1“The Fathers assembled there ... decreed in that council that every person, as well in his private as public fast, should continue all the day without meat and drink, till after the evening prayer. And whosoever did eat or drink before the evening prayer was ended should be accounted and reputed not to consider the purity of his fast. This canon teacheth so evidently how fasting was used in the primitive church as by words it cannot be more plainly expressed” (Of Good Works; and first, of Fasting.)2As indeed they are, etymologically; but, prior to the Reformation, a conventional distinction betweenabstinentiaandjejunium naturalehad long been recognized. “Exceptio eduliorum quorundam portionale jejunium est” (Tertullian).3Confucianism ought perhaps to be named as one. Zoroastrianism is frequently given as another, but hardlycorrectly. In the LiberSad-der, indeed (Porta xxv.), we read, “Cavendum est tibi a jejunio; nam a mane ad vesperam nihil comedere non est bonum in religione nostra”; but according to the Père de Chinon (Lyons, 1671) the Parsee religion enjoins, upon the priesthood at least, no fewer than five yearly fasts. See Hyde,Veterum Persarum religio, pp. 449, 548 (ed. 1700).4During the middle ages the prevalent notion was that it had its origin in paradise. The germ at least of this idea is to be found in Tertullian, who says: “Acceperat Adam a Deo legem non gustandi de arbore agnitionis boni et mali, moriturus si gustasset; verum et ipse tunc in psychicum reversus ... facilius ventri quam Deo cessit, pabulo potius quam praecepto annuit, salutem gula vendidit, manducavit denique et periit, salvus alioquin si uni arbusculae jejunare maluisset” (De jejuniis, c. 3).5Principles of Sociology, i. pp. 170, 284, 285. Compare the passage in the appendix from Hanusch,Slavischer Mythus, p. 408.6Spencer,Prin. of Sociology, i. 256, &c.; E.B. Tylor,Primitive Culture, i. 277, 402; ii. 372, &c.7Hooker, E.P. v. 72. In the Westminster Assembly’s Larger Catechism fasting is mentioned among the duties required by the second commandment.8The Brahmans themselves on the eleventh day after the full moon and the eleventh day after the new “abstain for sixty hours from every kind of sustenance”; and some have a special fast every Monday in November. See Picart,The Religion and Manners of the Brahmins.9נפשis here to be taken as substantially equivalent to “desire,” “appetite.”10See Judith viii. 6. “And yet it may be a question whether they (the Jews) did not always fast upon Sabbath,” says Hooker (E.P.v. 72, 7), who gives a curious array of evidence pointing in this direction. He even makes use of Neh. viii. 9-12, which might be thought to tell the other way. Justinian’s phrase, “Sabbata Judaeorum a Mose in omne aevum jejunio dicata” (l. xxxvi. c. 2; comp. Suetonius,Augustus, 76) may be accounted for by the fact that the day of atonement is called Sabbat Sabbatôn (“a perfect Sabbath”).11There is, as Graf (Gesch. Bücher des A.T.p. 41) has pointed out, no direct evidence that the fast on the 10th of the 7th month was ever observed before the exile. But the inference which he draws from this silence of the historical books is manifestly a precarious one at best. Bleek calls Lev. xvi. “ein deutliches Beispiel Mosaïscher Abfassung” (Einleitung, p. 31, ed. 1878).12The allusion to the ark warns us to be cautious in assuming the laws of the Mishna to have been ever in force.13The idea, however, is found in theClementine Homilies, ix. 9. Compare TertullianDe jejuniis, c. 8: “Docuit etiam adversus diriora daemonia jejuniis praeliandum.”14On the manuscript evidence the words “I was fasting,” in Acts x. 30, must also be regarded as doubtful. They are rejected by Lachmann, Tregelles and Tischendorf.15Quinam isti (adversarii) sint, semel nominabo: exteriores et interiores botuli psychicorum.... Arguunt nos quodjejunia propriacustodiamus, quod stationes plerumque in vesperamproducamus, quod etiamxerophagiasobservemus, siccantes cibum ab omni carne et omni jurulentia et uvidioribus quibusque pomis, nec quid vinositatis vel edamus vel potemus; lavacri quoque abstinentiam congruentem arido victui.16The language of the canon is ambiguous; but this interpretation seems to be preferable, especially in view of canon 23, which enacts thatjejunii superpositionesare to be observed in all months except July and August. See Hefele,Councils, i. 148 (Engl. trs.).17Compare the 52nd [51st] of the Apostolical canons. “If any bishop or presbyter or deacon, or indeed any one of the sacerdotal catalogue, abstains from flesh and wine, not for his own exercise but out of hatred of the things, forgetting that all things were very good ... either let him reform, or let him be deprived and be cast out of the church. So also a layman.” To this particular canon Hefele is disposed to assign a very early date.18Compare canon 64 of the (supposed) fourth synod of Carthage: “He who fasts on Sunday is not accounted a Catholic” (Hefele, ii. 415).19Priscillian, whose widespread heresy evoked from the synod of Saragossa (418) the canon, “No one shall fast on Sunday, nor may any one absent himself from church during Lent and hold a festival of his own,” appears, on the question of fasting, not to have differed from the Encratites and various other sects of Manichean tendency (c.406).20Cap. iii. pro partib. Saxoniae: “Si quis sanctum quadragesimale jejunium pro despectu Christianitatis contempserit et carnem comederit, morte moriatur. Sed tamen consideretur a sacerdote ne forte causa necessitatis hoc cuilibet proveniat, ut carnem comedat.” See Augusti,Christliche Archäologie, x. p. 374.21See Fink’s article “Fasten” in Ersch and Gruber’sEncyclopädie; Lane,Modern Egyptians; and Rycaut,Present State of the Armenian Church.
1“The Fathers assembled there ... decreed in that council that every person, as well in his private as public fast, should continue all the day without meat and drink, till after the evening prayer. And whosoever did eat or drink before the evening prayer was ended should be accounted and reputed not to consider the purity of his fast. This canon teacheth so evidently how fasting was used in the primitive church as by words it cannot be more plainly expressed” (Of Good Works; and first, of Fasting.)
2As indeed they are, etymologically; but, prior to the Reformation, a conventional distinction betweenabstinentiaandjejunium naturalehad long been recognized. “Exceptio eduliorum quorundam portionale jejunium est” (Tertullian).
3Confucianism ought perhaps to be named as one. Zoroastrianism is frequently given as another, but hardlycorrectly. In the LiberSad-der, indeed (Porta xxv.), we read, “Cavendum est tibi a jejunio; nam a mane ad vesperam nihil comedere non est bonum in religione nostra”; but according to the Père de Chinon (Lyons, 1671) the Parsee religion enjoins, upon the priesthood at least, no fewer than five yearly fasts. See Hyde,Veterum Persarum religio, pp. 449, 548 (ed. 1700).
4During the middle ages the prevalent notion was that it had its origin in paradise. The germ at least of this idea is to be found in Tertullian, who says: “Acceperat Adam a Deo legem non gustandi de arbore agnitionis boni et mali, moriturus si gustasset; verum et ipse tunc in psychicum reversus ... facilius ventri quam Deo cessit, pabulo potius quam praecepto annuit, salutem gula vendidit, manducavit denique et periit, salvus alioquin si uni arbusculae jejunare maluisset” (De jejuniis, c. 3).
5Principles of Sociology, i. pp. 170, 284, 285. Compare the passage in the appendix from Hanusch,Slavischer Mythus, p. 408.
6Spencer,Prin. of Sociology, i. 256, &c.; E.B. Tylor,Primitive Culture, i. 277, 402; ii. 372, &c.
7Hooker, E.P. v. 72. In the Westminster Assembly’s Larger Catechism fasting is mentioned among the duties required by the second commandment.
8The Brahmans themselves on the eleventh day after the full moon and the eleventh day after the new “abstain for sixty hours from every kind of sustenance”; and some have a special fast every Monday in November. See Picart,The Religion and Manners of the Brahmins.
9נפשis here to be taken as substantially equivalent to “desire,” “appetite.”
10See Judith viii. 6. “And yet it may be a question whether they (the Jews) did not always fast upon Sabbath,” says Hooker (E.P.v. 72, 7), who gives a curious array of evidence pointing in this direction. He even makes use of Neh. viii. 9-12, which might be thought to tell the other way. Justinian’s phrase, “Sabbata Judaeorum a Mose in omne aevum jejunio dicata” (l. xxxvi. c. 2; comp. Suetonius,Augustus, 76) may be accounted for by the fact that the day of atonement is called Sabbat Sabbatôn (“a perfect Sabbath”).
11There is, as Graf (Gesch. Bücher des A.T.p. 41) has pointed out, no direct evidence that the fast on the 10th of the 7th month was ever observed before the exile. But the inference which he draws from this silence of the historical books is manifestly a precarious one at best. Bleek calls Lev. xvi. “ein deutliches Beispiel Mosaïscher Abfassung” (Einleitung, p. 31, ed. 1878).
12The allusion to the ark warns us to be cautious in assuming the laws of the Mishna to have been ever in force.
13The idea, however, is found in theClementine Homilies, ix. 9. Compare TertullianDe jejuniis, c. 8: “Docuit etiam adversus diriora daemonia jejuniis praeliandum.”
14On the manuscript evidence the words “I was fasting,” in Acts x. 30, must also be regarded as doubtful. They are rejected by Lachmann, Tregelles and Tischendorf.
15Quinam isti (adversarii) sint, semel nominabo: exteriores et interiores botuli psychicorum.... Arguunt nos quodjejunia propriacustodiamus, quod stationes plerumque in vesperamproducamus, quod etiamxerophagiasobservemus, siccantes cibum ab omni carne et omni jurulentia et uvidioribus quibusque pomis, nec quid vinositatis vel edamus vel potemus; lavacri quoque abstinentiam congruentem arido victui.
16The language of the canon is ambiguous; but this interpretation seems to be preferable, especially in view of canon 23, which enacts thatjejunii superpositionesare to be observed in all months except July and August. See Hefele,Councils, i. 148 (Engl. trs.).
17Compare the 52nd [51st] of the Apostolical canons. “If any bishop or presbyter or deacon, or indeed any one of the sacerdotal catalogue, abstains from flesh and wine, not for his own exercise but out of hatred of the things, forgetting that all things were very good ... either let him reform, or let him be deprived and be cast out of the church. So also a layman.” To this particular canon Hefele is disposed to assign a very early date.
18Compare canon 64 of the (supposed) fourth synod of Carthage: “He who fasts on Sunday is not accounted a Catholic” (Hefele, ii. 415).
19Priscillian, whose widespread heresy evoked from the synod of Saragossa (418) the canon, “No one shall fast on Sunday, nor may any one absent himself from church during Lent and hold a festival of his own,” appears, on the question of fasting, not to have differed from the Encratites and various other sects of Manichean tendency (c.406).
20Cap. iii. pro partib. Saxoniae: “Si quis sanctum quadragesimale jejunium pro despectu Christianitatis contempserit et carnem comederit, morte moriatur. Sed tamen consideretur a sacerdote ne forte causa necessitatis hoc cuilibet proveniat, ut carnem comedat.” See Augusti,Christliche Archäologie, x. p. 374.
21See Fink’s article “Fasten” in Ersch and Gruber’sEncyclopädie; Lane,Modern Egyptians; and Rycaut,Present State of the Armenian Church.
FASTOLF, SIR JOHN(d. 1459), English soldier, has enjoyed a more lasting reputation as in some part the prototype of Shakespeare’s Falstaff. He was son of a Norfolk gentleman, John Fastolf of Caister, is said to have been squire to Thomas Mowbray, duke of Norfolk, before 1398, served with Thomas of Lancaster in Ireland during 1405 and 1406, and in 1408 made a fortunate marriage with Millicent, widow of Sir Stephen Scrope of Castle Combe in Wiltshire. In 1413 he was serving in Gascony, and took part in all the subsequent campaigns of Henry V. in France. He must have earned a good repute as a soldier, for in 1423 he was made governor of Maine and Anjou, and in February 1426 created a knight of the Garter. But later in this year he was superseded in his command by John Talbot. After a visit to England in 1428, he returned to the war, and on the 12th of February 1429 when in charge of the convoy for the English army before Orleans defeated the French and Scots at the “battle of herrings.” On the 18th of June of the same year an English force under the command of Fastolf and Talbot suffered a serious defeat at Patay. According to the French historian Waurin, who was present, the disaster was due to Talbot’s rashness, and Fastolf only fled when resistance was hopeless. Other accounts charge him with cowardice, and it is true that John of Bedford at first deprived him of the Garter, though after inquiry he was honourably reinstated. This incident was made unfavourable use of by Shakespeare inHenry VI.(pt. i. act iv. sc. i.). Fastolf continued to serve with honour in France, and was trusted both by Bedford and by Richard of York. He only came home finally in 1440, when past sixty years of age. But the scandal against him continued, and during Cade’s rebellion in 1451 he was charged with having been the cause of the English disasters through minishing the garrisons of Normandy. It is suggested that he had made much money in the war by the hire of troops, and in his later days he showed himself a grasping man of business. A servant wrote of him:—“cruel and vengible he hath been ever, and for the most part without pity and mercy” (Paston Letters, i. 389). Besides his share in his wife’s property he had large estates in Norfolk and Suffolk, and a house at Southwark, where he also owned the Boar’s Head Inn. He died at Caister on the 5th of November 1459. There is some reason to suppose that Fastolf favoured Lollardry, and this circumstance with the tradition of his braggart cowardice may have suggested the use of his name for the boon companion of Prince Hal, when Shakespeare found it expedient to drop that of Oldcastle. In the first two folios the name of the historical character in the first part ofHenry VI.is given as “Falstaffe” not Fastolf. Other points of resemblance between the historic Fastolf and the Falstaff of the dramatist are to be found in their service under Thomas Mowbray, and association with a Boar’s Head Inn. But Falstaff is in no true sense a dramatization of the real soldier.
The facts of Fastolf’s early career are to be found chiefly in the chronicles of Monstrelet and Waurin. For his later life there is much material, including a number of his own letters, in thePaston Letters. There is a full life by W. Oldys in theBiographia Britannica(1st ed., enlarged by Gough in Kippis’s edition). See also Dawson Turner’sHistory of Caister Castle, Scrope’sHistory of Castle Combe, J. Gairdner’s essayOn the Historical Element in Shakespeare’s Falstaff, ap.Studies in English History, Sidney Lee’s article in theDictionary of National Biography, and D.W. Duthie,The Case of Sir John Fastolf and other Historical Studies(1907).
The facts of Fastolf’s early career are to be found chiefly in the chronicles of Monstrelet and Waurin. For his later life there is much material, including a number of his own letters, in thePaston Letters. There is a full life by W. Oldys in theBiographia Britannica(1st ed., enlarged by Gough in Kippis’s edition). See also Dawson Turner’sHistory of Caister Castle, Scrope’sHistory of Castle Combe, J. Gairdner’s essayOn the Historical Element in Shakespeare’s Falstaff, ap.Studies in English History, Sidney Lee’s article in theDictionary of National Biography, and D.W. Duthie,The Case of Sir John Fastolf and other Historical Studies(1907).
(C. L. K.)
FAT(O.E.fáett; the word is common to Teutonic languages, cf. Dutchvet, Ger.Fett, &c., and may be ultimately related to Greekπίωνandπιαρός, and Sanskritpivan), the name given to certain animal and vegetable products which are oily solids at ordinary temperatures, and are chemically distinguished as being the glyceryl esters of various fatty acids, of which the most important are stearic, palmitic, and oleic; it is to be noticed that they are non-nitrogenous. Fat is a normal constituent of animal tissue, being found even before birth; it occurs especially in the intra-muscular, the abdominal and the subcutaneous connective tissues. In the vegetable kingdom fats especially occur in the seeds and fruits, and sometimes in the roots. Physiological subjects concerned with the part played by fats in living animals are treated in the articlesConnective Tissues;Nutrition;Corpulence;Metabolic Diseases. The fats are chemically similar to the fixed oils, from which they are roughly distinguished by being solids and not liquids (seeOils). While all fats have received industrial applications, foremost importance must be accorded to the fats of the domestic animals—the sheep, cow, ox and calf. These, which are extracted from the bones and skins in the first operation in the manufacture of glue, are the raw materials of the soap, candle and glycerin industries.
FATALISM(Lat.fatum, that which is spoken, decreed), strictly the doctrine that all things happen according to a prearranged fate, necessity or inexorable decree. It has frequently been confused with determinism (q.v.), which, however, differs from it categorically in assigning a certain function to the will. The essence of the fatalistic doctrine is that it assigns no place at all to the initiative of the individual, or to rational sequence of events. Thus an oriental may believe that he is fated to die on a particular day; he believes that, whatever he does and in spite of all precautions he may take, nothing can avert the disaster. The idea of an omnipotent fate overruling all affairs of men is present in various forms in practically all religious systems. Thus Homer assumes a single fate (Μοῖρα), an impersonal power which makes all human concerns subject to the gods: it is not powerful over the gods, however, for Zeus is spoken of as weighing out the fate of men (Il.xxii. 209, viii. 69). Hesiod has three Fates (Μοῖραι), daughters of Night, Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos. In Aeschylus fate is powerful even over the gods. The Epicureans regarded fate as blind chance, while to the Stoics everything is subject to an absolute rational law.
The doctrine of fate appears also in what are known as the higher religions,e.g.Christianity and Mahommedanism. In theformer the ideas of personality and infinite power have vanished, all power being conceived as inherent in God. It is recognized that the moral individual must have some kind of initiative, and yet since God is omnipotent and omniscient man must be conceived as in some sense foreordained to a certain moral, mental and physical development. In the history of the Christian church emphasis has from time to time been laid specially on the latter aspect of human life (cf. the doctrines of election, foreordination, determinism). Even those theologians, however, who have laid special stress on the limitations of the human will have repudiated the strictly fatalistic doctrine which is characteristic of Oriental thought and is the negation of all human initiative (seePredestination;Augustine, Saint;Will). In Islam fate is an absolute power, known asKismet, orNasib, which is conceived as inexorable and transcending all the physical laws of the universe. The most striking feature of the Oriental fatalism is its complete indifference to material circumstances: men accept prosperity and misfortune with calmness as the decree of fate.
FATE,in Roman mythology, the spoken word (fatum) of Jupiter, the unalterable will of heaven. The plural (Fata, the Fates) was used for the “destinies” of individuals or cities, and then for the three goddesses who controlled them. Thus, Fata Scribunda were the goddesses who wrote down a man’s destiny at his birth. In this connexion, however, Fata may be singular, the masculine and feminineFatus,Fata, being the usual forms in popular and ceremonial language. The Fates were also called Parcae, the attributes of both being the same as those of the Greek Moerae.
FATEHPUR,FathipurorFuttehpoor, a town and district of British India, in the Allahabad division of the United Provinces. The town is 73 m. by rail N.W. of Allahabad. Pop. (1901) 19,281. The district has an area of 1618 sq. m. It is situated in the extreme south-eastern corner of the Doab or tract of country between the Ganges and the Jumna, which respectively mark its northern and southern boundaries. The whole district consists of an alluvial plain formed by the deposits of the two great rivers. The central part is almost perfectly level, and consists of highly cultivated land interspersed with jungle and with tracts impregnated with saltpetre (usar). A ridge of higher land, forming the watershed of the district, runs along it from east to west at an average distance of about 5 m. from the Ganges. Fatehpur therefore consists of two inclined planes, the one 5 m. broad, sloping down rapidly to the Ganges, and the other from 15 to 20 m. broad, falling gradually to the Jumna. The country near the banks of the two rivers is cut up into ravines and nullahs running in all directions, and is almost entirely uncultivable. Besides the Ganges and Jumna the only rivers of importance are the Pandu, a tributary of the Ganges, and the Arind and Nun, which both fall into the Jumna. The climate is more humid than in the other districts of the Doab, and although fevers are common, it is not considered an unhealthy district. The average annual rainfall is 34 in.
The tract in which this district is comprised was conquered in 1194 by the Pathans; but subsequently, after a desperate resistance, it was wrested from them by the Moguls. In the 18th century it formed a part of thesubahof Korah, and was under the government of the wazir of Oudh. In 1736 it was overrun by the Mahrattas, who retained possession of it until, in 1750, they were ousted by the Pathans of Fatehpur. In 1753 it was reconquered by the nawab of Oudh. In 1765, by a treaty between the East India Company and the nawab, Korah was made over to the Delhi emperor, who retained it till 1774, when it was again restored to the nawab wazir’s dominions. Finally in 1801, the nawab, by treaty, reconveyed it to the Company in commutation of the amount which he had stipulated to pay in return for the defence of his country. In June 1857 the district rose in rebellion, and the usual murders of Europeans took place. Order was established after the fall of Lucknow, on the return of Lord Clyde’s army to Cawnpore. In 1901 the population was 686,391, showing a decrease of 2% in the decade. The district is traversed by the main line of the East Indian railway from Allahabad to Cawnpore. Trade is mainly agricultural, but the town of Fatehpur is noted for the manufacture of ornamental whips, and Jafarganj for artistic curtains, &c.
FATEHPUR SIKRI,a town in the Agra district in the United Provinces of India, on the road from Agra to Jaipur. Pop. (1901) 7147. It is a ruined city, and is interesting only from an archaeological point of view. It was founded by Akbar in 1569 as a thank-offering for the birth of a son, Selim, afterwards the emperor Jahangir, foretold by Selim Chisti, a famous Mahommedan saint. The principal building is the great mosque, which is said by Fergusson to be hardly surpassed by any in India. “It measures 550 ft. east and west by 470 ft. north and south, over all. The mosque itself, 250 ft. by 80 ft., is crowned by three domes. In its courtyard, which measures 350 ft. by 440 ft., stand two tombs. One is that of Selim Chisti, built of white marble, and the windows with pierced tracery of the most exquisite geometrical patterns. It possesses besides a deep cornice of marble, supported by brackets of the most elaborate design. The other tomb, that of Nawab Islam Khan, is soberer and in excellent taste, but quite eclipsed by its surroundings. Even these parts, however, are surpassed in magnificence by the southern gateway. As it stands on a rising ground, when looked at from below its appearance is noble beyond that of any portal attached to any mosque in India, perhaps in the whole world.” Among other more noteworthy buildings the following may be mentioned. The palace of Jodh Bai, the Rajput wife of Akbar, consists of a courtyard surrounded by a gallery, above which rise buildings roofed with blue enamel. A rich gateway gives access to a terrace on which are the “houses of Birbal and Miriam”; and beyond these is another courtyard, where are Akbar’s private apartments and the exquisite palace of the Turkish sultana. Here are also the Panch Mahal or five-storeyed building, consisting of five galleries in tiers, and the audience chamber. The special feature in the architecture of the city is the softness of the red sandstone, which could be carved almost as easily as wood, and so lent itself readily to the elaborate Hindu embellishment. Fatehpur Sikri was a favourite residence of Akbar throughout his reign, and his establishment here was of great magnificence. After Akbar’s death Fatehpur Sikri was deserted within 50 years of its foundation. The reason for this was that frequent cause in the East, lack of water. The only water obtainable was so brackish and corroding as to cause great mortality among the inhabitants. The buildings are situated within an enclosure, walled on three sides and about 7 m. in circumference. They are all now more or less in ruins, and their elaborate painting and other decoration has largely perished, but some modern restoration has been effected.
See E.B. Havell,A Handbook to Agra and the Taj, Sikandra, Fatehpur Sikri, &c. (1904).
See E.B. Havell,A Handbook to Agra and the Taj, Sikandra, Fatehpur Sikri, &c. (1904).
FATHER,the begetter of a child, the male parent. The word is common to Teutonic languages, and, like the other words for close family relationship, mother, brother, son, sister, daughter, appears in most Indo-European languages. The O. Eng. form isfæder, and it appears in Ger.Vater, Dutchvader, Gr.πατήρ, Lat.pater, whence Romanic Fr.père, Span.padre, &c. The word is used of male ancestors more remote than the actual male parent, and of ancestors in general. It is applied to God, as the Father of Jesus Christ, and as the Creator of the world, and is thus the orthodox term for the First Person of the Trinity. Of the transferred uses of the word many have religious reference; thus it is used of the Christian writers, usually confined to those of the first five centuries, the Fathers of the Church (see below), of whom those who flourished at the end of, or just after the age of, the apostles are known as the Apostolic Fathers. One who stands as a spiritual parent to another is his “father,”e.g.godfather, or in the title of bishops or archbishops, Right or Most Reverend Father in God. The pope is, in the Roman Church, the Holy Father. In the Roman Church, father is strictly applied to a “regular,” a member of one of the religious orders, and so always in Europe, in English usage, often applied to a confessor, whether regular or secular, and to any Roman priest, and sometimes used of sub-members of a religious society or fraternityin the English Church. Of transferred uses, other than religious, may be mentioned the application to the first founders of an institution, constitution, epoch, &c. Thus the earliest settlers of North America are the Pilgrim Fathers, and the framers of the United States constitution are the Fathers of the Constitution. In ancient Rome the members of the senate are thePatres conscripti, the “Conscript fathers.” The senior member or doyen of a society is often called the father. Thus the member of the English House of Commons, and similarly, of the House of Representatives in the United States, America, who has sat for the longest period uninterruptedly, is the Father of the House.
FATHERS OF THE CHURCH.The use of the word “father” as a title of respect is found in the Old Testament, where it is applied to patriarchs (Gen. l. 24 (Septuagint); Exod. iii. 13, 15; Deut. i. 8), priests (Judg. xvii. 10, xviii. 19), prophets (2 Kings ii. 12, vi. 21, xiii. 14), and distinguished ancestors (Ecclus. xliv. 1). In the time of our Lord the scribes claimed the name with an arrogance which He disapproved (Matt. xxiii. 9); in the rabbinic literature “the fathers” are the more eminent of the earlier rabbis whose sayings were handed down for the guidance of posterity.1The Christian Church, warned perhaps by the words of Christ, appears at first to have avoided a similar use of the term, while St Paul, St Peter and St John speak of their converts as spiritual children (1 Cor. iv. 14 f., Gal. iv. 19, 1 Pet. v. 13, 1 John ii. 12); they did not assume, so far as we know, the official style of “fathers in God.” Nor is this title found in the age which succeeded to that of the apostles. When Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, was martyred (A.D.155), the crowd shouted, “This is the father of the Christians”2; but the words were probably prompted by the Jews, who took a prominent part in the martyrdom, and who naturally viewed Polycarp in the light of a great Christian rabbi, and gave him the title which their own teachers bore. In the next century members of the episcopal order were sometimes addressed in this manner: thus Cyprian is styledpapasorpapaby his Roman correspondents.3The bishops who sat in the great councils of the 4th century were known as “the 318 fathers” of Nicaea, and “the 150 fathers” of Constantinople. Meanwhile the custom was growing up of appealing to eminent Church writers of a past generation under this name. Thus Athanasius writes (ad Afrosvi.): “We have the testimony of fathers (the two Dionysii, bishops of Alexandria and Rome, who wrote in the previous century) for the use of the wordὁμοούσιος.” Such quotations were multiplied, as theologians learnt to depend increasingly upon their predecessors, until the testimony of “our holy father” Athanasius, or Gregory the Divine, or John the Golden-mouthed, came to be regarded as decisive in reference to controverted points of faith and practice.
In the narrower sense thus indicated the “fathers” of the Church are the great bishops and other eminent Christian teachers of the earlier centuries, who were conspicuous for soundness of judgment and sanctity of life, and whose writings remained as a court of appeal for their successors. A list of fathers drawn up on this principle will begin with the Christian writers of the 1st century whose writings are not included in the New Testament: where it ought to end is a more difficult point to determine. Perhaps the balance of opinion is in favour of regarding Gregory the Great (d. 604) as the last of the Latin fathers, and John of Damascus (d.c.760) as the last of the fathers of the Greek Church. A more liberal estimate might include John Scotus Erigena or even Anselm or Bernard of Clairvaux in the West and Photius in the East. The abbé Migne carried his Latin patrology down to the time of Innocent III. (d. 1216), and his Greek patrology to the fall of Constantinople (1453); but, while this large extension of the field is much to the advantage of his readers, it undoubtedly stretches the meaning ofpatrologiafar beyond its natural limits. For ordinary purposes it is best to make the patristic period conterminous with the life of the ancient Catholic Church. In the West the Church enters the medieval stage of its history with the death of Gregory, while in the East even John of Damascus is rather a compiler of patristic teaching than a true “father.”
A further question arises. Are all the Christian writers of a given period to be included among the “fathers,” or those only who wrote on religious subjects, and of whose orthodoxy there is no doubt? Migne, following the example of the editors ofbibliothecae patrumwho preceded him, swept into his great collection all the Christian writings which fell within his period; but he is careful to state upon his title-page that his patrologies include the ecclesiastical writers as well as the fathers and doctors of the Church. For a comprehensive use of the term “ecclesiastical writers” he has the authority of Jerome, who enumerates among them4such heresiarchs or leaders of schism as Tatian, Bardaisan, Novatus, Donatus, Photinus and Eunomius. This may not be logical, but long usage has made it permissible or even necessary. It is often difficult, if not impracticable, to draw the line between orthodox writers and heterodox; on which side, it might be asked, is Origen to be placed? and in the case of a writer like Tertullian who left the Church in middle life, are we to admit certain of his works into our patrology and refuse a place to others? It is clear that in the circumstances the terms “father,” “patristic,” “patrology” must be used with much elasticity, since it is now too late to substitute for them any more comprehensive terms.
By the “fathers,” then, we understand the whole of extant Christian literature from the time of the apostles to the rise of scholasticism or the beginning of the middle ages. However we may interpret the lower limit of this period, the literature which it embraces is immense. Some method of subdivision is necessary, and the simplest and most obvious is that which breaks the whole into two great parts, the ante-Nicene and the post-Nicene. This is not an arbitrary cleavage; the Council of Nicaea (A.D.325) is the watershed which actually separates two great tracts of Christian literature. The ante-Nicene age yields priceless records of the early struggles of Christianity; from it we have received specimens of the early apologetic and the early polemic of the Church, the first essays of Christian philosophy, Christian correspondence, Christian biblical interpretation: we owe to it the works of Justin, Irenaeus, the Alexandrian Clement, Origen, Tertullian, Cyprian. In these products of the 2nd and 3rd centuries there is much which in its own way was not surpassed by any of the later patristic writings. Yet the post-Nicene literature, considered as literature, reaches a far higher level. Both in East and West, the 4th and 5th centuries form the golden age of dogmatic theology, of homiletic preaching, of exposition, of letter-writing, of Church history, of religious poetry. Two causes may be assigned for this fact. The conversion of the empire gave the members of the Church leisure and opportunities for the cultivation of literary taste, and gradually drew the educated classes within the pale of the Christian society. Moreover, the great Christological controversies of the age tended to encourage in Christian writers and preachers an intellectual acuteness and an accuracy of thought and expression of which the earlier centuries had not felt the need.
The ante-Nicene period of patristic literature opens with the “apostolic fathers,”5i.e.the Church writers who flourished toward the end of the apostolic age and during the half century that followed it, including Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch, Polycarp of Smyrna and the author known as “Barnabas.” Their writings, like those of the apostles, are epistolary; but editions of the apostolic fathers now usually admit also the early Church order known as theDidachē, the allegory entitled theShepherd, and a short anonymous apology addressed to one Diognetus. A second group, known as the “Greek Apologists,” embraces Aristides, Justin, Tatian, Athenagoras and Theophilus; and a third consists of the early polemical writers, Irenaeus andHippolytus. Next come the great Alexandrians, Clement, Origen, Dionysius; the Carthaginians, Tertullian and Cyprian; the Romans, Minucius Felix and Novatian; the last four laid the foundations of a Latin Christian literature. Even the stormy days of the last persecution yielded some considerable writers, such as Methodius in the East and Lactantius in the West. This list is far from complete; the principal collections of the ante-Nicene fathers include not a few minor and anonymous writers, and the fragments of many others whose works as a whole have perished.
In the post-Nicene period the literary output of the Church was greater. Only the more representative names can be mentioned here. From Alexandria we get Athanasius, Didymus and Cyril; from Cyrene, Synesius; from Antioch, Theodore of Mopsuestia, John Chrysostom and Theodoret; from Palestine, Eusebius of Caesarea and Cyril of Jerusalem; from Cappadocia, Basil, Gregory of Nyssa and Gregory of Nazianzus. The Latin West was scarcely less productive; it is enough to mention Hilary of Poitiers, Ambrose of Milan, Augustine of Hippo, Leo of Rome, Jerome, Rufinus, and a father lately restored to his place in patristic literature, Niceta of Remesiana.6Gaul alone has a goodly list of Christian authors to show: John Cassian, Vincent of Lerins, Hilary of Arles, Prosper of Aquitaine, Salvian of Marseilles, Sidonius Apollinaris of Auvergne, Caesarius of Arles, Gregory of Tours. The period ends in the West with two great Italian names, Cassiodorus and Pope Gregory I., after Leo the greatest of papal theologians.
The reader to whom the study is new will gain some idea of the bulk of the extant patristic literature, if we add that in Migne’s collection ninety-six large volumes are occupied with the Greek fathers from Clement of Rome to John of Damascus, and seventy-six with the Latin fathers from Tertullian to Gregory the Great.7
For a discussion of the more important fathers the student is referred to the articles which deal with them separately. In this place it is enough to consider the general influence of the patristic writings upon Christian doctrine and biblical interpretation. Can any authority be claimed for their teaching or their exegesis, other than that which belongs to the best writers of every age. The decree of the council of Trent8(ut nemo ... contra unanimum consensum patrum ipsam scripturam sacram interpretari audeat) is studiously moderate, and yet it seems to rule that under certain circumstances it is not permitted to the Church of later times to carry the science of biblical interpretation beyond the point which it had reached at the end of the patristic period. Roman Catholic writers,9however, have explained the prohibition to apply to matters of faith only, and in that case the Tridentine decree is little else than another form of the Vincentian canon which has been widely accepted in the Anglican communion:curandum est ut id teneamus quod ubique, quod semper, quod ab omnibus creditum est. The fathers of the first six or seven centuries, so far as they agree, may be fairly taken to represent the main stream of Christian tradition and belief during the period when the apostolic teaching took shape in the great creeds and dogmatic decisions of Christendom. The English reformers realized this fact; and notwithstanding their insistence on the unique authority of the canon of Scripture, their appeal to the fathers as representatives of the teaching of the undivided Church was as wholehearted as that of the Tridentine divines. Thus the English canon of 1571 directs preachers “to take heed that they do not teach anything in their sermons as though they would have it completely held and believed by the people, save what is agreeable to the doctrine of the Old and New Testaments, and what the Catholic Fathers and ancient Bishops have gathered from that doctrine.” Depreciation of the fathers was characteristic, not of the Anglican reformation, but of the revolt against some of its fundamental principles which was led by the Puritan reaction.10
Now that the smoke of these controversies has passed away, it is possible to form a clearer judgment upon the merits of the patristic writings. They are no longer used as an armoury from which opposite sides may draw effective weapons, offensive or defensive; nor on the other hand are they cast aside as the rubbish of an ignorant and superstitious age. All patristic students now recognize the great inequality of these authors, and admit that they are not free from the faults of their times; it is not denied that much of their exegesis is untenable, or that their logic is often feeble and their rhetoric offensive to modern taste. But against these disadvantages may be set the unique services which the fathers still render to Christian scholars. Their works comprise the whole literature of our faith during the decisive centuries which followed the apostolic age. They are important witnesses to the text of the New Testament, to the history of the canon, and to the history of interpretation. It is to their pages that we owe nearly all that we know of the life of ancient Christianity. We see in them the thought of the ancient Church taking shape in the minds of her bishops and doctors; and in many cases they express the results of the great doctrinal controversies of their age in language which leaves little to be desired.11
Authorities.—The earliest writer on patristics was Jerome, whose bookDe viris illustribusgives a brief account of one hundred and thirty-five Church writers, beginning with St Peter and ending with himself. Jerome’s work was continued successively by Gennadius of Marseilles, Isidore of Seville, and Ildefonsus of Toledo; the last-named writer brings the list down to the middle of the 7th century. Since the revival of learning books on the fathers have been numerous; among the more recent and most accessible of these we may mention Smith and Wace’sDictionary of Christian Biography, Hauck-Herzog’sRealencyklopädie, Bardenhewer’sPatrologieandGeschichte der altkirchlichen Litteratur, Harnack’sGeschichte der altchristlichen Litteratur bei Eusebiusand Ehrard’sDie altchristliche Litteratur und ihre Erforschung. A record of patristic collections and editions down to 1839 may be found in Dowling’sNotitia Scriptorum SS. Patrum. The contents of the volumes of Migne’s patrologies are given in theCatalogue général des livres de l’abbé Migne, and a useful list in alphabetical order of the writers in the GreekPatrologiahas been compiled by Dr J.B. Pearson (Cambridge, 1882). Migne’s texts are not always satisfactory, but since the completion of his great undertaking two important collections have been begun on critical lines—the Vienna edition of the Latin Church writers,12and the Berlin edition of the Greek writers of the ante-Nicene period.13For English readers there are three series of translations from the fathers, which cover much of the ground; the OxfordLibrary of the Fathers, theAnte Nicene Christian Libraryand theSelect Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers. Satisfactory lexicons of patristic Greek and Latin are still a desideratum: but assistance may be obtained in the study of the Greek fathers from Suicer’sThesaurus, theLexicon of Byzantine Greekby E.A. Sophocles, and theLexicon Graecum suppletorium et dialecticumof Van Herwerden; whilst the new greatLatin Lexicon, published by the Berlin Academy, is calculated to meet the needs of students of Latin patristic literature. For a fuller list of books useful to the reader of the Greek and Latin fathers see H.B. Swete’sPatristic Study(2nd ed., 1902).
Authorities.—The earliest writer on patristics was Jerome, whose bookDe viris illustribusgives a brief account of one hundred and thirty-five Church writers, beginning with St Peter and ending with himself. Jerome’s work was continued successively by Gennadius of Marseilles, Isidore of Seville, and Ildefonsus of Toledo; the last-named writer brings the list down to the middle of the 7th century. Since the revival of learning books on the fathers have been numerous; among the more recent and most accessible of these we may mention Smith and Wace’sDictionary of Christian Biography, Hauck-Herzog’sRealencyklopädie, Bardenhewer’sPatrologieandGeschichte der altkirchlichen Litteratur, Harnack’sGeschichte der altchristlichen Litteratur bei Eusebiusand Ehrard’sDie altchristliche Litteratur und ihre Erforschung. A record of patristic collections and editions down to 1839 may be found in Dowling’sNotitia Scriptorum SS. Patrum. The contents of the volumes of Migne’s patrologies are given in theCatalogue général des livres de l’abbé Migne, and a useful list in alphabetical order of the writers in the GreekPatrologiahas been compiled by Dr J.B. Pearson (Cambridge, 1882). Migne’s texts are not always satisfactory, but since the completion of his great undertaking two important collections have been begun on critical lines—the Vienna edition of the Latin Church writers,12and the Berlin edition of the Greek writers of the ante-Nicene period.13
For English readers there are three series of translations from the fathers, which cover much of the ground; the OxfordLibrary of the Fathers, theAnte Nicene Christian Libraryand theSelect Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers. Satisfactory lexicons of patristic Greek and Latin are still a desideratum: but assistance may be obtained in the study of the Greek fathers from Suicer’sThesaurus, theLexicon of Byzantine Greekby E.A. Sophocles, and theLexicon Graecum suppletorium et dialecticumof Van Herwerden; whilst the new greatLatin Lexicon, published by the Berlin Academy, is calculated to meet the needs of students of Latin patristic literature. For a fuller list of books useful to the reader of the Greek and Latin fathers see H.B. Swete’sPatristic Study(2nd ed., 1902).
(H. B. S.)
1See Buxtorf, s.v.Abh, and cf. the title of the tractPirke Aboth(ed. Taylor, p. 3).2Polyc. Mart. 8.3Studia biblica, iv. p. 273.4In his bookDe viris illustribus.5The termpatres apostoliciis due to the patristic scholars of the 17th century: see Lightfoot,St Clement of Rome, i. p. 3. “Sub-apostolic” is perhaps a more accurate designation.6Theeditio princepsof Niceta’s works was published by Dr A.E. Burn in 1905.7The Greek patrology contains, however, besides the text, a Latin translation, and in both patrologies there is much editorial matter.8Sess. iv.9E.G. Möhler,Symbolism(E. tr.) § 42.10See J.J. Blunt,Right Use of the Fathers, p. 15 ff.11See Stanton,Place of Authority in Religion, p. 165 f.12Corpus scriptorum ecclesiasticorum Latinorum.13Griechischen christlichen Schriftstellern der ersten drei Jahrhunderte.
1See Buxtorf, s.v.Abh, and cf. the title of the tractPirke Aboth(ed. Taylor, p. 3).
2Polyc. Mart. 8.
3Studia biblica, iv. p. 273.
4In his bookDe viris illustribus.
5The termpatres apostoliciis due to the patristic scholars of the 17th century: see Lightfoot,St Clement of Rome, i. p. 3. “Sub-apostolic” is perhaps a more accurate designation.
6Theeditio princepsof Niceta’s works was published by Dr A.E. Burn in 1905.
7The Greek patrology contains, however, besides the text, a Latin translation, and in both patrologies there is much editorial matter.
8Sess. iv.
9E.G. Möhler,Symbolism(E. tr.) § 42.
10See J.J. Blunt,Right Use of the Fathers, p. 15 ff.
11See Stanton,Place of Authority in Religion, p. 165 f.
12Corpus scriptorum ecclesiasticorum Latinorum.
13Griechischen christlichen Schriftstellern der ersten drei Jahrhunderte.
FATHOM(a word common, in various forms, to Scandinavian and Teutonic languages; cf. Danishfavn, Dutchvaamand Ger.Faden, and meaning “the arms extended”; the ultimate origin is a rootpet, seen in the Gr.πεταννύναι, to spread), a measure of length, being the distance from the tip of one middle finger to the tip of the other, when the arms are stretched out to their widest extent. This length has been standardized to a measure of 6 ft., and as such is used mainly in soundings as a unit for measuring the depth of the sea. “Fathom” is also used in the measurement of timber, when it is equivalent to 6 ft. sq.; similarly, in mining, a fathom is a portion of ground running the whole thickness of the vein of ore, and is 6 ft. in breadth and thickness. The verb “to fathom,”i.e.to sound or measure with a fathom-line, is used figuratively, meaning to go into a subject deeply, to penetrate, or to explore thoroughly.
FATIMITES,orFatimides, the name of a dynasty called after Fatima, daughter of the prophet Mahomet, from whom and her husband the caliph Ali, son of Abu Talib, they claimed descent. The dynasty is also called ‘Obaidi (Ubaidī) after ‘Obaidallah, the first sovereign, and ‘Alawī, a title which it shares with other dynasties claiming the same ancestry. For a list of sovereigns seeEgypt, sectionHistory(Mahommedan period); three, however, must be prefixed who reigned in north-western Africa before the annexation of Egypt: al-Mahdī ‘Obaidallah 297 (909); al-Qā’im Mahommed 322 (934); al-Mansūr Ismā‘īl 334 (945).
The dynasty owed its rise to the attachment to the family of the prophet which was widespread in the Moslem world, and the belief that the sovereignty was the right of one of its members. Owing, however, to the absence of the principle of primogeniture there was difference of opinion as to the person whose claim should be enforced, and a number of sects arose maintaining the rights of different branches of the family. The Fatimites were supported by those who regarded the sovereignty as vested in Ismā‘īl, son of Ja‘far al-Sādiq, great-great-grandson of Alī, through his second son Hosain (Ḥusain). Of this Ismā‘īl the first Fatimite caliph was supposed to be the great-grandson. The line of ancestors between him and Ismā‘īl is, however, variously given, even his father’s name being quite uncertain, and in some of the pedigrees even Ismā‘īl does not figure. Apparently when the family first became of political importance their Alid descent was not disputed at Bagdad, and the poet al-Sharīf al-Radī (d.A.H.406:A.D.1015), in whose family the office of Naqīb (registrar of the Alids) was hereditary, appears to have acknowledged it (Dīwān, ed. Beirut, p. 972). When their success became a menace to the caliphs of Bagdad, genealogists were employed to demonstrate the falsity of the claim, and a considerable literature, both official and unofficial, rose in consequence. The founder of the dynasty was made out to be a scion of a family of heretics from whom the terrible Carmathian sect had originated: later on (perhaps owing to the rôle played by Jacob, son of Killis, in bringing the Fatimites to Egypt), the founder was made out to have been a Jew, either as having been adopted by the heretic supposed to be his father, or as having been made to personate the real ‘Obaidallah, who had been killed in captivity. While the stories that make him of either Jewish or Carmathian origin may be neglected, as the product of malice, the uncertainty of the genealogies offered by their partisans renders any positive solution of the problem impossible. What seems to be clear is that secretly within the Abbasid empire propaganda was carried on in favour of one or other Alid aspirant, and the danger which any such aspirant incurred by coming forward openly led to his whereabouts being concealed except from a very few adherents. What is known then is that towards the end of the 3rd Islamic century the leader of the sect of Ismā‘ī-lites (Assassins,q.v.) who afterwards mounted a throne, lived at Salamia, near Emesa (Homs), having agents spread over Arabia, Persia and Syria, and frequently receiving visits from pious adherents, who had been on pilgrimage to the grave of Hosain (Ḥusain). Such visitors received directions and orders such as are usual in secret societies. One of these agents, Abū Abdallah al-Hosain called al-Shī‘ī, said to have filled the office of censor (muhtasib) at Basra, received orders to carry on a mission in Arabia, and at Mecca is said to have made the acquaintance of some members of the Berber tribe Kutama, south of the bay of Bougie. These persons persuaded him to travel home with them in the character of teacher of the Koran, but according to some authorities the ground had already been prepared there for a political mission. He arrived in the Kutama country in June 893, and appears very soon to have been made chief, thereby exciting the suspicion of the Aghlabite ruler of Kairawān, Ibrāhīm b. Aḥmad, which, however, was soon allayed. His success provoked a civil war among the Berbers, but he was protected by a chief named Ḥasan b. Hārūn, and displayed sufficient military ability to win respect. Nine years after his arrival he made use of the unrest following on the death of the Aghlabite Ibrāhīm to attack the town of Mila, which he took by treachery, and turned into his capital; the son and successor of Ibrāhīm, Abu’l-‘Abbās ‘Abdallah, sent his son al-Aḥwal to deal with the new power, and he defeated al-Shī‘ī in some battles, but in 903 al-Aḥwal was recalled by his brother Ziyādatallah, who had usurped the throne, and put to death.
At some time after his first successes al-Shī‘ī sent a messenger (apparently his brother) to the head of his sect at Salamia, bidding him come to the Kutama country, and place himself at the head of affairs, since al-Shī‘ī’s followers had been taught to pay homage to a Mahdī who would at some time be shown them. It is said that ‘Obaidallah, who now held this post, was known to the court at Bagdad, and that on the news of his departure orders were sent to the governor of Egypt to arrest him; but by skilful simulation ‘Obaidallah succeeded in escaping this danger, and with his escort reached Tripoli safely. Instructions had by this time reached the Aghlabite Ziyādatallah to be on the watch for the Mahdī, who was finally arrested at Sijilmāsa (Tafilalt) in the yearA.H.292 (A.D.905); his companion, al-Shī‘ī’s brother, had been arrested at an earlier point, and the Mahdī’s journey to the south-west must have been to elude pursuit.
The invitation to the Mahdī turned out to have been premature; for Ziyādatallah had sent a powerful army to oppose al-Shī‘ī, which, making Constantine its headquarters, had driven al-Shī‘ī into the mountains: after six months al-Shī‘ī secured an opportunity for attacking it, and won a complete victory. Early in 906 another army was sent to deal with al-Shī‘ī, and an earnest appeal came from the caliph Muqtafī (Moktafi), addressed to all the Moslems of Africa, to aid Ziyādatallah against the usurper. The operations of the Aghlabite prince were unproductive of any decided result, and by September 906 al-Shī‘ī had got possession of the important fortress Tubna and some others. Further forces were immediately sent to the front by Ziyādatallah, but these were defeated by al-Shī‘ī and his officers, to whom other towns capitulated, till Ziyādatallah found it prudent to retire from Al-Urbus or Laribus, which had been his headquarters, and entrench himself in Raqqāda, one of the two capitals of his kingdom, Kairawān being the other. Ziyādatallah is charged by the chroniclers with dissoluteness and levity, and even cowardice: after his retreat the fortresses and towns in what now constitute the department of Constantine and in Tunisia fell fast into al-Shī‘ī’s hands, and he was soon able to threaten Raqqāda itself.
By March 909 Raqqāda had become untenable, and Ziyādatallah resolved to flee from his kingdom; taking with him his chief possessions, he made for Egypt, and thence to ‘Irak: his final fate is uncertain. The cities Raqqāda and Kairawān were immediately occupied by Al-Shī‘ī, who proceeded to send governors to the other places of importance in what had been the Aghlabite kingdom, and to strike new coins, which, however, bore no sovereign’s name. Orders were given that the Shī‘ite peculiarities should be introduced into public worship.
In May 909 al-Shī‘ī led a tremendous army westwards to the kingdom of Tahert, where he put an end to the Rustamite dynasty, and appointed a governor of his own: he thence proceeded to Sijilmāsa where ‘Obaidallah lay imprisoned, with the intention of releasing him and placing him on the throne. After a brief attempt at resistance, the governor fled, and al-Shī‘ī entered the city, released ‘Obaidallah and presented him to the army as the long-promised Imām. The day is given as the 26th of August 909. ‘Obaidallah had been in prison more than three years. Whether his identity with the Mahdī for whom al-Shī‘ī had been fighting was known to the governor of Sijilmāsa is uncertain. If it was, the governor and his master the Aghlabite sovereign might have been expected to make use of their knowledge and outwit al-Shī‘ī by putting his Mahdī to death. Opponents of the Fatimites assert that this was actually done, and that the Mahdī presented to the army was not the real ‘Obaidallah, but (as usual) a Jewish captive, who had been suborned to play the rôle.
The chief command was now assumed by ‘Obaidallah, who took the title “al-Mahdī, Commander of the Faithful,” thereby claiming the headship of the whole Moslem world: Raqqādawas at the first made the seat of the court, and the Shī‘īte doctrines were enforced on the inhabitants, not without encountering some opposition. Revolts which arose in different parts of the Aghlabite kingdom were, however, speedily quelled.
The course followed by ‘Obaidallah in governing independently of al-Shī‘ī soon led to dissatisfaction on the part of the latter, who, urged on it is said by his brother, decided to dethrone their Mahdī, and on the occasion of an expedition to Ténés, which al-Shī‘ī- commanded, organized a conspiracy with that end. The conspiracy was betrayed to ‘Obaidallah, who took steps to defeat it, and on the last day of July 911 contrived to assassinate both al-Shī‘ī and his brother. Thus the procedure which had characterized the accession of the ‘Abbāsid dynasty was repeated. It has been conjectured that these assassinations lost the Fatimites the support of the organization that continued to exist in the East, whence the Carmathians figure as an independent and even hostile community, though they appear to have been amenable to the influence of the African caliph.
‘Obaidallah had now to face the dissatisfaction of the tribes whose allegiance al-Shī‘ī had won, especially the Kutāma, Zenāta and Lawāta: the uprising of the first assumed formidable proportions, and they even elected a Mahdī of their own, one Kādū b. Mu‘ārik al-Māwatī, who promulgated a new revelation for their guidance. They were finally defeated by ‘Obaidallah’s son Abu’l-Qāsim Mahommed, who took Constantine, and succeeded in capturing the new Mahdī, whom he brought to Raqqāda. Other opponents were got rid of by ‘Obaidallah by ruthless executions. By the middle of the year 913 by his own and his son’s efforts he had brought his kingdom into order. After the style of most founders of dynasties he then selected a site for a new capital, to be called after his title Mahdia (q.v.), on a peninsula called Ḥamma (Cape Africa) S.S.E. of Kairawān. Eight years were spent in fortifying this place, which in 921 was made the capital of the empire.
After defeating internal enemies ‘Obaidallah turned his attention to the remaining ‘Abbāsid possessions in Africa, and his general Habāsah b. Yūsuf in the year 913 advanced along the northern coast, taking various places, including the important town of Barca, his progress, it is said, being marked by great cruelty. He then advanced towards Egypt, and towards the end of July 914, being reinforced by Abu’l-Qāsim, afterwards al-Qā’im, entered Alexandria. The danger led to measures of unusual energy being taken by the Bagdad caliph Moqtadir, an army being sent to Egypt under Mu‘nis, and a special post being organized between that country and Bagdad to convey messages uninterruptedly. The Fatimite forces were defeated, partly owing to the insubordination of the general Habāsah, in the winter of 914, and returned to Barca and Kairawān with great loss.
A second expedition was undertaken against Egypt in the year 919, and on the 10th of July Alexandria was entered by Abu’l-Qāsim, who then advanced southward, seizing the Fayum and Ushmūnain (Eshmunain). He was presently reinforced by a fleet, which, however, was defeated at Rosetta in March of the year 920 by a fleet despatched from Tarsus by the ‘Abbāsid caliph Moqtadir, most of the vessels being burned. Through the energetic measures of the caliph, who sent repeated reinforcements to Fostat, Abu’l-Qāsim was compelled in the spring of 921 to evacuate the places which he had seized, and return to the west with the remains of his army, which had suffered much from plague as well as defeat on the field. On his return he found that the court had migrated from Raqqāda to the new capital Mahdia (q.v.). Meanwhile other expeditions had been despatched by ‘Obaidallah towards the west, and Nekor (Nakur) and Fez had been forced to acknowledge his sovereignty.
The remaining years of ‘Obaidallah’s reign were largely spent in dealing with uprisings in various parts of his dominions, the success of which at times reduced the territory in which he was recognized to a small area.
‘Obaidallah died on the 4th of March 933, and was succeeded by Abu’l-Qāsim, who took the title al-Qā’im biamr allah. He immediately after his accession occupied himself with the reconquest of Fez and Nekor, which had revolted during the last years of the former caliph. He also despatched a fleet under Ya‘qūb b. Isḥāq, which ravaged the coast of France, took Genoa, and plundered the coast of Calabria before returning to Africa. A third attempt made by him to take Egypt resulted in a disastrous defeat at Dhāt al-Humān, after which the remains of the expedition retreated in disorder to Barca.
The later years of the reign of Qā’im were troubled by the uprising of Abū Yazīd Makhlad al-Zenātī, a leader who during the former reign had acquired a following among the tribes inhabiting the Jebel Aures, including adherents of the ‘Ibādī sect. After having fled for a time to Mecca, this person returned in 937 to Tauzar (Touzer), the original seat of his operations, and was imprisoned by Qā’im’s order. His sons, aided by the powerful tribe Zenāta, succeeded in forcing the prison, and releasing their father, who continued to organize a conspiracy on a vast scale, and by the end of 943 was strong enough to take the field against the Fatimite sovereign, whom he drove out of Kairawān. Abū Yazīd proclaimed himself a champion of Sunnī doctrine against the Shī‘is, and ordered the legal system of Malik to be restored in place of that introduced by the Fatimites. Apparently the doctrines of the latter has as yet won little popularity, and Abū Yazīd won an enormous following, except among the Kutāma, who remained faithful to Qā’im. On the last day of October 944, an engagement was fought between Kairawān and Mahdia at a place called al-Akhawān, which resulted in the rout of Qā’im’s forces, and the caliph’s being shortly after shut up in his capital, the suburbs of which he defended by a trench. Abū Yazīd’s forces were ill-suited to maintain a protracted siege, and since, owing to the former caliph’s forethought, the capital was in a condition to hold out for a long time, many of them deserted and the besiegers gained no permanent advantage. After the siege had lasted some ten months Abū Yazīd was compelled to raise it (September 945); the struggle, however, did not end with that event, and for a time the caliph and Abū Yazīd continued to fight with varying fortune, while anarchy prevailed over most of the caliph’s dominions. On the 13th of January 946, Abū Yazīd shut up Qā’im’s forces in Susa which he began to besiege, and attempted to take by storm.
On the 18th of May 945, while Abū Yazīd was besieging Susa, the caliph al-Qā’im died at Mahdia, and was succeeded by his son Ismā’īl, who took the title Manṣūr. He almost immediately relieved Susa by sending a fleet, which joining with the garrison inflicted a severe defeat on Abū Yazīd, who had to evacuate Kairawān also; but though the cities were mainly in the hands of Fatimite prefects, Abū Yazīd was able to maintain the field for more than two years longer, while his followers were steadily decreasing in numbers, and he was repeatedly driven into fastnesses of the Sahara. In August 947 his last stronghold was taken, and he died of wounds received in defending it. His sons carried on some desultory warfare against Manṣūr after their father’s death. A town called Manṣūra or Ṣābrā was built adjoining Kairawān to celebrate the decisive victory over Abū Yazīd, which, however, did not long preserve its name. The exhausted condition of north-west Africa due to the protracted civil war required some years of peace for recuperation, and further exploits are not recorded for Manṣūr, who died on the 19th of March 952.
His son, Abū Tamīm Ma‘add, was twenty-two years of age at the time, and succeeded his father with the title Mo‘izz lidīn allah. His authority was acknowledged over the greater part of the region now constituting Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia, as well as Sicily, and he appears to have had serious thoughts of endeavouring to annex Spain. At an early period in his reign he made Jauhar, who had been secretary under the former caliph, commander of the forces, and the services rendered by this person to the dynasty made him count as its second founder after al-Shī‘ī. In the years 958 and 959 he was sent westwards to reduce Fez and other places where the authority of the Fatimite caliph had been repudiated, and after a successful expedition advanced as far as the Atlantic. As early as 966 the plan ofattempting a fresh invasion of Egypt was conceived, and preparations made for its execution; but it was delayed, it is said at the request of the caliph’s mother, who wished to make a pilgrimage to Mecca first; and her honourable treatment by Kāfūr when she passed through Egypt induced the caliph to postpone the invasion till that sovereign’s death.
In August 972 Mo‘izz resolved to follow Jauhar’s pressing invitation to enter his new capital Cairo. With his arrival there the centre of the Fatimite power was transferred from Mahdia and Kairawān to Egypt, and their original dominion became a province called al-Maghrib, which immediately fell into the hands of a hereditary dynasty, the Zeirids, acknowledging Fatimite suzerainty. The first sovereign was Bulukkīn, also called Abu’l-Futūḥ Yūsuf, appointed by Mo‘izz as his viceroy on the occasion of his departure for Egypt: separate prefects were appointed for Sicily and Tripoli; and at the first the minister of finance was to be an official independent of the governor of the Maghrib. On the death of Bulukkīn in 984 he was succeeded by a son who took the royal title al-Manṣūr, under whose rule an attempt was made by the Kutāma, instigated by the caliph, to shake off the yoke of the Zeirids, who originated from the Sanhaja tribe. This attempt was defeated by the energy of Manṣūr in 988; and the sovereignty of the Fatimites in the Maghrib became more and more confined to recognition in public prayer and on coins, and the payment of tribute and the giving of presents to the viziers at Cairo. The fourth ruler of the Zeirid dynasty, called Mo‘izz, endeavoured to substitute ‘Abbāsid suzerainty for Fatimite: his land was invaded by Arab colonies sent by the Fatimite caliph, with whom in 1051 Mo‘izz fought a decisive engagement, after which the dominion of the Zeirids was restricted to the territory adjoining Mahdia; a number of smaller kingdoms rising up around them. The Zeirids were finally overthrown by Roger II. of Sicily in 1148.
After the death of al-Ādid, the last Fatimite caliph in Egypt, some attempts were made to place on the throne a member of the family, and at one time there seemed a chance of the Assassins, who formed a branch of the Fatimite sect, assisting in this project. In 1174 a conspiracy for the restoration of the dynasty was organized by ‘Umarah of Yemen, a court poet, with the aid of eight officials of the government: it was discovered and those who were implicated were executed. Two persons claiming Fatimite descent took the royal titles al-Mo‘taṣim billah and al-Ḥāmid lillah in the years 1175 and 1176 respectively; and as late as 1192 we hear of pretenders in Egypt. Some members of the family are traceable till near the end of the 7th century of Islam.
The doctrines of the Fatimites as a sect, apart from their claim to the sovereignty in Islam, are little known, and we are not justified in identifying them with those of the Assassins, the Carmathians or the Druses, though all these sects are connected with them in origin. A famous account is given by Maqrīzī of a system of education by which the neophyte had doubts gently instilled into his mind till he was prepared to have the allegorical meaning of the Koran set before him, and to substitute some form of natural for revealed religion. In most accounts of the early days of the community it is stated that the permission of wine-drinking and licentiousness, and the community of wives and property formed part of its tenets. There is little in the recorded practice of the Fatimite state to confirm or justify these assertions; and they appear to have differed from orthodox Moslems rather in small details of ritual and law than in deep matters of doctrine.