Holy Prophet of Islam - Hazrat Muhammad Mustafa — Page 26
The Holy Prophet of Islam, Hadrat Muḥammad Mustafa sa. Roman. In its later phases it was more commonly called 'Byzantine' than. Roman, after the former name of Constantinople, Byzantium. . Then a deeper change took place. The empire had become. Christian, not just by formal decree of the ruler but by conversion at different levels. The majority of the population was Christian, although pagan philosophers taught in the school of Athens until the sixth century,. Jewish communities lived in the cities, and memories of the pagan gods still haunted the temples turned into churches. Besides the official. Orthodox Church, there sprouted others which differed from it in doctrine and practice and which gave expression to the loyalties and opposition to central authority of those whose language was other than Greek. . Over time, due to a dispute of authority there took place a division between the Church in the Byzantine territories, the Eastern Orthodox. Church with its patriarchs as heads of its priesthood, and those in western. Europe who accepted the supreme authority of the Pope in Rome. . To the east of the Byzantine Empire, across the Euphrates river, lay another great empire, that of the Sasanians, whose rule extended over what are now Iran and Iraq, and stretched into central Asia. The land now called. Iran or Persia contained a number of regions of high culture and ancient cities inhabited by different ethnic groups, divided from each other by steppes or deserts, with no great rivers to give them easy communication. . From time to time they had been united by strong and lasting dynasties; the latest was that of the Sasanians, whose original power lay among the. Persian-speaking peoples of southern Iran. Theirs was a family state ruled through a hierarchy of officials, and they tried to provide a solid basis of unity and loyalty by reviving the ancient religion of Iran, traditionally associated with the teacher Zoroaster. For this religion, the universe was a battle-ground, beneath the supreme God, between good and evil spirits; the good would win, but men and women of virtue and ritual purity could hasten the victory. . The two empires included the main regions of settled life and high culture in the western half of the world, but further south, on either side of the Red Sea, lay two other societies with traditions of organized power and 26