I am cancelling posting this week’s “Guide To Islam; As Seen Through Muslim Eyes” as there seem to still be problems with posting.

There are random redirects taking place when we try to access this posting. There are also random redirects taking place when I try to access the posting in which Bill Egnor asked for reports of problems. Could somebody please oblige me by reporting this. Thankyou.

Nur Hussein Ghazali

Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim. This posting is the thirty-second in our series of "Guides to Islam Through Muslim Eyes" and is the second introducing the school of thought of that is often called the "Wahhabi" school by its critics and by westerners. In the first part of this guide Abu Dubhaltach (markfromireland) continues his brief introduction to the foundation of the modern Saudi state and the importance of Muwahhidun/Wahhabist ideology as the foundation of that state.

The second part of the posting deals with Muwahhidun/Wahhabist doctrines and is co-written mostly by Abu Dubhaltach with some help from Imam Aydin. The translation of their document from Arabic to English is mine and any errors of translation or loss of nuance is mine and not theirs.

Umm Fatima.

Introduction: In the immediately preceding posting I said that the history of the Saudi state could be divided into three period and covered the first two periods of the the founding of the Saudi State. I finished by saying that the weak and enfeebled rump of a Saud kingdom seemed to the Ottomans to be not worth the effort of finishing off and that this mistake came from Ottoman transnationalism. (The Ottomans also underestimated the ever-increasing British determination to control the Arabian peninsula one way or the other. The British Empire’s rulers saw the Arabian peninsula in general as India’s western flank and were therefore keenly interested in it being ruled by client regimes friendly to British interests, their support for the Al Saud dynasty dates back to at least the early 1800s and continues to this day.) This “guide” deals briefly with the first interval of the third period — as this is the period in which the Muwahhidun/Wahhabist nature of the Saudi state was determined.

First Interval Third Period

"As a Wahhabi, I could never accept the Ottoman Sultan’s claim to the Caliphate, for the Turkish perversions of the Koran were abominable."

Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud II

By 1891 the Ottomans and their clients the Al Rashid had so decisively defeated the Al Saud that they were able to force them into exile in Kuwait. The house of Saud used this time in Kuwait to regroup and to ensure the loyalty of the Muwahhidun tribes by sending emissaries and preachers to them. In 1902 Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud II led a group of 40 fighters into the on the northern fringes of the Rub’ al-Khali, he hoped that tribal fighters from the tribes near the wells of Yabrin and Haradh would join him. Once 20 fighters had joined his group he decided to attack Riyadh. The attack started on the night January 14, 1902, Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud and some of his fighters scaled the walls and infiltrated the governor’s house where they discovered that ‘Ajlan the governor was spending the night in the Qaṣr al-Maṣmak. They were joined by the rest of the fighters and attacked at dawn when the gates of the fortress were opened. In the ensuing fighting they defeated the garrison and killed ‘Ajlan the governor. The fall of Masmak fort and the death of ‘Ajlan in combat with ‘Abd Allah ibn Jiluwi ensured that Riyadh whose population was overwhelmingly supportive of the House of Saud fell to the raiders. Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud immediately started to repair the city’s fortifications. Once this work was complete ‘Abd al-’Aziz sent to Kuwait for his father, ‘Abd al-Rahman, and handed over the city to him.

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Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim. This posting is the thirty-first in our series of "Guides to Islam Through Muslim Eyes" and is the first introducing the school of thought of that is often called the "Wahhabi" school by its critics and by westerners. To understand this school of thought you need to know at least the most important happenings and dates in the life of Muhammad Ibn Abd al-Wahab (1703-1791) who was an Islamic scholar from the Nejd province which at that time was ruled by the Turkish Ottoman empire. This introductory posting therefore concentrates on giving you an overview of Muhammad Ibn Abd al-Wahab’s life and times.

It should also be said at the beginning that unfortunately the terms "Wahhabi" and Wahhabis have been used so loosely that they have little or no value either as terms of analysis or description. A more accurate term is that which those Muslims who follow Abd al-Wahab’s teachings use to call themselves is — "Muwahhidun" (الموحدون‎) which translates into English as "Monotheists" or "Unitarians". You will also see them referred to as the Ahl al-Tawhid which means, "The People of Unity" or "The Unitarians".

We have followed our usual habit of transcribing the dates used in this posting from the Hijric calendar to the Western one to avoid confusing Westerners. Finally I  would like to thank Abu Dubhaltach (markfromireland) for writing this posting and compressing a lot of knowledge into such a small space. I have translated his text from Arabic and put in the links to English language resouces that he specified. Any errors that arise from the translation process are mine not his.

Umm Fatima

Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab

The Muslims who follow the school of thought founded by Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab and call themselves "Muwahhidun" (الموحدون‎) are Hanbali Muslims who follow the teachings of a religious leader and scholar named Muhammad Ibn Abd al-Wahab (1703-1791). 

Muhammad Ibn Abd al-Wahab was a reformist scholar from the Nejd province who advocated a return to the Islam of the seventh century  and rejected as harmful most of the developments in Islam since that period. The movement comprising his followers emerged during the eighteenth century in the Arabian Peninsula in what is now Saudi Arabia and eventually conquered it. The state known as Saudi Arabia is completely dominated by Muwahhidun and is the direct religious and political descendent of the state called "The First Saudi State" founded in 1744 as a result of an alliance between  Muhammad Ibn Abd al-Wahab and Muhammad bin Saud. In a very real sense therefore the history of the "Muwahhidun" is also the history of Saudi Arabia.

The First Saudi State was established in the year 1744 (1157 A.H.) when leader Sheikh Muhammad ibn Abd al Wahhab settled in Diriyah and Prince Muhammad Ibn Saud agreed to support and espouse his cause, with a view to cleansing the Islamic faith from distortions. The House of Saud with other allies rose to become the dominant state in Arabia controlling most of the Najd, but not either coast.This Saudi state lasted for about seventy-five years.

Source: The Kingdom – History of Saudi Arabia

See also: The First and Second Saudi States

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Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim. In this the thirtieth of the Guides to Islam “seen through Muslim eyes” and the last dealing with Sufism I look briefly at some recent developments in Sufism

Nur Hussein Ghazali

In reaction to Western encroachment and hegemonism many Muslims are seeking an Islamic revival, the methods by which they have sought to achieve this range from those whose response has been in the political arena to those who seek to revive Islam’s inner life. Some of the more politically minded revivalists have been hostile to Sufism which they see as a peasant religiosity  embodying superstition and un-Islamic elements imported from other cultures. Notwithstanding this hostility and attempted scapegoating Sufism has experienced a considerable revival. In part this is because Muslims can see that the western orientation of many reformers and political activists remains just as much a recipe for failure today as it was when it was first mooted during the colonial era.

The Sufic revival in the Islamic world has been paralleled by the spread of Sufi teachings in the West, particularly in America. An early example of this was the introduction of "drunken" Sufi teachings in the early 1900s by Inayat Khan (1882–1927) and his son Pir Vilayet Inayat Khan (1916–2004). In contrast to America in Europe "sober" Sufism gained great traction in the early days largely because of the writings of the French mathematician and metaphysician René Guénon (1886–1951). Later western writers such as Frithjof Schuon (1907–1998) (who was an initiate  of the Shadhili Tariqa) order of North Africa and  Titus Burckhardt (1908–1984) tried to fit Sufism into a theory of world religions based upon their own theories of universal esotericism. The writings of Martin Lings (Abu Bakr Siraj Ad-Din) (1909–2005) present to their readers a Sufic vision that is both intellectually rigorous and firmly grounded in Islamic teachings. While the Iranian exiled Scholar Seyyed Hossein Nasr (b. 1933) stresses intellectual discernment above all else and insistently points out that there is no Sufism without the Shariah. These writers’ works are dwarfed by the numerous volumes published in Western countries from a range of perspectives and directed at various types of readership.

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Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim. In this the twentyninth of the Guides to Islam "seen through Muslim eyes" and the second dealing with Sufism, Col. Iihsan a Sufic mentor of many years standing discusses Sufism in the light of Tawhid and outlines the two main approaches of that Islamic mysticism called "Sufism" he introduces the concept of Kalām, and gives examples of "drunken" and "sober" Sufic masters.

The illustration at the start of the Col. Iihsan’s posting is the Arabic word "Haqq" which has the root h-q-q and is often used to refer to Allah as the Ultimate Reality in Sufic teachings. It carries the following meanings in both classical and Quranic Arabic:

• (to be) suitable to the requirements of wisdom, justice, truth or fact.

• (to be) in accord with the needs of the situation.

• (to be) true, right, correct, just, proper.

• (to be) genuine, authentic, real, sound, substantial

• (to be)  established, confirmed as fact.

• (to be)  necessary, requisite, justified.

• (to be)  unavoidable, inevitable, due.

• (to be)  binding, obligatory, incumbent upon.

• to happen without doubt or uncertainty.

It can be interpreted as "Right and Reality" "The Truth", "The Reality", "The  Just and Correct", "The Truly Existing".

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Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim.

Introduction: Sufism also called Tasawwuf is often believed, wrongly, by non-Muslim to be a sect within Islam, from  this it follows that they consider Sufis to be the adherents to this sect both the original premise and that which follows from it are wrong. Sufism is in fact an aspect of Islam independent of any considerations of sect.

To paraphrase Ibn Khaldun, Sufism is a way of approaching Allah, a methodology, characterised total dedication to Allah, total dedication to worship, and a disregard for matters as wealth and prestige in favour of the ability to influence the ummah towards a more Islamic way of life.

This guide is the first of a set of guides written by by those with both the theoretical background and real life experience of this set of spiritual methodologies and those who practice them. I hope you will find it informative.

Suleiman Aydin.

Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim. I would like to start by expressing my thanks to Imam Aydin for his introduction. My purpose in this introductory posting is to cover prepare for the subsequent guides on this topic by covering some of the most basic points and clearing up some of the most common misunderstandings about Sufism and Sufis.

Omar Khdhayyir

Sufism, or Tasawwuf as it is also called is Islamic mysticism. It is often mistakenly believed by non-Muslims, especially Western non-Muslims, to be a sect of Islam. In fact Sufism which is better described as an aspect or dimension of Islam can be found amongst Sunni Muslims and Shia Muslims alike.

Tariqa: An order of Sufi practitioners. The word is derived from the word for "path" and meant the spiritual path chosen by Sufi practitioners.  Over the centuries "tariqa" the word came to mean the order itself

Omar Khdhayyir

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Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim.

Introduction: In the preceding 2 guides we covered the classical Sunni jurisprudential approach to Ijtihad. It is often said that in Sunni Jurisprudence that the “gates of Ijitihad are closed” this issue has never arisen in Shi’i jurisprudence because the Shi’i consider Ijtihad to be an ongoing process.

As well as Shi’i jurisprudence this guide also covers modern developments in Sunni jurisprudence.

All dates given in this guide are using the western calendar to avoid confusing a western readership.

Umm Fatima

Shi’i Jurisprudence

As Muslims the Shi’i of course accept the Holy Qur’an as the primary material source of law, as well as the Holy Qur’an the Shi’i also accept hadiths. A difference between the Shi’i and Sunni Muslims is that as well as Hadiths of The Prophet (PBUH) the Shi’i also make use of the Hadiths of the Imams and the Prophet’s family (PBUT).

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Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim.

Introduction: In the preceding guide we saw that the understanding of Islamic scholars and jurists to ijtihad has changed over the centuries and that by the beginning of the tenth century the meaning and scope of ijtihad  came to mean investigating and weighing sources to arrive at a legal determination, and that ijtihad was confined to those grey areas of law, where human reasoning using scripture might uncover the law as intended by God. We saw further that  where there was no ambiguity, ijtihad had no role to play. We saw as well that where there was overwhelming consensus amongst jurists and scholars on a matter that the matter was considered settled and that again ijtihad had no role to play. Despite these restrictions a considerable degree of legal pluralism existed by the beginning of the tenth century.

Suleiman Aydin

Ikhtilaf

This juristic diversity or pluralism arose for several reasons. One of these was that while the consensus opinion was considered as settled law legal rulings reached by a single mujtahid were considered to contain elements of uncertainty and therefore deemed to be merely probable (zanni) as opposed to definitive . The fact that the opinion of an individual mujtahid was merely probable as opposed to definitive and the fact that there was a  multitude of jurists of varying levels of competence meant that there were many and various juristic opinions a situation which is described by the Arabic word "ikhtilaf".

Proceduralism

This diversity was accounted for by scholars by examining ijtihad’s purpose. Was ijtihad a means of discovering the truth or was it instead a methodology for forming a well-reasoned but possibly fallacious opinion about the topic at hand?

Amongst Sunni jurists the latter view predominated. The majority of Sunni jurists (mukhattia) considered that every legal problem had a single right answer in the mind of Allah, and a mujtahid  should try to discover it. However because Allah’s intent would not be revealed until the Day of Judgment, and because humans are imperfect and fallible even the most conscientious and rigorous exercise of ijtihad could result in a conclusion different from Allah’s intent. Nevertheless ijtihad’s result was valid even where it diverged from Divine Intent so long as it was performed rigorously and in good faith.

A minority of Sunni Jurists held that there was no single right answer to legal problems because Allah would not require human beings to carry out His will without giving them objective and conclusive means for discovering what that Will was. Thus so long as the ijtihad was performed with, to use a Western legal expression, "due diligence" the conclusion drawn by a mujtahid was binding on that mujtahid and school.

Both of these points of view allowed for considerable diversity of opinion. What was important was the rigour with which the process was approached.

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Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim.

Introduction: Islam is a religion of Law we emphasise practice as well as belief. In Christianity theology is the central religious discipline and locus for defining a sacrament based faith which is administered by a priestly caste. In Islam and Judaism however there are no priests in the Christian sense of the word the Rabbi, the Imam, the Ayatollah, all are scholars of law.

This guide is the first in a mini-series of guides in which we discuss the concept of ijtihad,and fiqh, as part of and preparation for the guides to sharia (law). We are deliberately keeping the guides on these topics as short as possible as we know from experience that people coming new to the topic, particularly those who are not from a Muslim culture, can find the terminology and indeed the concepts confusing.

Umm Fatima, Suleiman Aydin.

Shariah and Fiqh

In Islam we have two terms that are used to refer to law: “shariah” (شريعه) and “fiqh” (فقه). Shariah means Allah’s law as contained in the Holy Qur’an and the Hadiths. Fiqh means the efforts of Muslim scholars – fuqaha (فقهاء‎) specialising in Islamic law to discern and elaborate the  elaborate the details of shariah through investigation and debate. A key point that you must understand from the outset is that shariah is an unchanging revelation, fiqh, on the other hand is a human endeavour and is thus variable according the society in which it is found, is open to debate, reinterpretation, and change.

Over the centuries jurists have developed Islamic law by using their knowledge of the Quran, hadith, and analogical reasoning with local practice. A consequence of this was the emergence of the major schools of legal thought (madhhabs مذهب). For the Sunni  the madhabs are  — Hanafi, Maliki, Shafii, Hanbali — while for Twelver Shii the madhhab that emerged is the Jafari madhab.

As these schools emerged the Sunni and the Shi’i developed different understandings of who it was who held the power to interpret shariah. Sunni scholars held that the actual temporal ruler delegated this right to scholars. While the Shi’i initially believed that only an Imam (in this context the word “Imam”means any one of 12 infallible members of the Ahl al-Bayt) could interpret shariah because they believed, the Imams were infallible. Following the disappearance of the 12th Imam Shi’i jurists reinterpreted  this tradition as granting judicial authority to the fuqaha as the Imam’s representatives, absent the Imam. In addition to the Holy Qur’an and hadith of the Prophet (PBUH), the Shi’i also use the rulings of the Imams. Ijma (إجماع), scholarly consensus, is admitted by the Shi’i only if it includes the infallible imam’s opinion.

There are two types of fiqh literature:

1. Usul al-fiqh (roots of law). Usul al-fiqh which considers the hermeneutical principles that can be used for deriving rules (norms) from scripture. It a philosophy of law and is important because it is the theoretical basis of Islamic law and the kernel of Islamic orthodoxy.

2. Furu al-fiqh (branches of law). Deals with the elaboration of those rules which govern ritual and social activities.

These structures are combined in the Islamic concept of “ijtihad” (إجتهاد) which means or independent reasoning. Ijtihad both recognizes and encourages a variety of interpretations on all but the most fundamental structures of the law. Only scholars who are highly trained in the sources of the law are qualified to practice ijtihad most Muslims are not highly trained lawyers and so they follow the rulings of legal scholars instead.

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Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim.

Introduction: In this posting I continue the guide to Shia Islam.

In the preceding posting Dubhaltach showed that Shia Muslims are the followers or supporters of Ali ibn Abi Talib (Imam Ali) who, the Shi’i believe, together with his wife the Prophet’s (PBUH) daughter Fatima inherited Prophet Mohammed’s (PBUH) religious and political leadership, and spiritual authority. The Shi’i further hold that this religious and political leadership was in turn passed on to their sons Hassan and Hussein and thus to the Imams. If you watched the documentary to which Dubhaltach linked you will have learnt that the event that defined Shi’ism was the martyrdom of Hussein, his male family members, and his companions at Karbala (Irak) in 681 of the western calendar by the Umayyads. This event led to a paradigm of martyrdom in the cause of justice which is repeated throughout Shi’a history. The battle of Karbala and the martyrdom of Hussein above all other events defines the Shi’i and imbues their vision of the world and their role within it with both passion and tragedy.

Umm Fatima

Branches of Shi’ism

There are main branches of Shia Muslims: the Zaydis, the Ismailis (Seveners), and the Ithna Ashari (Twelver or Imami Shia):+

Zaydis

The smallest group are the Zaydis. They are followers of Zayd ibn Ali ibn al-Hussein and are what remains of the warrior Shia who believed that the imam ought to fight for his rights and be a ruler of state. They are mostly to be found in Yemen, with some in Irak.

Ismailis

Ismailis believe that there were seven Imams. The last being Ismail. They founded the Fatimid Empire and are led by the Aga Khan they are the esoteric branch of Shi’ism .

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