Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 16.djvu/621

Rh SECTS.] the eyes of their respective partisans. A further distinc tion between the Shi ites and other sects is, that they introduced the practice of giving the Koran an allegorical interpretation. This system permitted them to see in the sacred book whatever meaning they chose, and was carried out at a later date, as we shall see, by the founder of the Ismailian sect. Under the Abbasids it seemed for a moment that the Shi ite doctrines were about to triumph. We know, in fact, that the founder of that dynasty gave himself out as the heir of the house of All. But reasons of State prevailed, and the Abbasids, false to their first professions, The on the whole supported orthodoxy. Under their reign ortho- were established the four orthodox sects Miilikite, Hanafite, Shdfi ite, and Hanbalite, which even at this day SCCLS &quot; * divide between them the whole Moslem world. They are named after their founders Malik, Abu Hanifa, Shdfi i, and Ibn Hanbal. These sects only differ from each other on a few points of civil and religious jurisprudence. They agree on questions of dogma. It was not, however, without difficulty that orthodoxy succeeded in obtaining the victory. Under Ma mun and other Caliphs several doctors, as we have seen, were persecuted for believing that the Koran was the uncreated word of God. From the time of Motawakkil, however, orthodoxy regained the upper hand. Still, this reaction would not have lasted long, in face of the advance in science which marked the accession of Ma mun to power, if the orthodox had had no other defensive weapons than material force and the assent of the majority. As philosophy made its way in Islam, thanks to the translations from Greek authors, which were made principally during the Caliphate of Ma mun, it called forth in men s minds a movement of scientific curiosity which might have been fatal to orthodoxy. In the tenth century of our era a society of encyclopedists was formed at Basra, who, under the name of Ikhwan al-Safa, or Brothers of Purity, put forth a number of very curious treatises, in which all sorts of physical and metaphysical questions were discussed and resolved in a scientific manner. 1 There is no doubt that these lucid and attractive writings would have led to a great religious revolution, if the orthodox had not understood the danger of their position, and applied themselves also to the study of philosophy, for the pur pose of employing it in the service of the faith. It was thus that, towards the middle of the tenth century, a certain Abu 1-Hasan al-Ash arf, a descendant of that Abu h ari. Miisa al-Ash arf who had formerly acted the part of arbitrator in the dispute between Mo awiya and All, struck out a system in which religion appeared to be reconciled with philosophy ; a system which was natur ally sure to attract all commonplace minds that is to say, the greater number. Ash arism, or philosophic theology (Kalam), was adopted with enthusiasm by the triumphant orthodox doctors, and thenceforth pure philosophy and the heterodox sects ceased to extend their influence. 2 The creation, however, of this philosophical theology had not done away with all dangers for orthodoxy. We have seen above that the Shi a were divided into several sects, each holding for one of the direct descendants of AH, and paying him the reverence due to a deity. One of these sects, called the Ismailian, because it acknowledged Isma il, the seventh Imam or Pontiff of the posterity of All, as its chief, was the source of the greatest disorders in the Moslem empire, and was not far from being triumphant in Asia, as it was for a long time in Egypt. naili- The Ismailians, like all the other Shi ites, believed in the

1 The most important have been translated into German by Prof. Dieterici. 2 See Houtsma, De Strijd over het dogma in den Isldm tot op el- Anh ari ; and Spitta, Zur Geschickte Abu I- Hasan al-Asarl a. coming of a Messiah, whom they called the Mahdi, and who, according to them, was one day to appear on earth, in order to establish the reign of justice and equity, and to take vengeance on the oppressors of the family of All. They also believed in a God of far more elevated character than the God of the Koran, one who was unapproachable by human reason, and who had created the universe, not directly, but by the intermediate action of a sublime being, the Universal Reason, produced by an act of God s will. The Universal Reason, in its turn, had produced the Universal Soul, which, on its part, had given birth to primitive Matter, to Space, and to Time. These five principles were the causes of the universe. Man, emanating from them, had a tendency to reascend towards his source. The chief end of his being was to attain to perfect union with the Universal Reason. 3 But, left to himself, man would have been powerless to attain this end. The Universal Reason and the Universal Soul therefore became incarnate among men, in order to guide them towards the light. These incarnations were no other than the prophets in all ages, and, in the last period, the Imams of the posterity of AH. In the second half of the ninth century, a Persian, born in Susiana and named Abdallah b. Maimun al-Kadddh, nourished the dream of destroying Islam, and thought these doctrines, suitably modified, likely to be highly useful in carrying out his purpose. He devised a system at once religious, philosophical, political, and social, in which, as he thought, all beliefs were to meet and mingle, but and in this consisted its originality a system so graduated to suit different degrees of intelligence, that the whole world should become one vast Masonic association. The chief of the Ismailians, the Imam Isma il, having died, AbdallAh asserted that his son Mohammed b. Isma il was to succeed him as the founder of this new religion, which it was Abdallah s mission to announce to the world. Since the creation of the world, as Abdallah asserted, there had been six religious periods, each marked by an incarnation of the Universal Reason in the person of a prophet. Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed had been the prophets of these periods. Their mission had been to invite men to accept more and more perfect forms of religion. The seventh and last religion, and the most perfect of all, was that of Mohammed b. Isma il, the true Messiah. The Ismailians, as may be imagined, readily embraced the theories of Abdallah. In addressing other sects and religions, Abdallah used special arguments with each. With the philosophers he dwelt on the philosophical principles of his doctrine. The conversion of Christians, Moslems, or Jews, was a more difficult task. Abdallah had established several degrees of initia tion, and it was only by slow degrees, and with the most minute precautions, that he gained a mastery over the mind of the future proselyte. His curiosity was firtt aroused by allegorical interpretations of the Old Testament, the Gospels, and the Koran, and by proposing to him reli gious problems which could not be solved by any of the existing religions. The solution of these problems was not to be given to him till he should have signed a compact, and sworn never to reveal the mysteries with which he was made acquainted. If he took this pledge, he thence forward belonged, body and soul, to the sect ; and woe to him if he made any attempt to withdraw himself from the authority of his chiefs ! The compact signed, the newly- initiated disciple had to make a certain payment, which went to swell the treasury of the sect. The secret society 3 It need hardly be said that all these doctrines were borrowed from Gnosticism and from Neo-Platonism. See on the Ismailian sect Gu yard, Fragments rdatifs d la doctrin* des Ismaeliens, and Un grand- maitre des Assassins au temps dc Saladin. XVI. 75