before the theologians of Baghdad, one of them refused to sign the fatwa declaring him an unbeliever; he was not clear, he said, as to the case. And it is true that such records as we have of the time suggest that his condemnation was forced by the government as a matter of state policy. He was a Persian of Magian origin, and evidently an advanced mystic of the speculative type. He carried the theory to its legitimate conclusion, and proclaimed the result publicly. He dabbled in scholastic theology; had evident Mu'tazilite leanings; wrote on alchemy and things esoteric. But with this mystical enthusiasm there seem to have united in him other and more dangerous traits. The stories which have reached us show him of a character fond of excitement and change, surrounding himself with devoted adherents and striving by miracle-working of a commonplace kind to add to his following. His popularity among the people of Baghdad and their reverence for him rose to a perilous degree. He may have had plans of his own as a Persian nationalist; he may have had part in one of the Shi'ite conspiracies; he may have been nothing but a rather weak-headed devotee, carried off his feet by a sudden tide of public excitement, the greatest trial and danger that a saint has to meet. But the times were not such then in Baghdad that the government could take any risks. Al-Muqtadir was Khalifa and in. his weak hands the Khalifate was slipping to ruin. The Fatimids were supreme in North Africa; the Qarmatians held Syria and Arabia, and were threatening Baghdad itself. In eight years they were to take Mecca. Persia was

seething with false prophets and nationalists of every shade. Thirteen years later Ibn ash-Shalmaghani was put to death in Baghdad on similar grounds; in his case, Shi'ite conspiracy against the state was still more clearly involved. We can only conclude in the records of Ibn Khallikan (d. 681), "The history of al-Hallaj is long to relate; his fate is well known; and God knoweth all secret things." With him we must leave, for the present, consideration of the Sufi development and return to the Mu'tazilites and to the people tiring of their dry subtilties.