w up as a persecuted minority faith in a vast empire; its adherents looked forward to a future life, and were not primarily concerned with developing a plan for living in the everyday world. In particular, Christians did not take the reins of political power for three centuries, when they inherited the Roman political and legal system intact. "Render unto Caesar" establishes a sort of separation of church and state in the text of Christian scripture. Even after Christianity became politically dominant, monasticism, an escape from the ordinary round of life, remained a common goal of pious Christians.
Islam could not be a community of hermets ... on the
contrary, part of God's command was precisely that
persons should live in community, should worship
together, should marry and bring up children, and
even should see to it that right and justice prevailed
in the earth among all human beings. The substance
of human beings' obligation to God was to be God's
...