Michel (Mīshīl) ʿAflaq (c. 1910-89) was a Syrian philosopher and principal founder of the Arab nationalist Baʿth ("Renaissance") Party. He was born in Damascus to a Greek Orthodox family. His father, a grain trader in the Mīdān, was an early supporter of Arab nationalism. A scholarship enabled ʿAflaq to study for five years, from 1928 to 1932, at the Sorbonne, in Paris, where he obtained a licence in history. Deeply interested in political philosophy, he read Proudhon and Marx, as well as Sorel, Bergson, and Maurras. Together with Ṣalāḥ