He was king and priest and magistrate, doctor
of civil and religious law, and supreme referee on all matters whether
of opinion or practice; he was, in a word, the Pope of Islam. Nor did
his three successors abate anything of Abu Bekr's pretensions. The only
power they delegated was the command of the Mussulman armies, which were
then overrunning the world, and the government of the provinces these
had conquered.
Ali, however, when he at last succeeded to the Caliphate, found himself
opposed by the very party whose candidate he had once been, and this
party had gathered strength in the interval. With the conquest of the
world worldly ideas had filled the hearts of Mussulmans, and a strong
reaction also had set in in favour of those specially national ideas of
Arabia which religious fervour had hitherto held in check. It was
natural, indeed inevitable, that this should be the case, for many
conquered nations had embraced the faith of Islam, and, as Mussulmans,
had become the equals of their conquerors, so that what elements of
pride existed in these found their gratification in ideas of race and
birth rather than of religion, ideas which the conquered races could not
share, and which were the special inheritance of Arabia.
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