Chapter II: Preface

It is with very great diffidence that I send out this book. Of the lack and need of some text-book of the kind there can be little doubt. From the educated man who wishes to read with intelligence his “Arabian Nights” to the student of history or of law or of theology who wishes to know how it has gone in such matters with the great Muslim world, there is demand enough and to spare. Still graver is the difficulty for the growing body of young men who are taking up the study of Arabic. In English or German or French there is no book to which a teacher may send his pupils for brief guidance on the development of these institutions; on the development of law there are only scattered and fragmentary papers, and on the development of theology there is practically nothing. But of the difficulty of supplying this need there can be even less doubt. Goldziher could do it fully and completely; no other Arabist alive could approach the task other than with trepidation. The following pages therefore form a kind of forlorn attempt, a rushing in on the part of one who is sure he is not an angel and is in grave doubt on the question of folly, but who also sees a gap and no great alacrity on the part of his betters toward filling it. One thing, however, I would premise with emphasis. All the results given here have been reached or verified from the Arabic sources. These sources are seldom stated either in the text or in the bibliography, as the book is intended to be useful to non-Arabists, but, throughout, they lie behind it and are its basis. By this it is not meant that the results of this book are claimed as original. Every Arabist will recognize at once from whose wells I have drawn and who have been my masters. Among these I would do homage in the first instance to Goldziher; what Arabist is not deep in his debt? With Goldziher’s influence through books I would join the kindred influence of the living voice of my teacher Sachau. To him I render thanks and reverence now for his kindly sympathy and guidance. Others in whose debt I am are Nöldeke, Snouck Hurgronje, von Kremer, Lane—many more. Those who are left of these will know their own in my pages and will be merciful to my attempts to tread in their steps and to develop their results. What is my own, too, they will know; into questions of priority I have no desire to enter. Foot-notes which might have given to each scholar his due have been left unwritten. For the readers of this book such references in so vast a subject would be useless. Such references, too, would have in the end to be made to Arabic sources.

More direct help I have to acknowledge on several sides. To the atmosphere and scholarly ideals of Hartford Seminary I am indebted for the possibility of writing such a book as this, so far from the ordinary theological ruts. Among my colleagues Professor Gillett has especially aided me with criticism and suggestions on the terminology of scholastic theology. Dr. Talcott Williams, of Philadelphia, illumined for me the Idrisid movement in North Africa. One complete sentence on p. 85 I have conveyed from a kindly notice in _The Nation_ of my inaugural lecture on the development of Muslim Jurisprudence. Finally, and above all, I am indebted to my wife for much patient labor in copying and for keen and luminous criticism in planning and correcting. With thanks to her this preface may fitly close.

DUNCAN B. MACDONALD.

HARTFORD, December, 1902.

⁂ As it has proved impracticable to give in the body of the
book a full transliteration of names and technical terms, the
learner is referred for such exact forms to the chronological
table and the index. In these _hamza_ and _ayn_, the long
vowels and the emphatic consonants are uniformly represented,
the last by italic.

CONTENTS

PAGE

INTRODUCTION 3

PART I

_CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT_

CHAPTER I

FROM DEATH OF MUHAMMAD TO RISE OF ABBASIDS 7

CHAPTER II

TO RISE OF AYYUBIDS 34

CHAPTER III

TO PRESENT SITUATION 50

PART II

_DEVELOPMENT OF JURISPRUDENCE_

CHAPTER I

TO CLOSE OF UMAYYAD PERIOD 65

CHAPTER II

TO PRESENT SITUATION 91

PART III

_DEVELOPMENT OF THEOLOGY_

CHAPTER I

TO CLOSE OF UMAYYAD PERIOD 119

CHAPTER II

TO FOUNDATION OF FATIMID KHALIFATE 153

CHAPTER III

TO TRIUMPH OF ASH‘ARITES IN EAST 186

CHAPTER IV

AL-GHAZZALI 215

CHAPTER V

TO IBN SAB‘IN AND END OF MUWAHHIDS 243

CHAPTER VI

TO PRESENT SITUATION 266

APPENDICES

I. ILLUSTRATIVE DOCUMENTS IN TRANSLATION 291

II. SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY 358

III. CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE 368

INDEX 373

ERRATA

Page 30, line 5, for al-Mukanna read al-Muqanna.
” 86, l. 19, for first Khalifa read second Khalifa.
” 201, l. 26, for _tasalsal_ read _tasalsul_.
” 237, for Mansell read Mansel.
” 267, l. 30, for Haqqari read Hakkari.
” 299, l. 10, for _Mushriqs_ read _Mushriks_.
” 300, l. 4, for kalimatan ash-shahada read kalimata-sh-shabada.
” 325, l. 23, for _wihdaniya_ read _wahdaniya_.
” 339, l. 11, for _ihtiyaz_ read _ihtiyaj_.

Transcriber’s Note: The errata have been corrected.

DEVELOPMENT OF MUSLIM THEOLOGY, JURISPRUDENCE, AND CONSTITUTIONAL THEORY