page 172 - Neglected Arabia Vol 2

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NEQLECTED ARABIA
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Missionary News and Letters
Published Quarterly
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§ FOR PRIVATE CIRCULATION AMONG THE FRIENDS OF
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THE ARABIAN MISSION
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Two Hours of Contrasts ■ \
9 Rev. B. D. Ha k ken %
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T HIS morning 1 spent uhout two hours in the btuuur, two most in­ •K
9 teresting and ut the same time contrasting hours. I first went to
9 the shop of a friend, a young man who had attended the Mission
school here in the past. During the conversation I asked him what
j lie had heard about affairs oiy the mainland where Ibn Saoud, Sultan of ;
f Xejd, is said to be forcing all the Shia Moslems to pray with the Sunni
Moslems. Just at this point, the boy’s father came along and took up the
conversation. He said that the report was true and that it was a very bad
thing to use compulsion in religion, that each man should be free to choose
his own religion and that it was not the affair of any one except the man i
himself. This and a great deal more bearing on the same subject. I told
him that I was very glad to hear this and that I hoped that all the people
in Bahrain would in the near future come to this same opinion for then •.
a man could become a Christian and would not be persecuted so terribly V : I
because of his faith. But this statement was too much for him, as I ex­
acted it would be, since he is known to be quite fanatical in his attitude ;
toward Christianity. He said that the case of a man becoming a Christian r
i was quite a different thing and that in that case the man should l>e abso­ i
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lutely shunned and not given a chance to have anything to do with his ■ • &
: fellows in any way. Then he went into a great long tirade against that
j type of man and likened him to a thief who should be punished according ; :
9 io his crime and there was no greater crime than this, that a man should - ~ Td
1 desert Islam and become a Christian. ^ ? *
1 While he was talking in this manner, quite a crowd* collected in front
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juf the shop and a man in this crowd, who afterwards turned out to be a W •
Imutowah or religious leader, turned to me and said. “Why do you people
1 preach to us here and ask us to believe in Christ? We believe in him
I and we l>clicyc in nil the prophets." I wua given no chance to reply ami
*ihe man continued on for the space of at least fifteen minutes during which
I time he quoted practically the whole of a fairly long chapter from the r •
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