In the doctrine of the Imamat, common to all the offshoots of the Shia'h sect, is to be found the chief point of difference between the Sunni and the Shia'h, a difference so great that there is no danger of even a political union between these two great branches of Islam. I have already described, too, how the Shia'hs reject the Sunnat, though they do not reject Tradition. A good deal of ill-blood is still kept up by the recollection--a recollection kept alive by the annual recurrence of the Muharram fast--of the sad {85} fate of 'Ali and his sons. The Sunnis are blamed for the work of their ancestors in the faith, whilst the Khalifs Abu Bakr, Omar, and Osman are looked upon as usurpers. Not to them was committed the wonderful ray of light. In the possession of that alone can any one make good a claim to be the Imam, the Guide of the Believers. The terrible disorders of the early days of Islam can only be understood when we realise to some extent the passionate longing which men felt for a spiritual head--an Imam. It was thought to be impossible that Muhammad, the last--the seal--of the prophets should leave the Faithful without a guide, who would be the interpreter of the will of Allah. We here make a slight digression to show that this feeling extends beyond the Shia'h sect, and is of some importance in its bearing upon the Eastern Question. Apart from the superhuman claims for the Imam, what he is as a ruler to the Shia'h, the Khalif is to the Sunni--the supreme head in Church and State, the successor of the Prophet, the Conservator of Islam as made known in the Quran, the Sunnat and the Ijma' of the early Mujtahidin. To administer the laws, the administrator must have a divine sanction. Thus when the Ottoman ruler, Selim the First, conquered Egypt, (A.D. 1516) he sought and obtained, from an old descendant of the Baghdad Khalifs, the transfer of the title to himself, and in this way the Sultans of Turkey became the Khalifs of Islam. Whether Mutawakal Billal, the last titular Khalif of the house of 'Abbas, was right or wrong in thus transferring the title is not my purpose now to discuss. I only adduce the fact to show how it illustrates the feeling of the need of a Pontiff--a divinely appointed Ruler. Strictly speaking, according to Muhammadan law, the Sultans are not Khalifs, for it is clearly laid down in the Traditions that the Khalif (or the Imam) must be of the tribe of the Quraish, to which the Prophet himself belonged.