Islâm, was completed by submitting the whole to a peculiar treatment. It
was carefully divested of all marks of origin and labelled _hadîth_,[1]
so that henceforth it was regarded as emanations from the wisdom of the
Arabian Prophet, for which his followers owed no thanks to foreigners.

[Footnote 1: _Hadîth_, the Arabic word for record, story, has assumed
the technical meaning of "tradition" concerning the words and deeds of
Mohammed. It is used as well in the sense of a single record of this sort
as in that of the whole body of sacred traditions.]

At first, it was only at Medina that some pious people occupied themselves
with registering, putting in order, and systematizing the spiritual
property of Islâm; afterwards similar circles were formed in other centres,
such as Mecca, Kufa, Basra, Misr (Cairo), and elsewhere. At the outset
the collection of divine sayings, the Qorân, was the only guide, the only
source of decisive decrees, the only touchstone of what was true or false,
allowed or forbidden. Reluctantly, but decidedly at last, it was conceded
that the foundations laid by Mohammed for the life of his community were
by no means all to be found in the Holy Book; rather, that Mohammed's
revelations without his explanation and practice would have remained an
enigma. It was understood now that the rules and laws of Islâm were founded
on God's word and on the Sunnah, _i.e._, the "way" pointed out by the
Prophet's word and example. Thus it had been from the moment that Allah had
caused His light to shine over Arabia, and thus it must remain, if human
error was not to corrupt Islâm.

At the moment when this conservative instinct began to assert itself among
the spiritual leaders, so much foreign matter had already been incorporated
into Islâm, that the theory of the sufficiency of Qorân and Sunnah could
not have been maintained without the labelling operation which we have