s upon Christians.

The Shia'hs do not acknowledge the Sihah-Sittah, the six correct books of
the Sunnis, but it by no means follows that they reject Tradition. They
have five books of Traditions, the earliest of which was compiled by Abu
Ja'far Muhammad A.H. 329, or a century later than the Sahih-i-Bukhari, the
most trustworthy of the Sunni set. Thus all Musalman sects accept the first
and second ground of the faith--the Quran and the Sunnat--as the inspired
will of God; the Shia'hs substituting in the place of the Traditions on
which the Sunnat is based, a collection of their own. What it is important
to maintain is this, that the Quran alone is to no Musalman an
all-sufficient guide.

3. IJMA'.--The third foundation of the Faith is called Ijma', a word
signifying to be collected or assembled. Technically it means the unanimous
consent of the leading theologians, or what in Christian theology would be
called the "unanimous consent of the Fathers." Practically it is a
collection of the opinions of the Companions, the Tabi'in and the
Taba-i-Tabi'in. "The Law," says Ibn Khaldoun {17} "is grounded on the
general accord of the Companions and their followers." The election of Abu
Bakr to the Khalifate is called Ijma'-i-Ummat, the unanimous consent of the
whole sect. The Companions of the Prophet had special knowledge of the
various circumstances under which special revelations had been made; they
alone knew which verses of the Quran abrogated others, and which verses
were thus abrogated. The knowledge of these matters and many other details
they handed on to their successors, the Tabi'in, who passed the information
on to their followers, the Taba-i-Tabi'in. Some Muslims, the Wahhabis for
example, accept only the Ijma' of the Companions; and by all sects that is
placed in the first rank as regards authority; others accept that of the
'Fugitives' who dwelt at Madina; and there are some amongst the orthodox
who allow, as a matter of theory, that Ijma' may be collected at any time,
but that practically it is not done because there are now no Mujtahidin.
The highest rank a Muslim Theologian could reach was that of a Mujtahid, or
one who could make an Ijtihad, a word which, derived from the same root as
Jihad (a Crescentade), means in its technical sense a logical deduction. It
is defined as the "attaining to a certain degree of authority in searching
into the principles of jurisprudence." The origin of Ijtihad was as
follows:--M