gonism. There was now a class of Jewish hypocrites, just as there was one amongst the Arabs. Ibn Ishak enumerates a long list of 'Jewish Rabbis who sought shelter in Islam and accepted it only in appearance, whilst they were hypocrites at heart.' They were sharp enough to perceive Mohammed's failings and the groundlessness of his pretensions. They sought to undermine his religion in secret, whilst they accommodated themselves to it in public. Ibn Ishak says: 'These hypocrites attended the mosque and listened to the conversations of the Moslems, but afterwards they mocked at them and ridiculed their faith;' and again: 'Some of them said to one another, "Come, let us believe Mohammed's revelations in the morning and deny them in the evening, in order to confuse them in their religion: perhaps they will then do as we do, and renounce their religion altogether."' But less forbearance was shown to these Jewish than to the Arab hypocrites. We read: 'On one occasion several of them came to the mosque, spoke to each other in an undertone, and kept close together. When Mohammed saw this, he ordered that they should be ejected from the mosque by force.' This order was promptly executed, and we are graphically informed how one was seized by the leg, another by the collar, a third by the beard; how they were struck in the face, knocked down, violently thrust out and angrily told 'not to come near again to the mosque of God's Apostle.' Thus was raillery treated in Medina, which had often been borne with such apparent meekness and gentleness in Mecca.

The entire body of the Jews was now accused of unbelief, jealousy, and dishonesty, for disbelieving in Mohammed and for refusing to regard him as that Great Prophet with whose expected advent they had formerly threatened their Arab enemies. Revelations were issued against them, holding out condign punishment for their enmity, envy, and unbelief, many of them being embodied in the second Surah of the Koran. The Moslems were enjoined to sever the close ties of friendship which had hitherto united many of them with the Jews, through their being neighbours or allies. They were asked: 'Will you love them, though they, on account of your believing the entire Scripture, do not love you?' Nay, Mohammed, only seventeen months after his arrival in

Medina, took the decided step of changing his Kibla from Jerusalem to the temple of Mecca, and thus purposely widened the breach between him and the Jews.

As soon as this was done, a number of the latter went to Mohammed, saying: 'What has caused thee to give up thy former Kibla, though thou still professest to be in the faith of Abraham? Return to thy former Kibla, and we will follow thee.' But the narrator adds that, by this, they only intended to lead him away from his faith. Mohammed proved himself equal to the occasion, by giving forth this revelation 'The fools say, "What has turned him from his former Kibla?" Answer, "To God belong the east and the west; He leads in the right way whomsoever He will. So we have made you (sc. the Arabs) the centre of the nations, that you should bear witness to men, and the ambassador should bear witness to you. We appointed the former Kibla only for the purpose of seeing who should follow the ambassador and who turn away from him. As for Abraham, he was neither a Jew nor a Christian, nor an idolater, but one turning from what is evil and resigning himself to God. Nearest to Abraham are those who follow him and this prophet and those who believe."'

The Jews remained unconvinced. They declined to follow him in the direction of the idol shrine of Mecca, saying: 'We remain in that in which we have found our fathers, who were better and more learned than we are.' They were not disposed to recognise the Arab nation as the religious centre of the world, but held fast to their settled belief, which they had already expressed to the renegade Abd Allah, by telling him: 'Prophetship does not belong to the Arabs thy master is a mere secular chief.'

This being their conviction, the Jews sought to expose Mohammed's disqualification as a prophet, by perplexing him with knotty questions, and demanding of him supernatural signs, just as the Koreishites had previously puzzled him in Mecca. He was to give them information about 'Alexander the two horned,' to tell them what punishment God intended for adulterers, or to let them hear God speak with him, as He spoke with Moses, and the like. Ibn Hisham narrates one of their interviews and its consequences in the following words: 'A number of Jews came to Mohammed and said,