Al Makk., i. 198. De Gayangos, in a note, points out that
this was a mistake: for Abdulmumen was grandfather of Yakub
Almansur, and could not be the king meant here. He therefore
reads, "Yakub, one of the Beni Abdulmumen."

Side by side with, and in bitter hostility to, the earlier freethinkers
lived the faquis or theologians. The Andalusians originally belonged to
the Mohammedan sect of Al Auzai[1] (711-774), whose doctrines were
brought into Spain by the Syrian Arabs of Damascus. But Hischem I., on
coming to the throne, shewed his preference for the doctrines of Malik
ibn Aus,[2] and contrived that they should supplant the dogmas of Al
Auzai. It may be that Hischem I. only shewed a leaning towards Malik's
creed, without persuading others to conform to his views, but at all
events the change was fully accomplished in the reign of his successor,
Hakem I., by the instrumentality of Yahya ibn Yahya Al Seythi, Abu
Merwan Abdulmalek ibn Habib,[3] and Abdallah Zeyad ibn Abdurrahman
Allakhmi, three notable theologians of that reign. Yahya returned from a
pilgrimage to the East in 827, and immediately took the lead in the
opposition offered to Hakem I. on the ground of his being a lax
Mussulman, but, in reality, because he would not give the faquis enough
power in the State.[4]

In the reign of Mohammed (852) these faquis had become powerful enough
to impeach the orthodoxy of a well-known devout Mussulman, Abu
Abdurrahman ibn Mokhli, but the Sultan, with a wise discretion, as
commendable as it was rare, declared that the distinctions of the Ulema
were cavils, and that the expositions of the new traditionist "conveyed
much useful instruction, and inculcated very laudable practices."[5]

Efforts were made from time to time to overthrow this priestly
ascendency, as notably by Ghazali, the "Vivificator," as he was called,
"of religious knowledge." This attempt failed, and the rebel against
authority was excommunicated.[6] Yet the strictly oxthodox party did not
succeed in arresting--to any appreciable extent--the progress of the
decay which was threatening to attack even the distinctive features of
the Mohammedan religion.[7] It is a slight indication of this, that the
peculiar Moslem dress gradually began to be given up, and the turban was
only worn by faquis,[8] and even they could not induce the people to
return to a habit once thought of great importance.[9]

[1] Al Makk., i. 403. De Gayangos' note.