spirits hearken behind a curtain¹ to GOD's decrees and counsels, &c. What Muhammad relates of Harut and Marut two angels ² that sinned, is precisely what the Midrash Jalkut ³ relates of the angels Shamhazai and 'Azael: and his assertion that, at the Deluge, "the oven boiled ⁴ up" is evidently an echo of the Rabbinical saying that "the ⁵ generation that lived in the time of the Flood were punished with hot water."

It was not merely such traditions as these that Muhammad borrowed from the Jewish tribes of

Judaic Influence.

Arabia. He learnt from them to believe in the mission of the Prophets of the Old Covenant, regarding whom he often speaks⁶ in the Qur'an. It is beyond dispute, moreover, that his belief in the One True GOD, though not directly due to his intercourse with the Jews, was nevertheless

much strengthened thereby; and we may believe that Muhammad's iconoclasm owed something to the same influence. But the impress which Talmudic ¹ Judaism as it then existed in Arabia has left on the religious system of Islam is deeper still. The Jews at that time dwelling in the country seem to have attached much more practical importance, as they did in our Lord's day, to their own traditions than to the teachings of Holy Scripture. Their religion was to a great extent a religion of outward observances, of fasting and pilgrimage, of ceremonial rites. Muhammad was very naturally led to deem these things of very great importance. The Pharisaism of the Jews thus became the parent of that which is now manifested in Islam. Hence too sprang the idea, so deeply rooted among Muslims, that obedience to the letter of what they hold to be GOD's law will atone for sin, and that Heaven must be won by good works, such as fighting in order to spread Islam with the sword, performing the pilgrimage to Mecca, and reciting the Qur'an.