George Sale, The Koran, commonly called the Alcoran of Mohammed, translated into English immediately from the original Arabic; with Explanatory Notes, taken from the most approved Commentators. To which is prefixed A Preliminary Discource (1734)
used to eat both: of their eating of the latter some instances will be given hereafter; and as to the former, it is said they used to pour blood, which they sometimes drew from a live camel, into a gut, and then broiled it in the fire, or boiled it, and eat it 1: this food they called Moswadd, from Aswad, which signifies black; the same nearly resembling our black-puddings in name as well as composition 2. The eating of meat offered to idols I take to be commonly practised by all idolaters, being looked on as a sort of communion in their worship, and for that reason esteemed by Christians, if not absolutely unlawful, yet as what may be the occasion of great scandal 3: but the Arabs were particularly superstitious in this matter, killing what they eat on stones erected on purpose round the Caaba, or near their own houses, and calling, at the same time, on the name of some idol 4. Swine’s-flesh, indeed, the old Arabs seem not to have eaten; and their prophet, in prohibiting the same, appears to have only confirmed the common aversion of the nation. Foreign writers tell us that the Arabs wholly abstained from swine’s-flesh 5, thinking it unlawful to feed thereon 6, and that very few, if any, of those animals are found in their country, because it produces not proper food for them 7; which has made one writer imagine that if a hog were carried thither, it would immediately die 8.
Of usury.
In the prohibition of usury 9 I presume Mohammed also followed the Jews, who are strictly forbidden by their law to exercise it among one another, though they are so infamously guilty of it in their dealing with those of a different religion: but I do not find the prophet of the Arabs has made any distinction in this matter.
Superstitious customs relating to cattle abolished.
Several superstitious customs relating to cattle, which seem to have been peculiar to the pagan Arabs, were also abolished by Mohammed. The Korân 10 mentions four names by them given to certain camels or sheep, which for some particular reasons were left at free liberty, and were not made use of as other cattle of the same kind. These names are Bahîra, Saïba, Wasîla, and Hâmi: of each whereof in their order.
As to the first it is said that when a she-camel, or a sheep, had borne young ten times, they used to slit her ear, and turn her loose to feed at full liberty; and when the died, her flesh was eaten by
1 Nothr al dorr, al Firauz. al Zamakh. & al Beid.
2 Poc. Spec. p. 320.
3 Compare Acts xv. 29, with I Cor. viii. 4, &c.
4 See the fifth chap. of the Kor. p. 82. and the notes there.
5 Solin, de Arab. cap. 33.
6 Hieronym. in Jovin. l. 2. c. 6.
7 Idem, ib.
8 Soinus, ubi supra.