every orientalist assumption about the east starts with the premise that the europeans were the modern colonizers, and the orientals were the backward subjects. “belonging to a country with definite interests in the orient” has surely influenced the point of view of these scholars about the east. according to the orientalist vision, the orient and orientals were objects of study, and the europeans were the subjects. orientalism was based upon the belief in a basic difference between the east and the west, and deeply influenced by the essentialism. according to this current of thought, human history is divided into civilizations with their own unique and unchangeable essences. the people and their characteristics could be understood by studying these unchanging cultural essences in the ancient and authoritative texts of the classical period (the golden age in islam is a period that goes from the 8th to the 14th century). the interest in the present conditions of the muslims and their current thoughts were not important for a good comprehension. that is why the oriental scholar was typically a philologist. from this ideology originated the abstract concept of the homo islamicus, or arabicus. this homo islamicus was a specific type of human being, had a fixed mindset, and was clearly opposed to the western mindset. in fact, the islamic civilization was considered, in these essentialist terms, a coherent civilization that remained the same in all times and places, from the rise of islam until today. islam was considered the opposite of western civilization, rigid, inflexible, tyrannical, in decline, hostile to outside influences, inferior, and these characteristics were considered part of the essence of the islamic civilization. instead, the western civilization was considered modern, rational, liberal, advanced, and the top of the human hierarchy. “the west”, by defining “the orient”, was defining itself. orientalists believed that islamic civilization reached its prime under the abbasid dynasty during the 8th/10th century, and then gradually lost its energy and vigor. a clear example of this way of thinking can be found in the lecture “islam and science” that ernest renan (france’s most important philologist and scholar of religion) gave at university of sorbonne of paris in 1883. islam was considered inferior, not rational, opposed to the science, and the muslim was fanatical. renan affirmed that the period of splendor during the abbasid dynasty was due only to the scientific tradition of greek antiquity that was been preserved until that moment. this kind of discourse supported the idea of western superiority and legitimized european colonialism.