Salafi or Die

Modern Islam.

In the past 30 or so years, Islam has been rapidly transformed from a spirituality of tolerance to one that is rapidly dissolving into chaos. The modern Deoband/Salafi/Wahabi/Ikhwan al-Muslameen movement did not start without a cause.

Moh’d abd Al-Wahhab was born in the 18th century in Eastern Saudi Arabia (Najd) in what was then the Ottoman Empire. He thought himself to be a reformer of Islam, one who was making a movement to head Islamic life back to the time of the Prophet Mohammad, pbuh. He believed that the Ottoman Islamic Empire was corrupt partially because of Tasawwuf/Sufi tariqats and because of the lack of Islamic jurisprudence. Abd al-Wahhab was no scholar though, as most writers and Islamic scholars at that time considered him to be of ill intelligence and unable to clearly formulate connections of Islamic jurisprudence.

Wahhab was a follower of the Hanbali Madhab, which was the strictest of all interpreters of the Qu’ran and Hadiths. Wahhab took his interpretations of Islamic fiqh (jurisprudence) a many steps further. One major difference is that Wahhab/Salafi do not agree that graves of the Prophet or Saints of Islam should be visited or that one should call on an intercessor to pray for them. In Islam these two topics are a very big deal.
By making it harram to ask another to pray for you, would make Sufism completely harram. It would also make the rituals of the Shia’a harram. It would essentially make the past 1400 years of Islamic life harram by his interpretation.

During the life of Wahhab, the Ottoman Empire was quite powerful and was gaining more territory in Europe. The British were not pleased by this so once Wahhab was found they had found the hammer that could weaken the empire. Before the time of Wahhab, war between Muslims was unheard of, but during his time he was able to spread much dissent amongst Muslims in the Ottoman Empire that the Sultans would have to quell war in the empire and not continue to gather strength in Europe.

This history from that time till now would prove to be the starting ground of much of the trouble we see today. From Nationalism, thanks France, to the strict interpretations of the Qu’ran, Islam would never be the same, the heydays were over.

Fast forward to the 20th Century. The British, French, and Russians (to some degree) have their hands all over the Islamic world and divided the land up into certain areas with their own names. Egypt, Transjordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, and Turkey. Islamic power would never again be consolidated. Divisions between them began. Nationalism was fervent during the 20th century. Instead of people all calling themselves Muslims, they were now calling themselves Egyptians, Yemenis, Qatari, Iraqi, etc. Now it would be easier for a puppet master to come in and cause more divisions and fighting amongst the people.

In the 1950’s Sayyid Qutb, a secular Egyptian journalist, spent time in Ohio where he began to witness such immoral behavior. He saw men and women dancing and possibly fornicating before marriage, he saw racist segregation. Those two aspects alone would shake him and shake many a Muslim when they visited America. Ironically, up the road from where Qutb was living in the US, another scholar was forming his own distinct opinion based off of what he was witnessing in the US, the NeoCon movement, as inspired by Leo Strauss was taking shape. The Islamic brotherhood movement by Qutb which became the founding teaching of Osama Bin Laden was born from the same thoughts as Leo Strauss, a NeoCon. Neocon George Bush is basically at war with his brother in so many ways.

Modern globalization has only exacerbated the discontent Muslims have been feeling for the past century. Modern Muslims are being pitted against one another by outside forces. Globalization has made the oil producing nations beyond wealthy and caused the poor nations to spin into such turmoil that it would be hard to see the silver lining. Islam in itself expressively states that all wealth that comes from nature should be used for the good of all and not for the few who control it. What has happened in the 20th century is a slap in the face of the Prophet, sws, and Allah. The main perpetrators are the Saudi Royal Family who are wahhabis/Salafis. The prophet, when alive, spoke this about the people from Najd, the ancestral home of the Saudi family.

2 seperate Hadiths. (I have plenty more)

2. "What I most fear in my community is a man who interprets verses of the Qur'an out of context." (reference to Moh’d abd-al-Wahhab)

5. "There will be in my Community a dissent and a faction, a people with excellent words and vile deeds. They will read Qur'an, but their faith does not go past their throats. They will pass through religion the way an arrow passes through its quarry. They will no more come back to the religion than the arrow will come back to its original course. They are the worst of human beings and the worst of all creation. The one who kills them or is killed by them is blessed. They summon to the book of Allah but they have nothing to do with it. Whoever kills them is closer to Allah than they. Their sign is that they shave (their heads)." (The Wahhabi tribe generally shave the head, whilst some amongst them still wear the hair long, which is the ancient Badawi practice.)