tions to work out a solution. Knowledge is handed to them on a platter. It is their duty to partake of the wisdom thus proffered and to digest it.

These Matn before referred to are a syllabus of a commentary upon a commentary worked into their present shape not later than the thirteenth or fourteenth century of the Christian era and representing the wisdom of a still earlier epoch. During the first four years of study all undergraduates must confine their operations to working at these Matn. At the expiration of this period they are authorised to consult 'explanatory works.' These latter authorities are all, however, based upon the glorification of the past. The net result is that the harder a man applies himself and the more faithfully he respects the rules of the University the more inextricably does he bury himself in the past.

It must not be inferred that Al Azhar professors are ignorant men: they are not; they are encyclopædic in their knowledge of what pertains to their work. They live in the Middle Ages. Their knowledge is archaic, antiquated, antediluvian, and, from the utilitarian standpoint of the modern world, of very little practical value; but it is thorough. Besides, they are devoted to their work they are indefatigable; and it is their example as much as their precept which inspires their students to labour with a persistency and a perseverance worthy of admiration.

V

The construction of the Mosque of Al Azhar goes back practically to the foundation of medieval Cairo. Though completed A.D. 970, it has been restored so frequently that nothing may be said to date from this early period except the central part of the building with its cupolas. Everything else is of a later period.

The sanctuary now forms the principal hall of instruction. In this section there are 140 marble columns: it covers 4000 square yards. In the centre of the building is a large open court. On three sides are riwaks, or porticoes, each of which is reserved for the use of the natives of a particular foreign country or province of Egypt. On the fourth side, that towards Mecca, is the main place of prayer.

The teaching staff consists of 280 professors. The latest published figures fix the number of students at 5611. Their ages vary from ten to forty; they come from all over the Muhammadan world. Before the war there was hardly a single Islamic State that did not have a representative at Al Azhar. The war and the subsequent unrest have tended to cut down this foreign

element. The Egyptian students are largely drawn from the peasant class. The best blood of Egypt has not in recent years sent its sons to collegiate mosques. What is more ominous is that Al Azhar professors rarely allow their sons to follow in their footsteps.

The enrolment just given does not include the hundreds of boys who attend the kuttab, or elementary school, attached to the Madrassa. These children run about here, there, and everywhere. So do pedlars, who offer for sale all kinds of mysterious non-alcoholic beverages. And tourists come here too, generally led by ignorant and loquacious dragomen. No desks are seen anywhere. An occasional chair is reserved for such masters as may care to make use of it. The students sit on grass mats in a circle around their professors, many of whom also prefer this recumbent posture. Some fifty or sixty classes go on at one time in the same immense assembly hall. Each group pays attention to its own lecturer, who usually speaks in a low but carefully modulated voice.

VI

It was not until 1895 that the rulers of modern Egypt took a hand in elaborating plans for the internal management of Al Azhar. In that year a Khedivial decree appointed a Commission of five ulema, who were charged with the duty of preparing such rules as would foster the prosperity and the improvement of the collegiate mosque. The report took the form of law in July 1896. The regulations read quite well in print. But Al Azhar is too old an institution for governmental red tape to mean a great deal, unless public opinion is at the back to give it driving power and meaning. These bye-laws were amended and further elaborated in 1911. They, however, have neither affected, nor sought to affect, the general features of the old mediæval curriculum. They have left Al Azhar substantially as it was in the days of Saladin the Great, when Richard Cœur de Lion ruled England. The veneer of modernism has, in a word, been confined to attempting to apply certain bureaucratic principles to the administration of the University as opposed to the direction of its pedagogic work.

A further modification submitted to the jurisdiction of Al Azhar the School of Kadis, or training college for Sharia judges. This work constitutes a separate department. It in no sense. interferes with the general course of studies followed by those undergraduates not matriculated in this particular section.

When all is said and done, the one and only sign of a vitalising influence enveloping Al Azhar comes from without, and not from within. Around the collegiate mosque, and in the centres where its students congregate, Government schools have been opened.

where French and history and geography and like subjects are taught.

Considering the large enrolment of Al Azhar, the numbers who attend these classes are relatively small. The very fact, however, that these students, who have such an engrossing task and practically no leisure, still find time to work at modern subjects means a great deal. It clearly demonstrates that with the slightest encouragement their minds could be directed into productive channels and provide a new and elevating leadership for Islam. As things stand now the plight of the average Al Azhar alim is a sorry one. A few decades ago Egypt was an Islamic State, not only in the sense that the overwhelming majority of its inhabitants followed the religion of the Prophet, but also because the whole form of its body politic was Muhammadan. To-day all this has changed: the government is conducted along Occidental lines. Outside of the Makhama Sharia and allied courts the judicial organisation of the country is fashioned according to Western standards. The modern avocat has practically replaced the Muslim jurisconsult. At all events, the earning capacity of the latter has been reduced within negligible limits.

It has already been explained that Islam has no priests or ministers of the Gospel, as the Christian world understands the word. The result both of this evolution and of this fundamental principle of Muhammadanism is that with each succeeding year the lot of an alim is becoming more and more precarious. Therein lies a great source of danger to the peace and quiet of Islam if nothing is done to arrest the present drift. These men who have devoted long years of study to acquire a knowledge which gives them great prestige among their fellows are not going to sit idly by and see themselves brushed aside. Something must be done.

The world owes a debt of gratitude to the religion of the Prophet. To-day it is carrying on in the wilderness the most successful of battles against the forces of paganism. No other creed makes so many converts. It is impossible to gauge the amount of good which would accrue to mankind in general, and to Africa and Asia in particular, were Egypt to utilise in a practical and creative manner the doctrinal erudition and well-trained minds of the sheiks of Al Azhar. Not only do they thoroughly understand their religion, but they have mastered in a way unknown to Europeanised Egyptians the intricacies and beauties of Arabic. This means that they hold in their hands the key to the soul of the East. It would be relatively easy for them to extend their field of endeavour. They could, without interfering with the substantial part of their programme, find time to bring themselves into touch with present-day knowledge.

Under conditions now obtaining, many of the best potential

benefactors of the East are changed into elements which arrest the march of progress. The work which is now going on in the neighbourhood of Al Azhar shows that these minds are hungering for knowledge of a substantial and utilitarian character. The great risk is that these men may in time desert the old collegiate mosques or remain there to nurse a grievance. They may learn to compare the practical value of one form of teaching with that of the other and be led to abandon their old love or to imbibe from its fountain the poison of hatred. Herein lies the danger. The modern world has not invaded the citadel of Al Azhar, but it is menacing its sentries and is taking the bread out of the mouth of its sons. There need be no warfare between the twentieth century and the Middle Ages. There is plenty of room in Al Azhar for it to absorb much that is good and serviceable in the culture of to-day. It is big enough to do so. When it does, Islam will take on new vitality and the world will be happier and better. In a word, the great problem of the East centres on education. This means that an ounce of productive energy applied to Al Azhar will be worth many pounds of similar force distributed elsewhere.

PIERRE ARMINJON.

PIERRE CRABITÈS.

CHRISTIAN MISSIONS IN NIGERIA

THERE are in Nigeria many different sorts of Christian missionaries: the Church Mission Society and the Cambridge University Mission, which are of the Church of England; the Sudan United Mission and the Sudan Interior Mission, which are Nonconformist; the Mennonite Brethren and the Plymouth Brethren and the Seventh Day Adventists, which are what they are; various other 'bodies,' all of the Dissenter type, and the Roman Catholics.

The Anglican missionaries are recruited from the British Isles; the Nonconformist missionaries draw from a wider area, and include in their numbers Americans, Danes, Canadians, South African Dutch, and others: the Roman Catholics, commonly known as the fathers,' are mostly French and Italian, with a number of Irishmen.

Generally speaking the personnel of the British Administration in Nigeria are not sympathetic towards the missions. There are exceptions, of course here and there you will find an individual official who is friendly and helpful to the missions.

The Government policy was to arrange for each denomination to have its own bit of territory to work in its own way, other denominations being excluded therefrom. Whether this was a sound policy or not does not matter at all, because it was an unworkable policy.

Certainly there are many disadvantages attaching to a state of affairs in which there are two or three or more different sets of missionaries competing for converts in the one area. In one district of which I was in charge, by no means large, there were seven different sorts of Protestant missionaries busily at work. The result was anything but happy, and edification was entirely to seek. Still, that is the position as it exists, and it has to be faced.

It is the fashion, it is indeed a fetich, throughout the official community to laud 'the fathers.' You seldom hear them spoken of otherwise than in the most friendly way, whereas the references to the Protestant missionaries are not infrequently of a critical character. It is true that I never observed that people who spoke in the highest terms of the Catholic missions and in quite