Word: caliphs
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...perhaps it never will. It lingered long and lovingly when it happened upon Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt, but then it moved on?still searching. Yet Nasser came closer to filling the role than any other man since the 12th century warrior Saladin or perhaps the powerful 9th century Caliph of Baghdad Harun al-Rashid. A burly, broad-shouldered army officer, son of a lower-middle-class postal clerk, Nasser overturned a rotting monarchy 18 years ago and brought visions of prosperity to his own country and hope for new unity to a diffuse and frustrated Arab world...
Christian domination over the Holy City ended three centuries later; in A.D. 638, the troops of the Byzantine Emperor surrendered after an onslaught to the Moslem cavalry of the Caliph Omar. In memory of Mohammed's heavenly visit, the victorious Moslems built the Dome of the Rock over the site of the Old Temple. More often than not, they tolerantly allowed Christians and Jews free access to the shrines of the city. In 1095, however, inspired by rumors of Islamic persecution of pilgrims, Pope Urban II proclaimed a holy crusade to reconquer Jerusalem for Christ. Four years later, mail...
...Arabs' empire failed because they lacked the skill of political synthesis. In conquered territory, Arab rulers hewed to the Koran and tended to let the conquered govern themselves. Mohammed designated no successor (caliph); his squabbling heirs split Islam into rival sects. For a time, independent Moslem states retained Mohammed's vigor. While Europe slept, great Arab universities flourished in Cordova, Baghdad and Cairo; in Spain, the Arab philosopher Averroes revitalized Aristotle. After the death of the Caliph Harun al-Rashid in 809, the Baghdad caliphate plunged into civil war; in succeeding centuries, marauding Mongols poured into the Arab...
...intricate metalwork and cabinetry. The turn-of-the-century architect, Antoni Gaudi, resorted in his unfinished Church of the Holy Family in Barcelona to restless linear rhythms that recall the Moorish Alhambra. Andalusian laments still recall an Arab origin, and even the haunting cries of flamenco suit a caliph better than a king...
...Egypt's powerful Moslem Brotherhood, an organization of religious fanatics who want to ban such modern immoralities as pictures of the human form, return to the laws of the Koran. Their aim: to set up a sort of Prophet's Republic, whose President would be declared caliph of the Moslem world...