Wahhabism - A Critical Essay

100 Pages·2002·1.343 MB·English

by  Dr Hamid Algar

Oneonta, New York

CONTENTS

Wahhabism:A Critical Essay ...................................... 1
Appendices
A: From the Writings of ................................................
Muhammad b. ‘Abd al-Wahhab ............................. 67
B: A near contemporary view of .................................
early Wahhabism ...................................................... 73
C: A Shi’i Response to Wahhabism ......................... 77
Chronology ................................................................. 81
Bibliography ............................................................... 83
Index ............................................................................ 85

WAHHABISM
:
A Critical Essay

I

W
hat follows is a modest survey of the history,

the doctrines, and the contemporary
significance of Wahhabism. Persons sympathetic to
the teachings we call here “Wahhabism” might, of
course, object to this designation, for it is a title given
to the movement by those standing outside of it, often
with pejorative intent. Wahhabis themselves prefer
the titles al-Muwahhidun or Ahl al-Tauhid, “the
asserters of the divine unity.” But precisely this self-
awarded title springs from a desire to lay exclusive
claim to the principle of tauhid that is the foundation
of Islam itself; it implies a dismissal of all other
Muslims as tainted by shirk. There is no reason to
acquiesce in this assumption of a monopoly, and
because the movement in question was ultimately the
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Wahhabism: A CRITICAL ESSAY
work of one man, Muhammad b. ‘Abd al-Wahhab, it
is reasonable as well as conventional to speak of
“Wahhabism” and “Wahhabis.”
Two other preliminary remarks. First, in the
extremely lengthy and rich history of Islamic thought,
Wahhabism does not occupy a particularly important
place. Intellectually marginal, the Wahhabi movement
had the good fortune to emerge in the Arabian
Peninsula (albeit in Najd, a relatively remote part of
the Peninsula) and thus in the proximity of the
Haramayn, a major geographical focus of the Muslim
world; and its Saudi patrons had the good fortune, in
the twentieth century, to acquire massive oil wealth, a
portion of which has been used in attempts to
propagate Wahhabism in the Muslim world and
beyond. In the absence of these two factors,
Wahhabism might well have passed into history as a
marginal and short-lived sectarian movement. Those
same two factors, reinforced by a partial congruity
with other contemporary tendencies in the Islamic
world, have endowed Wahhabism with a degree of
longevity.
Second, Wahhabism is an entirely specific
phenomenon, calling for recognition as a separate
school of thought or even as a sect of its own.
Sometimes the Wahhabis are characterized,
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