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Rh considers the caliph the secular head of the Moslem com- munity, the leader of the believers and the protector of the faith, but bestows no spiritual authority on him. In opposi- tion to that the Shiite view confines the imamate to the family of Ah and makes the imam not only the sole legitimate head of the Moslem society but also the spiritual and religious leader whose authority is derived from a divine ordinance. Extremist Shiites went so far as to consider the imam the incarnation of the deity. Shiism germinated most success- fully in Iraq, but Syria and Lebanon still contain nearly a quarter million, fragmented into several minor sects and heterodoxies. Like a magnet Shiism attracted to itself all sorts of nonconformists and malcontents — economic, social, political and religious.

No sooner had the awe inspired by Islam worn off than male and female professional singers and musicians began to make their appearance. In the Umayyad era Mecca and, more particularly, Medina became a nursery of song and a conservatory of music. They attracted gifted artists from outside and supplied the Damascus court with an ever- increasing stream of talent. The second Umayyad caliph, Yazid I, himself a composer, introduced singing and musical instruments into the court. Other Umayyads — except the austere and puritanical Umar II — followed suit. So wide- spread was the cultivation of musical art under the Umayyads that it provided their rivals, the Abbasid party, with an effective argument in their propaganda aimed at under- mining the house of the 'ungodly usurpers'.

Moslem hostility towards representational art does not manifest itself in Umayyad times. The caliphs had Christian painters decorate their palaces with mural frescoes and mosaics which combine Nabataean, Syrian, Byzantine and Sasanid motifs. They depict royal enemies of the Arabs, hunting scenes, nude dancers, musicians and merrymakers. The fringes of the Syrian Desert, especially in its southern part, are strewn with remains of palaces and hunting lodges Rh