'A handbook of Syria (including Palestine). London: Naval Staff Intelligence Department, June 1919' [‎114r] (232/738)

RELIGION
221
tobacco, which the others enjoy. Of the ‘ intelligent ’ there are
two degrees; those who after two years’ probation are initiated,
but continue their ordinary occupations; and those who devote
themselves to sacred duties. The different degrees of initiation
are accompanied by ceremonies; that whereby a man is intro
duced into the order of ‘uqqal has as part of it the eating of figs.
They have a cosmogony of their own, wherein they make the
duration of the world 343 million years, divided into seventy
cycles, each of which has had seven ‘ speakers’, seven ‘ trustees
and seven £ sovereigns ’. The number seven has thus religious
importance, as has also the number five ; their religious
literature consists of the 111 treatises of Hamzah, the chief
missionary of their system. Some specimens of these have
been published ; the}' - are polemical in character, but contain
some historical matter, dealing with Hakim and his times.
The sect is identified in some of these with the Qarmatians,
who play a considerable part in the history of Islam in the
ninth and tenth centuries.
They adhere strongly to the idea of tribal revenge, and with
the inflexible resolve to take the life of an enemy for that of
a friend there coexists the equally binding duty to protect
a brother Druse who may have shed blood. In determined
courage, stubborn endurance and power of united action they
are superior to the Bedouin, who, however, excel them in
simple daring and personal intrepidity.
Before entertaining a visitor of whose religion they have no
previous knowledge, they will place two pots before him, one
empty, the other full of water. If the stranger pours the
water from the full vessel into the empty one, this is taken as
a sign that he is a believer in transmigration. To discover
whether a stranger is a true or false Druse, they ask: ‘ Are
there farmers in your part of the country who plant the seed
of the myrobalan ’ ? The true Druse replies : ‘ They plant it
in the hearts of the believers ’.
This sort of freemasonry is necessary, as like the Ansariyeh,
they maintain the propriety of taqiyah, i. e. concealing their
sect if confession is accompanied with risk.