the order in which they stand, grouping them,
however, for further convenience sake under their various sectarian
heads, for it must be remembered that Islam, which in its institution
was intended to be one community, political and religious, is now
divided not only into many nations, but into many sects. All, however,
hold certain fundamental beliefs, and all perform the pilgrimage to
Mecca, where they meet on common ground, and it is to this latter fact
that the importance attached to the Haj is mainly owing.

The main beliefs common to all Mussulmans are--

1. A belief in one true God, the creator and ordainer of all things.

2. A belief in a future life of reward or punishment.

3. A belief in a divine revelation imparted first to Adam and renewed at
intervals to Noah, to Abraham, to Moses, and to Jesus Christ, and last
of all in its perfect form to Mohammed. This revelation is not only one
of dogma, but of practice. It claims to have taught an universal rule
of life for all mankind in politics and legislation as well as in
doctrine and in morals. This is called Islam.

4. A belief in the Koran as the literal word of God, and of its inspired
interpretation by the Prophet and his companions, preserved through
tradition (Hadith).[1]

These summed up in the well-known "Kelemat" or act of faith, "There is
no God but God, and Mohammed is the apostle of God," form a common
doctrinal basis for every sect of Islam--and also common to all are the
four religious acts, prayer, fasting, almsgiving and pilgrimage,
ordained by the Koran itself. On other points, however, both of belief
and practice, they differ widely; so widely that the sects must be
considered as not only distinct from, but hostile to, each other. They
are nevertheless, it must be admitted, less absolutely irreconcileable
than are the corresponding sects of Christianity, for all allow the rest
to be distinctly within the pale of Islam, and they pray on occasion in
each other's mosques and kneel at the same shrines on pilgrimage.
Neither do they condemn each other's errors as altogether
damnable--except, I believe, in the case of the Wahhabites, who accuse
other Moslems of polytheism and idolatry. The census of the four great
sects may be thus roughly given--

1. The Sunites or Orthodox Mohammedans 145,000,000
2. The Shiites or Sect of Ali 15,000,000
3. The Abadites (Abadhiyeh) 7,000,000
4. The Wahha