Page:The Nestorians and their rituals, volume 1.djvu/182

128 I am of opinion, however, that the modern Yezeedees have borrowed little from Christianity beyond what was incorporated into their system by their more learned and zealous forefathers, when the Gospel was first proclaimed in these parts. Their professed reverence for our blessed seems to arise more from the difficulty of withholding from Him the honour which is universally ascribed to His character and dignity, than from any knowledge which they possess of His person or mission. In this respect, indeed, they are profoundly ignorant, and their confession of Isa, the Son of Mary, is much more undefined and imperfect than that of the Mohammedans. It is true that they affect more attachment to Christians than to Mussulmans; but this may be fully accounted for on other ground than that of any sincere respect for Christianity. For ages the Christians have been co-sufferers with them, they have lived under the same yoke of bondage and oppression, and this community of endurance has doubtless tended to engender something akin to sympathy between the two parties.

Beyond this vague acknowledgment of the of mankind, and an equally uncertain homage which they profess to render to the prophets and apostles, as well as to the Old and New Testament Scriptures, the Yezeedees practise no rites distinctively Christian. Their ceremonial washings at Sheikh Adi, which have been thought by some to be borrowed from the Sacrament of Holy Baptism, have a much closer resemblance to an almost universal practice among the heathen, who deem it an act of devotion to bathe in the pools near which their temples are erected. And not only are these ablutions repeated at every new visit to the shrine of Sheikh Adi, but many other streams and ponds are held sacred by the Yezeedees, and are frequented by them on particular occasions for the same purpose.

Mr. Layard is mistaken when he states that the "Yezeedee year begins with that of the eastern Christians." It began this year (1850) on the 17th of April, and the inscriptions on