Page:William Muir, Thomas Hunter Weir - The Caliphate; Its Rise, Decline, and Fall (1915).djvu/404

 717–20] he bribed the guard, and effected his escape to Al-Baṣra, where he raised a dangerous rebellion, as we shall in the sequel see.

The policy pursued in Khorāsān and Central Asia after the recall of Yezīd is another evidence that the Caliph was more intent on the spread of the Faith than on temporal aggrandisement. There were loud cries of harshness and exaction from the professed converts of Khorāsān. ʿOmar sent for a deputation of these to represent their grievances, and finding their complaint well-founded, deposed Al-Jarrāḥ the viceroy, and insisted that all who said the creed, and joined in the religious services, should be exempt from burdens, and placed on the same footing as themselves. To consolidate his rule, he stayed the sword against outlying countries, and called in the garrisons and columns that had been settled in those heathen parts. Throughout all the provinces retained, the people, finding now the comfort and advantages of conversion, began to flock in multitudes to the Faith. At first they were tested by their willingness to be circumcised; but ʿOmar hearing of it, forbade a test nowhere enjoined in the Ḳorʾān; "for Moḥammad," said he, "was sent to call men to the faith, not to circumcise them." To the warning of an Egyptian official that the number of conversions was seriously affecting the revenue, he replied that "God sent His Prophet as a missionary, not a tax-gatherer." At the same time burdens on unbelievers were imposed, as elsewhere, to the utmost, but justice towards them must also be observed. No churches, synagogues, or fire-temples were to be destroyed: but the erection of new ones was forbidden. The policy of ʿOmar was thus to fill Khorāsān and the adjoining districts with a population of contented believers; to consolidate the Faith and cast the sword aside. And in this policy so far as his short and transient reign allowed, he was successful.

In spite of his reply to the Egyptian official, ʿOmar had to take steps to put a stop to the falling off in the land-tax due to the migration of the peasantry into the towns. His measures were wiser and less violent than those of Al-Ḥajjāj. After consulting the lawyers of Medīna, he apparently forbade the sale of taxable land by non-Muslims to Muslims (who paid no tax) after the year 100 This measure held good