Page:Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje - Mohammedanism (1916).djvu/88

 Rh time on, Islâm strove to distinguish itself ever more sharply from its most important rivals. There was no absolute stagnation, the evolution was not entirely stopped; but it moved at a much quieter pace, and its direction was governed by internal motives, not by influences from outside. Moslim catholicism had attained its full growth.

We cannot within the small compass of these lectures consider the excrescences of the normal Islâm, the Shîʿitic ultras, who venerated certain descendants of Mohammed as infallible rulers of the world, Ishmaʿilites, Qarmatians, Assassins; nor the modern bastards of Islam, such as the Sheikhites, the Bâbîʾs, the Behâʾîs—who have found some adherents in America—and other sects, which indeed sprang up on Moslim soil, but deliberately turned to non-Mohammedan sources for their inspirations. We must draw attention, however, to protests raised by certain minorities against some of the ideas and practices which had been definitely adopted by the majority.

In the midst of Mohammedan catholicism there always lived and moved more or less freely "protestant" elements. The comparison may even be continued, with certain qualifications, and we may speak also of a conservative and of a liberal protestantism in Islâm. The conservative protestantism is represented by the Hanbalitic school and kindred spirits, who most emphatically preached that the Agreement