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