There can be no doubt as to which of these two religions must be regarded as the original mother of this tradition. The Hauranite Christians, who, from their costume, manners, language, and traditions, undoubtedly inherited the country from the pre-Muhammedan age, venerate the Makâm perhaps even more than the Muhammedans; which would be altogether impossible in connection with the hostile position of the two religious sects towards one another, and in connection with the zealous scorn with which the Syrian Christians regard the religion of Islam, if the Hauranitish tradition of Job and the Makâm were of later, Muhammedan origin. It is also possible that, on a closer examination of the Makâm and the buildings about the Sachra, one might find, besides crosses, Greek inscriptions (since they are nowhere wanting in the Nukra), which could only have their origin in the time before the occupation of Islam (635 a.d.); for after this the Hauranite Christians, who only prolong their existence by wandering from chirbe to chirbe, have not even built a single dwelling-house, much less a building for religious worship, which was forbidden under pain of death in the treaty of Omar. But in connection with the pre-Islam Monastery of Job, which owed its origin only to the sacred tradition that held its ground in that place, are monumental witnesses that this tradition is pre-Islamic, and has been transferred from the Christians to the Mussulmans, required? We may go even further, and assert that Muhammed, in the Sur. xxxviii. 41ff. of the Korân, had the Hauranitish tradition of Job and the localities near Sa'dîje definitely before his mind.
We must regard the merchandise caravans which the inhabitants of Tehâma sent continuously into the “north country,” esh-shâm,[1] and the return freight of which consisted chiefly of Hauranitish corn, as proof of a regular
- ↑ In Jemen the Higâz, Syria may have been called Shâm in the earliest times. The name was taken into Syria itself by the immigration of the Jemanic tribes of Kudâ'a, and others, because they brought with them the name of Syria that was commonly used in their native land.
