Detailed explanation on the difference in these main madhabs (sects).

A lot of people have a lot of views about these subjects and how they should be handled when informing other people about them. I was advised by well Islamicly educated brother when I posed the question him on whether I can just post this as information and let people be informed rather than pushed towards or sold onto which of these sects they should follow or believe in. He told me that I had to be biased other wise I wouldn’t be doing my duty right. It would be like giving out wrong information on very sensitive topic.

I then struggled with my self on how to really tackle this issue of providing this information in an informative way as possible with out offending or suppressing any one. My key tackle for this post is getting the information out in informational format so that’s exactly what this is, strictly information with no side taking and no being biased. May Allah guide us all insha-allah.

In this first section we start with a look at Wahhabism, at how it came to be and what its sources are in history and in the world. There was questioned asked by me to explain what Sunni Muslims and wahhabi Muslims are and how they differ from each other.

Wahhabism

Wahhabism Arabic: Al-Wahhābīyya الوهابية is the name given to the branch of Islam practiced by those who follow the teachings of Muhammed Ibn Abdul Wahhab, after whom the movement is named. Ibn Abdul Wahhab, who reintroduced (Shariah) (Islamic) law to the Arabian Peninsula, was influenced by the writings of scholars such as Ahmad ibn Hanbal and Ibn Taymiyya. This theology is the dominant form found in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Qatar, as well as some pockets of Somalia, Algeria and Mauritania.

The term “Wahhabi” (Wahhābīya) is rarely used by the people it is used to describe. The currently preferred term is “Salafism” from Salaf as-Salih, the “pious predecessors” as earlier propagated mainly by Ibn Taymiyya, his students Ibn Al Qayyim al-Jawziyya, and later by Muhammad ibn Abdul Wahab and his followers.

Beliefs

Wahhabi theology treats the Qur’an and Hadith as fundamental texts, interpreted upon the understanding of the first three generations of Islam and further explained by many various commentaries including Ibn Abd al-Wahhab’s. His book called Kitab al-Tawhid (”Book of Monotheism”), and the works of the earlier scholar Ibn Taymiyya (1263–1328) are fundamental to Wahabism.

Ibn Abdul-Wahhab went so far as to declare Jihad against so-called Muslims who persisted in committing acts of polytheism such as grave worship .

Wahhabis see their role as restoring Islam from what they perceive to be polytheism and innovations, superstitions, deviances, heresies and idolatries. There are many practices that they believe are contrary to Islam, such as:

• Listening to certain types of music
• Drawings of human beings or other living things which contain a soul
• Praying while visiting tombs (praying to Prophet Mohammed’s tomb is also considered polytheism)
• Blindly following any madhhabs (schools of thought) of Islamic jurisprudence in their legal expertise, “except for one who is under necessity and can not reach the Sunnah.
• Using non-literal explanations of God’s attributes exclusively in preference to literal explanations.
• Celebrating the “mawlid” (birth of Prophet Muhammad)
• Innovations (bid’ah) in matters of religion (e.g. new supplementary methods of worship or laws not sanctioned by God or his prophet.)

Wahhabism also denounces “the practice of unthinking adherence to the interpretations of scholars and the blind acceptance of practices that were passed on within the family or tribe. Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab believed in the responsibility of the individual Muslim to learn and obey the divine commands as they were revealed in the Quran and in the hadith.

A Fading Definition

The term Wahhabi has been often conflated with a lot of other issues and pejoratives. Due to its different representations in different contexts, for the most part, it has lost any real, significant meaning. See this article on the “Wahhabi Myth” for a collection of different usages of this term.

Modern spread of Wahhabism

In 1924 the Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia | al-Saud dynasty (who were influenced by the teachings of Abdul Wahhab) conquered Mecca and Medina, the Muslim holy cities. This gave them control of the Hajj, the annual pilgrimage, and the opportunity to preach their version of Islam to the assembled pilgrims. However, Wahhabism was a minor current within Islam until the discovery of oil in Arabia, in 1938. Vast oil revenues gave an immense impetus to the spread of conservative Islamic theology. Saudi laypeople, government officials and clerics have donated many tens of millions of US dollars to create religious schools, newspapers and outreach organizations.

This theology spread into Oman during the 18th century where it played a role in the internal disputes and succession struggles of the country. Ultimately however, its influence lessened over time despite early success.

Wahhabism is also thought to have had a large impact on the Qatar peninsula. It caught on with many of the tribes of the peninsula and was a motivating factor in the efforts of the Al Thani clan (the current ruling dynasty of Qatar to resist attempted conquest by the Al Khalifa clan (the current ruling dynasty of Bahrain) who rejected Wahhabism. Wahhabism also set Qatar apart from the rest of the Persian Gulf States. This may have been part of the reason that Qatar did not join the United Are Emirates as was suggested by the British at the time.

Some argue that Hassan al-Banna, the Egyptian founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, was influenced by the Wahhabis, although he was a Sufi. The Muslim Brotherhood claimed to be purifying and restoring Islam, a theme which ran through Abdul Wahhab’s preaching, but its goal was not to call to pure Islamic Monotheism, but rather to unify Muslims of different madhhabs into its group to restore the Caliphate or Islamic law in Egypt. When the Muslim Brotherhood was banned in various Middle Eastern countries, Saudi Arabia gave refuge to Brotherhood exiles. However Salafis in Saudi Arabia reject the Sufism of the Muslim Brotherhood and other ideas they believe contravene Islamic theology.