The State According to Muhammad Islamic Scholars Agree the Prophet Is the Guide, but Not on How to Enact His Political Principles

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MORE than one Arab ruler besieged by Islamist opposition might be tempted to sympathize with the pagan rulers of Mecca in 622, who persecuted the Prophet Muhammad for subversion and forced him to flee with his followers to Medina.

But that flight, which begins the Muslim calendar, is at the root of many of the problems Arab leaders face today. For in Medina, Muhammad became the temporal, political ruler of the Muslim community. From the dawn of Islamic civilization, religion and politics have been inextricably linked. "Political Islam," the bane of governments from Algeria to Saudi Arabia, is as old as Islam itself.

Nearly 14 centuries later, Islamists of all …