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Philo in Alexandria and Maimonides in Fostat were the products not of the Bible and the Talmud alone, but of a combination of Hebraism and Hellenism, pure in the case of Philo, mixed with the spirit of Islam in Maimonides. And this leads us to consider the second point mentioned above, the nature and content of what was attributed in the middle ages to the credit of reason.
This document required them, in conformity with Obada's determination, to make known to the populace, by public proclamation and declaration, that any citizen whose house had been destroyed by the fire of the past night would be granted ground and building materials without payment, at Fostat across the Nile, where he might found a new home provided he would settle there and embrace Islam.
By the orders of this prince the ruined Nilometer was abandoned, and a new one built at the meridional point of the island now called Rhodha, just between Fostât and Gizeh.
In Memphis all was still silent, and all he saw in the old town struck him as strangely worn-out, torpid, and decayed; it seemed only fit to be left to ruin, while on the other side of the river, in the new town of Fostat, on all hands busy, eager, new-born vitality met his eyes.
He was commissioned by the governor to bring it back to Fostat. And the fugitives seemed disposed to obey, for the boat lay to. The captain had recognized the speaker as the captain of the watch from Fostat, an inexorable man; and now, for the first time, he clearly understood the deadly peril of the enterprise.
To the east is that glorious cemetery known as the "tombs of the khalifs," which contains many of the finest architectural gems of mediæval Egypt; to the west is Fostat, the original "city of the tent," from which Cairo sprang, while over the rubbish heaps of old Babylon, the Roman aqueduct stretches towards Rhoda, that beautiful garden island on whose banks tradition has it that the infant Moses was found, while still further across the river, sail-dotted and gleaming in the sun, the great Pyramids mark the limit of the Nile Valley and the commencement of that enormous desert which stretches to the Atlantic Ocean.
He had been riding towards it for about half an hour when the caravan halted at the last station but one, on the high road between Kolzum and Babylon. A considerable troop of horse soldiers dismounted at the same time, but Orion had not summoned these to protect him; on the contrary, he was in their charge and they were taking him, a prisoner, to Fostat.
This celebrated doctor was the founder of one of the four orthodox sects which recognised the Moslem religion, and whose followers take the name "Shafites" from their chief. The Iman esh-Shafi died at Fostât when but forty-three years old.
On the eastern shore, meanwhile, the men charged to kill the Arabs' horses were doing their work, so as to prevent any who might escape from returning to Fostat, or riding forward to Doormat and reporting what had occurred. On board silence now prevailed. All five Arabs were stretched on the deck, and the insatiate boatmen were dealing a finishing stroke to those who were only wounded.
This general, on his arrival near Alexandria, received a deputation from the inhabitants of Fostât charged to negotiate a treaty. Their overtures were favourably entertained, and the conquest of the country seemed probable without bloodshed.
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