There are four great points of dispute amongst the schoolmen in Al-Islam; (1) the Unity and Attributes of Allah, (2) His promises and threats, (3) historical as the office of Imam and (4) Predestination and the justice thereof.  On the latter subject opinions range over the whole cycle of possibilities.  For instance, the Mu’tazilites, whom the learned Weil makes the Protestants and Rationalists of Al-Islam, contend that the word of Allah was created in subjecto, ergo, an accident and liable to perish, and one of their school, the Kadiriyah (=having power) denies the existence of Fate and contends that Allah did not create evil but left man an absolutely free agent.  On the other hand, the Jabarlyah (or Mujabbar=the compelled) is an absolute Fatalist who believes in the omnipotence of Destiny and deems that all wisdom consists in conforming with its decrees.  Al-Mas’udi (chaps. cxxvii.) illustrates this by the saying of a Moslem philosopher that chess was the invention of a Mu’tazil, while Nard (backgammon with dice) was that of a Mujabbar proving that play can do nothing against Destiny.  Between the two are the Ashariyah; trimmers whose standpoint is hard to define; they would say, “Allah creates the power by which man acts, but man wills the action,” and care not to answer the query, “Who created the will ?” (See Pocock, Sale and the Dabistan ii. 352.) Thus Sa’adi says in the Gulistan (iii. 2), “The wise have pronounced that though daily bread be allotted, yet it is so conditionally upon using means to acquire it, and although calamity be predestined, yet it is right to secure oneself against the portals by which it may have access.”  Lastly, not a few doctors of Law and Religion hold that Kaza al-Muhkam, however absolute, regards only man’s after or final state; and upon this subject they are of course as wise as other people, and—­no wiser.  Lane has treated the Moslem faith in Destiny very ably and fully (Arabian Nights, vol. i. pp. 58-61), and he being a man of moderate and orthodox views gives valuable testimony.

[FN#129] Arab.  “Shaykh al-Hujjaj.”  Some Santon like Hasan al-Marabit, then invoked by the Meccan pilgrims:  see Pilgrimage, i. 321.  It can hardly refer to the famous Hajjaj bin Yusuf al-Sakafi (vol. iv. 3).

[FN#130] Here the Stories of the Sixteen Constables abruptly end, after the fashion of the Bresl.  Edit.  They are summarily dismissed even without the normal “Bakhshish.”

[FN#131] Bresl.  Edit. vol xi. pp. 400-473 and vol. xii. pp. 4-50, Nights dccccxli.-dcccclvii.  For Kashghar, see vol. i. 255.

[FN#132] Mr. Payne proposes to translate “’Anbar” by amber, the semi-fossilised resin much used in modern days, especially in Turkey and Somaliland, for bead necklaces.  But, as he says, the second line distinctly alludes to the perfume which is sewn in leather and hung about the neck, after the fashion of our ancient pomanders (pomme d’ ambre).

[FN#133] i.e.  The Caliph:  see vol. i. p. 50.