science, revolved round theology. There were, apparently, only two
outstanding exceptions to this rule, the academy of Mamun (813–833)
at Bagdad, and the hall of wisdom of the Fatimites at Cairo
(1004–1171); both of these are explained by their environment.
From the earliest times, independent scholars instructed classes
in mosques—the common places of meeting for the community—and
gave their pupils personal certificates. Their subjects were
the reading and interpretation of the Koran; the body of traditions
from the Prophet; the thence deduced system of theology;
the canon law. But the interpretation of the Koran involved
grammatical and lexicographical studies of early Arabic, and hence
of the early Arabic literature. Theology came to involve metaphysical
and logical studies. Canon law required arithmetic and
mensuration, practical astronomy, &c. But these last were strictly
ancillary; the object of the instruction was primarily to give knowledge
of value for the life of the next world, and, secondarily, to turn
out theologians and lawyers. Medicine was in Jewish and Christian
hands; engineering, architecture, &c., with their mathematical bases,
were crafts. Then this instruction was gradually subsidized and
organized by the state, or endowed by individuals. How early this
took place is uncertain. But the individual teacher, with his
certificate, remained the object of the student; there was nothing
corresponding to our general degrees. Thirdly, educational institutions
came to be equipped with scholarships of money or in kind
for the students. The first instance of this is generally ascribed to
Nishapur (Naisābūr) in 1066; but it soon became general in the
system and afforded a means of control and centralization. A final,
and most important, characteristic was the wide journeying of the
students “in search of knowledge.” Aided by Arabic as the universal
language of learning, students journeyed from teacher to teacher,
and from Samarkand to the Atlantic, gathering on their way hundreds
of personal certificates. Scholars were thus kept in touch all over
the Moslem world, and intellectual unity was maintained.
To the democratic equality of Islam, in which the slave of to-day may be the prime minister of to-morrow, there is one outstanding exception. The descendants of the Prophet and of his relatives (the family of Hāshim) formed and form a special class, held in social The Sayyids. reverence, and guarded from contamination and injury. These are the sayyids (lords), and genealogical registers of them are carefully preserved. They are of all degrees of wealth and poverty, but are guarded legally from mésalliances with persons of ignoble origin or equivocal occupation. Their influence is very great, and in some parts of the Moslem world they have the standing and reverence of saints.
See Von Kremer, Culturgeschichte des Orients, based largely on Māwardī’s Aḥkām, trans. in part by Ostrorog; McG. de Slane’s trans. of Ibn Khaldūn, Prolégomènes; Lane, Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians; R. F. Burton, Pilgrimage to Mekka; Snouck Hurgronje, Mekka; Hughes, Dictionary of Islam; Juynboll, De Mohammedaansche Wet; Macdonald, Development of Muslim Theology, &c. For women in Islam, see Harem. (D. B. Ma.)
MAHOMMEDAN LAW. The legal situation in the Moslem world is of the highest complexity, and can be made intelligible only by tracing its historical development. First came the system (fiqh, sharī‘a) which takes the place in Islam of canon law in Roman Christendom. It begins with Mahomet sitting as judge over the primitive Moslem community at Medina. He was the Prophet of God, and judged, as he ruled, absolutely; any decision of his was valid. But he found it, in general, advisable and fitting to follow the local law or usage of Medina when the new faith did not require a change. It thus came about that his decisions followed, at one time, the usage of the Arab tribes of Medina; at another, the law respected by the Jewish tribes there—a rabbinic development of the law of Moses, deeply affected by Roman law; at another, the more developed commercial law of Mecca, known to his followers who had fled thence with him; or, finally, his own personal judgment, stated it might be as his own sense of right or as the decision of Allah and even incorporated in the Koran. In his use of these he was an eclectic opportunist, and evidently, except as regards such frequently recurring subjects as inheritance, marriage, &c., had no thought of building up a system or code. At his death he left behind only a few specific prescriptions in the Koran and a mass of recorded decisions of cases that had come before him. He had used himself, in our terms, common law, equity, legislation; to guide his followers he left his legislative enactments and the record of his use of common law. Since his death there has been no new legislation in orthodox Islam.
With the death of Mahomet began the development and codification of Moslem law. It was at first entirely practical. Cases had to be decided, and to decide them there was, first, the Koran; secondly, if nothing ad rem was found in the Koran, there were the decisions of the Prophet; thirdly, if these failed, there was the common law of Medina; and, fourthly, if it, in turn, failed, the common sense of the judge, or equity. A knowledge of the decisions of Mahomet came thus to be of great importance, and records of such decisions were eagerly sought and preserved. But this was simply a part of a much wider movement and tendency. As among primitive peoples in general, custom and usage have always been potent among the Arabs. The ways of the fathers, the old paths, they love to tread. Very early there arose a special reverence for the path and usage (sunna) of Mahomet. Whatever he did or said, or left unsaid or undone, and how he did it, has become of the first importance to the pious Moslem, who would act in every way as did the Prophet. There is evidence that for this purpose the immediate companions of Mahomet took notes, either in memory or in writing, of his table talk and wise sayings, just as they took down or learned by heart for their private use the separate fragments of the Koran. His sayings and doings, manners and customs, his answers to questions on religious life and faith, above all his decisions in legal disputes, came to be recorded on odd sheets in private notebooks. This was the beginning of the enormous literature of traditions (ḥadīth) in Islam. The collecting and preserving of these, which was at first private, for personal guidance and edification, finally became one of the most powerful weapons of political and theological propaganda, and coloured the whole method and fabric of Moslem thought. All knowledge tended to be expressed in that form, and each element of it to be traced back to, and given in the words of, some master or other through a chain of transmitters. Above all there grew up an enormous mass of evidently forged sayings put into the mouth of Mahomet. At every important political or theological crisis each party would invent and put into circulation a tradition from him, supporting its view. By a study of these flatly opposed “sayings” it is possible to reconstruct the different controversies of Islam in the past, and to discover what each party regarded as the essence of its position.
The first collecting of traditions was for private purposes, and the first publication dealing with them was legal. This was the Muwaṭṭa’ of Malik ibn Anas (d. 795), a corpus juris based partly on traditions, and a protest in its methods against the too speculative character of the books of canon law which preceded it. Thereafter came collections of two different types. The earlier kind was arranged according to the companions of Mahomet, on whose authority the traditions were transmitted; after each companion came the traditions going back to him. The best known example of this kind is the Musnad of Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal. The other kind, called Muşannaf (classified), contains traditions arranged in chapters according to their subject matter. That of Bukhārī is the most famous, and is arranged to give a traditional basis for a complete system of canon law; its rubrics are those of such a system. Another is that of Muslim ibn al-Ḥajjāj, who paid less attention to legal aspects and more to minute accuracy. There are many others of more or less acceptance and canonicity. Bukhārī’s book enjoys a reverence only second to that of the Koran. But in all these publications the primary object was to purify the mass of traditions of forged accretions and to give to the believer a sound basis for his knowledge of the usages of the Prophet, whether for his personal or for public use. These two kinds were a natural development. In the Moslem community there were from the first students of tradition proper whose interest lay in collecting, testing and transmitting, not in combining, systematizing and elucidating; whose preference was to take a single statement from the Prophet and apply it to a case, without reasonings or questionings. And there were students of canon law who were interested rather in the system and results, and who, while they used traditions, used them only to an end and insisted on the free application of speculative principles. The conflict of the future was to be between these traditionalists, on the one hand, and rationalists, on the other; and the result was to be a compromise.
With the wide sweep of Moslem conquest another element came into the development. This was Roman law, which the Moslem jurist found at work in the conquered Roman provinces and in the law courts of which they went to school. It is to be remembered that the Arab armies were not devastating hordes; they recognized the need of law and order wherever
