Ammianus Marcellinus Quotes
Saracens, a race whom it is never desirable to have either for friends or enemies …
Ammianus Marcellinus, c. 330-395, Roman Soldier and Historian, The Roman History, 380
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
He was located in Syria at the time.
This quotation shows The Prophet relaying a message from Allah. This quotation is often used to explain the reason that Islamic nations often support each other regardless of interests, legality, or morality of the position. If the other Muslim nation is a friend of Allah’s, and one opposes the other Islamic nation, then one is not only standing against Allah’s “friend” but Allah himself might make war on you for standing against his friend. So for Islamic nations like Turkey and Pakistan to even be supportive of anti-terrorist activities against Islamic terrorists is a politically, culturally and religiously very difficult thing to do because fundamentalists will cite this quotation and warn that the policy may well be “standing in enmity” against one of Allah’s friends. For most Islamic nations, their religious culture produces a basic instinct to support other Islamic nations against heretics (the Judeo-Christian West or the Hindu-Buddhist East) lest Allah declare war on them.
Throughout much of Africa there is one party rule, and opposition is generally regarded as being almost treason. Perhaps a partial cause of this is language.
Ammianus Marcellinus (born c. 330, died c. 391 – 400) was a Roman soldier and historian who wrote the penultimate major historical account surviving from antiquity (preceding Procopius). His work, known as the Res Gestae, chronicled in Latin the history of Rome from the accession of the Emperor Nerva in 96 to the death of Valens at the Battle of Adrianople in 378, although only the sections covering the period 353 to 378 survive.
