e foreign to
the Arabic speech of Mohammed's time.

Indeed, all the subjects which had given rise to dogmatic controversy
in the Christian Church, except some too specifically Christian, were
discussed by the _mutakallims_, the dogmatists of Islam. Free will or
predestination; God omnipotent, or first of all just and holy; God's word
created by Him, or sharing His eternity; God one in this sense, that His
being admitted of no plurality of qualities, or possessed of qualities,
which in all eternity are inherent in His being; in the world to come only
bliss and doom, or also an intermediate state for the neutral. We might
continue the enumeration and always show to the Christian church-historian
or theologian old acquaintances in Moslim garb. That is why Maracci and
Reland could understand Jews and Christians yielding to the temptation
of joining Islam, and that also explains why Catholic and Protestant
dogmatists could accuse each other of Crypto-mohammedanism.

Not until the beginning of the tenth century A.D. did the orthodox
Mohammedan dogma begin to emerge from the clash of opinions into its
definite shape. The Mu'tazilites had advocated man's free will; had given
prominence to justice and holiness in their conception of God, had denied
distinct qualities in God and the eternity of God's Word; had accepted a
place for the neutral between Paradise and Hell; and for some time the
favour of the powers in authority seemed to assure the victory of their
system. Al-Ash'ari contradicted all these points, and his system has in the
end been adopted by the great majority. The Mu'tazilite doctrines for a
long time still enthralled many minds, but they ended by taking refuge
in the political heresy of Shi'itism. In the most conservative circles,
opponents to all speculation were never wanting; but they were obliged
unconsciously to make large concessions to systematic thought; for in the
Moslim world as elsewhere religious belief without dogma had become as
impossible as breathing is without air.

Thus, in Islam, a whole system, which could not even pretend to draw its
authority from the Sunnah, had come to be accepted. It was not difficult
to justify this deviation from the orthodox abhorrence against novelties.
Islam has always looked at the world in a pessimistic way, a view expressed
in numberless prophetic sayings. The world is bad and will become worse and
worse. Religion and morality will have to wage an ever more hopele