so approximating to Judaism, as continually to keep alive the image of its spurious relation to the true religion, in both its branches.

In the teaching of our Lord, and his apostles and evangelists, the resurrection of the dead is uniformly represented as being followed by the general judgment. The Mahometan doctrine of a judgment to come, so far concurs with the Christian; from which it widely differs in the presumptuous and revolting minuteness with which Mahomet and his followers pretend to scrutinize and expose the secrets of the invisible world. Here, however, as in so many other examples, where Mahometanism seems most to swerve from the reverent simplicity of Gospel truth, its aberrations serve only to render a separate branch of the analogy with revealed religion more complete, by betraying further affinities with the errors of Rabbinical Judaism. Thus, the Mahometan notions of the near approach of the sun at the last day, by whose extraordinary heat the wicked shall be then tormented; of the books to be produced, wherein men's actions are registered; of the balance, wherein they shall be weighed; and of the bridge Al-Sirật, over which all must pass, from the judgment to their respective destinations, — with several

more particulars, are notoriously borrowed from the reveries of the old Jewish writers. *

The fearful sights and sounds, on the other hand, which the Mahometans believe are to precede the general resurrection to judgment, very remarkably correspond with the signs predicted in the New Testament; whence, as the following statement of their belief on this subject, given by the learned English translator of the Koran may suffice to show, they must have been derived. At the first sound of the last trumpet, they say," the earth will be shaken, and not only all buildings, but the very mountains levelled; the heavens shall melt, the sun be darkened, the stars fall; and the sea shall be troubled and dried up, or turned into flames, the sun, moon, and stars being thrown into it." The reader conversant with Scripture will easily refer the particulars of this representation to their proper sources in the New Testament;the main resort of Mahometan plagiarism, on the subject of the future judgment.

The commanding claims of the Christian religion, and the vain pretensions of the Mahometan superstition, stand no where more conclusively opposed to one another, than in the doctrines of the two creeds respecting the reSee Sale, Prelim. Discourse, pp. 110-120.

wards and punishments of a future state: in their descriptions of hell and paradise; the joys of the blessed in the one, and the torments of the condemned in the other. Nor does the sublime spirituality, and dignified reserve of the Gospel, when treating on these awful and mysterious subjects, more convincingly bespeak the divine origin of Christianity, than the gross sensuality, and disgusting specifications, of the Koran and its commentators, betray Mahometanism in its proper character, as a false and spurious revelation.

Even here, however, a certain analogy will be found to obtain, between the true revelation and the false; and in a way perfectly accordant with their respective characters. For it appears, on examination, that the paradise and hell of Mahomet are, in fact, mainly compounded, either, 1. from materials furnished by Rabbinical Judaism, or, 2. from perverted applications, in the literal sense, of the figurative language of Scrip

ture.

1. The learned translator of the Koran has traced Mahomet, in his representations of hell and its torments, to Jewish sources, for several of the most prominent and peculiar features of his doctrine: the notions of the seven stories, or apartments, into which, according to the Maho

metan belief, hell is divided; of the guard of angels, over each of these apartments; of the partition-wall, which separates hell from paradise; of the diversity of punishments to be endured by the wicked; of their skins, or faces, being burnt black by the alternations of intolerable heat and cold; and of the limited term appointed to the sufferings of the Mussulmans, or true believers, who shall then be admitted into paradise; these, with other particulars of his doctrine of hell torments, existed long before the time of Mahomet, in the Rabbinical writings; and plainly appear to have been borrowed from the received doctrine of the Jews. *

1;

Paradise, the Mahometans describe as a garden, situate above, or in, the seventh heaven the chief beauty of this abode of the blessed, according to the Koran, consisting in the delightful rivers by which it is traversed. Some of these rivers, the commentators say, flow with water, some with milk, some with wine, and others with honey. For the first entertainment of the blessed, on their admission, the commentators provide the ox Balâm and the fish Nûn. The entrance to the hundred different gardens into which paradise is subdivided, they represent as made through eight several gates. Within, the Koran

* See Prelim. Discourse, pp. 121–126. and compare Mill, De Mohammed. ante Mohamm. pp. 412-416.

teaches, there will be, not only different abodes, but abodes of different degrees of happiness; the felicity of each person being proportioned to his deserts; the portion of those, who shall, morning and evening, behold the face of God, constituting, according to the tradition of Mahomet, the highest degree.

In all these particulars, as Mr. Sale has satisfactorily argued, the paradise of Mahomet is a literal transcript from that fabled by the Jews: "Whence Mohammed took the greatest part of his paradise, it is easy to show. The Jews constantly described the future mansion of the just as a delicious garden, and make it also reach to the seventh heaven. They also say it has three gates, or, as others will have it, two; and four rivers, flowing with milk, wine, balsam, and honey. Their Behemoth and Leviathan, which they pretend will be slain for the entertainment of the blessed, are so apparently the Balâm and Nûn of Mohammed, that his followers themselves confess he is obliged to them for both. The Rabbins, likewise, mention seven degrees of felicity, and say, that the highest will be of those who perpetually contemplate the face of God."* In one particular alone, the leading feature

* Prelim. Discourse, p. 133, 134. See also Mill, ut supra, pp. 416

419.