ABSTRACT
The saying that the Middle East is a world in transition is too much of a cliche not to be true. Only the border-zones of this areaIstanbul, Beirut, and Cairo-were drawn before World War I into the modern world, while the Arab countries between the Suez Canal and the Zagros Mountains, between the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean, remained in a sort of medieval existence. When the Arabs marched forth under the banner of the Prophet and created an empire from central France to Samarkand, they also acquired great cultural accomplishments. Nevertheless, as in every empire, after a few centuries of flourishing civilization, disintegration and decay set in. While other empires disappeared completely, the Arab world in this phase of decadence was overrun and kept for centuries in a sort of anaesthesia by the Turks, who have the same religion but in mentality and behaviour are a world apart from the Arabs. The Turkish military and administrative system was imposed upon the Arabs, whose language and customs, however, remained practically unaffected by this foreign domination. The Arab way of life continued in a state of hibernation during the four centuries of Turkish rule. Total night fell upon the Arab world about the same time as the lights of the Renaissance began to glow in Europe, and only after World War I were the Arabs violently shaken out of their centuries-old lethargy. Their cultural and economic achievements during the long period of stagnation were extremely small compared with those of former times.
