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Wahhabism[a] (Arabic: ٱلْوَهَّابِيَّة, romanized: al-Wahhābiyya) is a religious revivalist movement within Sunni Islam named after the 18th-century Hanbali scholar Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab.[4][b] It was initially established in the central Arabian region of Najd and later spread to other parts of the Arabian Peninsula,[c] and is today followed primarily in Saudi Arabia and Qatar.
The Wahhabi movement staunchly denounced rituals related to the veneration of Muslim saints and pilgrimages to their tombs and shrines, which were widespread amongst the people of Najd. Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab and his followers were highly inspired by the Hanbali scholar Ibn Taymiyya (1263–1328 CE/AH 661–728) who advocated a return to the purity of the first three generations (salaf) to rid Muslims of bid'a (innovation) and regarded his works as core scholarly references in theology. While being influenced by Hanbali school, the movement repudiated Taqlid to legal authorities, including oft-cited scholars such as Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Qayyim (d. 1350 CE/AH 751).[6]
Wahhabism has been variously characterized by historians as "orthodox", "puritan(ical)", or "revolutionary",[d] while its adherents describe it as an Islamic "reform movement" to restore "pure monotheistic worship". Socio-politically, the movement represented the first major Arab-led revolt against the Turkish, Persian and foreign empires that had dominated the Islamic world since the Mongol invasions and the fall of Abbasid Caliphate in the 13th century; and would later serve as a revolutionary impetus for 19th-century pan-Arab trends.[e] In 1744, Ibn Abd al-Wahhab formed a pact with a local leader, Muhammad bin Saud, establishing a politico-religious alliance with the Saudi monarchy that lasted for more than 250 years. The Wahhabi movement gradually rose to prominence as an influential anti-colonial reform trend in the Islamic world that advocated the re-generation of the social and political prowess of Muslims. Its revolutionary themes inspired several Islamic revivalists, scholars, pan-Islamist ideologues and anti-colonial activists as far as West Africa.[f]
For more than two centuries, Ibn Abd al-Wahhab's teachings were championed as the official creed in the three Saudi States. As of 2017, changes to Saudi religious policy by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman have led to widespread crackdowns on Islamists in Saudi Arabia and the rest of the Arab world. By 2021, the waning power of the religious clerics brought about by the social, economic, political changes, and the Saudi government's promotion of a nationalist narrative that emphasizes non-Islamic components, led to what has been described as the "post-Wahhabi era" of Saudi Arabia.[g] Saudi Arabia's annual commemoration of its founding day on 22 February since 2022, which marked the establishment of Emirate of Dir'iyah by Muhammad ibn Saud in 1727 and de-emphasized his pact with Ibn Abd al-Wahhab in 1744, has led to the official "uncoupling" of the religious clergy by the Saudi state.[h]
- ^ a b Bonacina 2015, pp. 12–40.
- ^ a b Coller 2022, pp. 151, 235.
- ^ a b Bayley 2010, pp. 21–41.
- ^ Esposito 2003, p. 123, "Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab"
- ^ Commins 2006, p. vi "What is the Wahhabi Mission?... A neutral observer could define the Wahhabi mission as the religious reform movement associated with the teachings of Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab (1703–1792)"
- ^ Peri Bearman; Thierry Bianquis; C Edmund Bosworth; E J Van Donzel; Wolfhart Heinrichs, eds. (2002). The Encyclopedia of Islam: New Edition Vol. XI. Leiden: Brill. p. 39. ISBN 9004127569.
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