ABSTRACT
Alan Haworth relates the story of the destruction of the Great Library
at Alexandria, which was said to contain all the knowledge in the world.
The Arabs who conquered Egypt set fire to the library on the instruc-
tions of the Caliph, wholly destroying it. The Caliph reasoned that a
book would either be heretical because it contradicted the Koran or
redundant since it agreed with it. As liberals, Haworth claims, we need a
reason for not burning the library that the Caliph can accept, while we
both retain our own beliefs, in particular our beliefs about religion.
