History of Wahhabism

Wahhabism (Arabic: الوهابية‎, al-Wahhābiya(h)) is an Islamic doctrine and religious movement founded by Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab.[1] It has been variously described as "ultraconservative",[2] "austere",[3] "fundamentalist",[4] or "puritan(ical)";[5][6] as an Islamic "reform movement" to restore "pure monotheistic worship" (tawhid) by devotees;[7] and as a "deviant sectarian movement",[7] "vile sect"[8] and a distortion of Islam by its opponents.[3][9] The term Wahhabi(ism) is often used polemically and adherents commonly reject its use, preferring to be called Salafi or muwahhid.[10][11][12] claiming to emphasize the principle of tawhid[13] (the "uniqueness" and "unity" of God),[14] for exclusivity on monotheism, dismissing other Muslims as practising shirk, (idolatry).[15] It follows the theology of Ibn Taymiyyah and the Hanbali school of jurisprudence, although Hanbali leaders renounced Abd al-Wahhab's views.[6]

Wahhabism is named after an eighteenth-century preacher and activist, Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab (1703 - 1792).[16] He started a reform movement in the remote, sparsely populated region of Najd,[17] advocating a purging of such widespread Sunni practices as the veneration of saints and the visiting of their tombs and shrines, all of which were practiced all over the Islamic world, but which he considered idolatrous impurities and innovations in Islam (Bid'ah).[18][14] Eventually he formed a pact with a local leader, Muhammad bin Saud, offering political obedience and promising that protection and propagation of the Wahhabi movement meant "power and glory" and rule of "lands and men".[19]

The alliance between followers of ibn Abd al-Wahhab and Muhammad bin Saud's successors (the House of Saud) proved to be a durable one. The House of Saud continued to maintain its politico-religious alliance with the Wahhabi sect through the waxing and waning of its own political fortunes over the next 150 years, through to its eventual proclamation of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in 1932, and then afterwards, on into modern times. Today Ibn Abd Al-Wahhab's teachings are the official, state-sponsored form of Sunni Islam[3][20] in Saudi Arabia.[21] With the help of funding from Saudi petroleum exports[22] (and other factors[23]), the movement underwent "explosive growth" beginning in the 1970s and now has worldwide influence.[3] The US State Department has estimated that over the past four decades the capital Riyadh has invested more than $10bn (£6bn) into charitable foundations in an attempt to replace mainstream Sunni Islam with the harsher, intolerant Wahhabism.[24] (as of 2017 changes to Saudi religious policy by Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman have led some to suggest that "Islamists throughout the world will have to follow suit or risk winding up on the wrong side of orthodoxy".[25])