ORDERS OF HOLY MEN IN PALESTINE.
(Answers to Questions.)
By P. J. Baldensperger, Esq.
There are four principal Orders of Holy Men, شيل الله يا رجال الله, Shale illah ya rajâl Allah, an exclamation used in reference to a man mentioned, and which ought always to be said when a holy name is pronounced. It means "God's party, yea, men of God." The exact time when the four men lived I could not make out. They are: 1. Sultan 'Abd el Kader; 2. Sîdna Ehmad el Erfa'i; 3. Il Seyyed Ehmad el Badawi; 4. Sîdna Ibrahim el Dsuki. They may probably have lived about or after the Crusades. At all events the Tangiers traveller, Ibn Batoutah, mentions the Erfa'i in 1326 A.D. The East has always been filled with such people, and their disciples, or Darawish, as they here call them, have always quarrelled as to whose sanctity is greatest. One day Bajazid and his Derwishes met 'Abd el Kader and his Derwishes, and a dispute arose between them as to who was holier. A tree near by was beckoned to come by 'Abd el Kader, so it uprooted itself and stood still, but when Bajazid called the tree it came to him, whereupon 'Abd el Kader at once dismissed his Derwishes, and said, as he was not holier than Bajazid, he would give up being their leader, and went and lived 40 years in a mountain, with one knee bound, so that he could not kneel down and pray and get up, and so he became crippled. These men have existed, في الدراك, before they were born, and before the Prophet Mohammed. They all have supernatural powers or secrets, اسرار, and have the power to appear now and then. They have drunk Paradise water, ميه القوسر, Moyet el Ḳosar, and had it in Paradise jugs, شربة الصلاح, Sharbet el Sulah, with them.
I. Sultan 'Abd el Kader el Kheirani, Sultan el Saleeheen, also called Araj Abu Dirballa Bâz Allah—السلطان عبدالقادر الخيراني سلطان الصالحين واعرج ابو دربلة باز الله
Before he was born he was to be a Wély, therefore he is also called Asbak, اسبق, the preceding. When his mother, Kheira, خيرا was yet a young girl, gathering wood, all her companions left her, and a lion was going to eat her, so he appeared, killed the lion, and bound the wood with a serpent. At another time a man was going to violate her—he again appeared and saved her. When she got married and became with child, he told her, out of the womb, that it was he who had saved her twice before she was his mother. As soon as he was born, he confirmed what he said before, and was acknowledged as a Wély. The world was then all under the influence of the Dsuki, the Erfa'i, and the Badawi; he claimed partnership with them, and as they would not give it him
