Page:Early Christianity in Arabia.djvu/189

Rh power of his idolatrous opponents, Muhammed began to make advances towards the subversion of Christianity. The chief of the Taiites was a Christian named Adi; his subjects, we are told, were idolaters, and he was obliged to seek refuge in Syria from the arms of the prophet; but his wife and family fell into the hands of the victor, and he was compelled to redeem them by his apostacy. The Christian inhabitants of Dûmato'l-Gjaudal, a town on the frontiers of Syria, five days from Damascus, and fifteen or sixteen from Medina, were induced by the persuasions of Abdo'l-Rahman to accept the faith of Islam, and the daughter of their prince, who was a Calbite and named Ashas, was betrothed to their converter. But their conversion was perhaps insincere, for after the battle of Muta Muhammed was obliged to confirm them by force in their new religion; and at the same time the church of the tribe of Ganam, whose crime, according to the Arabian writers, was that of hypocrisy, was levelled with the ground. But the conquests of Muhammed only extended as yet over the northern districts of Arabia, while the whole of Yaman was subject to Badhân, the Persian viceroy.