efore Christ, so
Mahomet claims the Caaba for the pure worship of Allah in primeval
times. It is sacred henceforth to him alone. The rule was set up that
no idolater should be admitted to the pilgrimage, and it thus lost
its character as a heathen, and became instead a Moslem, institution.

[Footnote 4: See for this Wellhausen's _Reste arabischen
Heidenthums_, pp. 64-98.]

Spread of Islam.--Mecca once converted, the rest of Arabia could not
long remain outside. There was reluctance in various places to make
the change which Mahomet now required of all his countrymen. But the
penalty of refusing it was the prophet's wrath, with its terrible
attendants, war and rapine, and none of the Arabs cared enough for
their old gods to brave such terrors for their sake. The inhabitants
of Taif endeavoured to make terms, so that the change might be less
abrupt. Their ambassadors urged that fornication, usury, and the use
of wine might be allowed them, but this could not be granted; the
Taifites must accept the deprivations to which all the Moslems had
agreed. Then they asked that their Rabba, their goddess, might be
spared to them for three years, and as this was refused, for two
years, a year, a month. But the only concession they could obtain was
that they should not be obliged to destroy their goddess with their
own hands. The ancient paganism, it will be seen, fell easily and
without any tragedy.

Mahomet did not long survive the national acceptance of his religion;
he died on 8th June 632. But he did not die without having opened up
to his followers very wide views for the future of his cause, and
started them on a career of religious war and conquest which was not
soon to be arrested. From a comparatively early period of his career
he had considered that Islam was destined to prevail not only in
Arabia but in other lands. Starting with the idea that his revelation
was only a later stage of that which had taken place in Judaism and
Christianity, he had advanced to the position that these were false
religions, and his own the only true one. Wherever he looked in the
world he could see no true religion but his own; it must therefore
take the place of all others. Accordingly he sent embassies from
Medina to Heraclius the emperor of the East, to the king of Persia,
to the governor of Egypt, and to other potentates, announcing himself
to be the "Prophet of God," and calling upon them to give up their
idolatrous worships and retur