that was known which was actually stated, and no explanation of the statement was lawful. Thus, when Ahmad ibn Hanbal was examined by the inquisitors of al-Ma´mun he replied only by quoting the words of the Qur´an or tradition, refusing to draw any conclusions from these statements and admitting no conclusions drawn, keeping silence when arguments were proposed to him, and protesting that such examination as to religious belief was itself an innovation. This position was hardly satisfactory to those who had inherited any part of the Hellenic tradition, and it ultimately became impossible. An organic body which cannot adapt itself to its surroundings is doomed to decay. The Islamic state had sufficient vitality to meet the new conditions introduced by its expansion to Syria and Persia, and now the time had come for Islamic theology to adapt itself to the new thought that was invading it. As we have seen, the philosophers al-Kindi and al-Farabi were loyal Muslims, and had no suspicion that their investigations were leading to heretical conclusions, and such was undoubtedly the case with the earlier Mu`tazilites also, but results had justified the orthodox in a suspicious attitude towards “argument” (_kalam_). Now, towards the close of the third century the attempt to find an orthodox _kalam_ appears as a movement which originates with the Mu`tazilites, of whom a section of the more conservative sought to return to an orthodox stand-point, and to use _kalam_ in theology in defence of the traditional beliefs as against the heretical conclusions which were in circulation. Following a somewhat later usage we may employ this term _kalam_ to denote an orthodox philosophical theology, that is to say, one in which the methods of philosophy were used, but the primary material was obtained from revelation, and thus one which was closely parallel with the scholastic theology of Latin Christendom. We have cited the name of al-Ash`ari as representative of the first stage of this movement, but it is equally represented by the contemporary al-Mataradi in Samarqand and by at-Tahawi in Egypt. Of these, however, at-Tahawi has quite passed into oblivion. For long the Ash`arites and the Mataridites formed rival orthodox schools of _kalam_, and al-Mataridi’s system still has a certain vogue amongst Turkish Muslims, but the Ash`arite system is that which commands the widest assent. Theologians reckon thirteen points of difference between the two schools, all of purely theoretical importance.