Bible with Greek philosophy; they adopted an allegorical interpretation of the text. This interpretation was employed for the purpose of bridging over the gulf existing between the rationalistic idea of God and the irrational idea as taught by the Koran. The rationalistic Mutazilist theology of the Mahometans, although denounced at first as heretical, steadily gained ascendancy; the schools of Bagdad and Bassora rang with its doctrines. The Caliph Almamun exalted it into the theology of the court, and condemned the old simple views of religion. The adherents of orthodoxy were horrified by this license of interpretation, for the text of the Koran, in an underhand way, was forced into conveying an opposite meaning, and simple faith lost all support. They, therefore, adhered strictly to the letter and to the natural meaning of the text. Some of them went still further. They took, in their literal meaning, all the expressions concerning God, however gross they might be, which occurred in the Koran, or were used by tradition, and constructed a most vile theology. Mahomet expressed a revelation thus: "My Lord came to meet me, gave me his hand in greeting, looked into my face, laid his hand between my shoulders, so that I felt his cold finger-tips," and the orthodox school accepted all this in revolting literalness. This school (Anthropomorphists) did not hesitate to declare that God was a body possessed of members and a definite form; that he was seven spans high, measured by his own span; that he was in a particular spot--upon his throne; that it was permissible to affirm of him that he moves, mounts his throne and descends from it, stops and rests. These and still more blasphemous descriptions of the Supreme Being, in the same grossly materialistic strain, were given by the orthodox Mahometan teachers of religion, in order to show their adherence to the letter of the Koran in contradistinction to the Rationalists. The Jews of the East lived in so close a connection with the Mussulmans that they could not fail to be affected by these tendencies. The same phenomena were repeated, therefore, in Jewish circles, and the variance between Karaites and Rabbanites assisted in transferring the Islamic controversies to Judaism. The official supporters of Judaism, however, the colleges of Sora and Pumbeditha, held aloof from them. Entirely absorbed in the Talmud, and its exposition, they either took no notice at first of the violent agitation of mind prevailing, or else refused to yield to it. But outside of the colleges men were actively interested in these new methods, and Judaism was pushed through another process of purification.