Two principal forms of state and society stemmed from the Prophet Muhammad. One was the caliphate, his successors who were deemed competent to give both political and religious leadership. Theother was that of a community (umma), a religious body headed by those learned in law and theology who provided schools and courts, teachers and judges. Whereas the caliphate sponsored a version of Islam as a culture of imperial power and courtly accomplishments, in the oases of Arabia and garrison cities of the Middle East, the learned and the holy men cultivated Islam as a religion of law and piety, theology and devotion.

The formal teaching of Islam as a religion embedded in a community began with the Prophet. Later hadith reported that the Prophet used to sit in the mosque surrounded by students, whom he instructed in passages of the Quran. Other hadith recount how he sent teachers of the Quran (qurraʾ) to the Arabian tribes.

After Muhammad’s death, his companions became the bearers of his religious legacy and authority. They preserved the Quran and were the repositories of memories, stories, and the sayings of the Prophet. They were committed to the precedents he had set for ritual, family, social, and legal behavior and were venerated because of their contact with him. For a long period, the memory of the Prophet was oral and personal. Only gradually were the first written records, themselves embedded in later texts, set down.