"The umma is experiencing difficulties because it marginalised the Book of Allah. The umma drifted from revelation because it refrained from using reason, the God-given faculty that enables the acquisition of knowledge, including knowledge of revelation. This transpired under the influence of ulema that had little regard for reason. The umma retreated from reason under pressure from tradition. There was a power struggle between the traditionists and the rationalists regarding the right way to follow revelation. Traditionists argued that the right way to follow revelation was to follow the ways of the forefathers. Rationalists, by contrast, argued that the right way to comprehend revelation was to use reason. Traditionists did not agree. As they could not defeat the rationalists intellectually, for they were not well versed in reasoning, they resorted to violence. They exterminated five-thousand rationalists in 786, during the reign of Musa al-Hadi, in a pogrom reminiscent of the , that transpired in 1792, a millennium afterwards in revolutionary France. It appears that "orthodoxy" was established by force not just in revolutionary France. Sixteen thousand adherents of tradition were put to death at the time of the rule of Maximilien Robespierre and the Jacobins. However, in Islam, it was the rationalists that were persecuted by the traditionists. In a seismic paradigm shift, the umma turned from revelation to tradition, to follow the forefathers, as recorded in the books of traditions. "In the eyes of our honourable scholars there is no question that God appointed them not only as the guardians of His religion but also as the intermediaries between Him and the people, as the translators of His orders and prohibitions, and as the commentators of His verses and rules." (Shahrur, 2009:390). There was a re-orientation from the Book of Allah to the books of tradition, from revelation to the ways of the forefathers. Traditional Islam - based upon traditions - altered the meaning of key words. For example, the word in the Book of Allah, which means wisdom, was rendered as the way of the prophet. This rendering of the term amounted to tampering with the meaning of the term. It reflects an anti-intellectual bias, designed to reinforce , or the unquestioning following of tradition. The bias against reason was reinforced by al-Ghazali, who recommended that thinkers be put to death. By reorienting the Muslims from the Book of Allah to the books of traditions, the misrendering of the term enticed Muslims away from the path of righteousness to the ways of the predecessors. Traditional ulema assert that there is no morality without revelation. This would mean that all persons that did not receive revelation are not in a position to be ethical. Persons that assert that there is no morality without revelation are unaware that it is reason that enables us to anticipate the effects of different acts. Thus, to reject causality is not just to reject ethics not grounded in revelation; it is also to reject ethics derived from revelation. It is not surprising that Bukhari features no books on justice, freedom and reason. The disregard of causality was instrumental in paving the way for a range of catastrophes, for example the Abbasids' killing of Mongol traders. "The immediate cause of the Mongol invasion can be attributed to a grievous mistake of 'Alauddin Muhammad, the Shah of Khwarism. A body of traders who had arrived from Mongolia was put to death, and when Chengiz Khan deputed an embassy to enquire into the reasons for it, Muhammad replied by killing the envoy too. On receiving the news of this outrage upon international courtesy, the Mongol Khakan Chengiz Khan let loose the whirlwind of savagery upon the world of Islam." (Nadwi, 2006:49, 61-73). Muslims rulers could not foresee the effects of their crimes because they followed neither revelation nor used their reason..