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A biography on the founder of the Wahhabi movement and first Saudi state
List of contents
INTRODUCTION 1 THE WAHHABI PHENOMENONContested Origins
Divisive Sect or New Orthodoxy?
Backward-Looking or Ahead of Its Time?
Religious Universalism and Political Particularism
Sources of a Controversial History
2 AGITATOR FOR GODScion of a Small Town Culture
Regional Travel and Early Influences
Response to an Ecumenical Challenge?
Narrow Window on the Wider Islamic World
Relaunching the Campaign for Godliness
The al-'Uyayna Years
3 GUIDE OF THE COMMUNITYAlliance with the Al Sa'ud of al-Dir'iyya
Overturning the Status Quo
The Battle for Najd
Later Career
Personality
4 CHAMPION OF TRUE BELIEFIbn 'Abd al-Wahhab's Writings
Assertion of Orthodoxy
Oneness of God
Tawhid in Action
Friends, Enemies, and the Fifth Column
A Community Apart
5 IDEOLOGUE OF STRUGGLEExcommunication (
Takfir)
Secondary
Takfir and Emigration (
Hijra)
Jihad 6 SCOURGE OF POLYTHEISTSSunni Clerical Opponents
The Bedouin
Customary Law
Takfir of the Bedouin
Tribalism and the Bedouin
Holy Men, Cults, and Sufis
The Shi'a
7 THE REGIME OF GODLINESS AND THE POLITICAL ORDERExplaining the Genesis of Wahhabism
Social and Economic Trends
State Formation and the Regime of Godliness
Commanding Right and Forbidding Wrong
Government and the Political Order
Obedience to the Ruler
Princes and Clerics
Imamate
Administration of Justice
Social Justice
Conclusion
8 WAHHABISM, SAUDI STATES, AND FOREIGN POWERSSaudi Expansion and Conquest of the Holy Cities
Spreading the Word
Destruction of al-Dir'iyya
Wahhabi View of the Ottomans
Saudis and Christian Powers
The Second Saudi State's Uneven Career
Civil War and Collapse of the Second Saudi State
Restoration and Renewal
The Ikhwan and Internal Dissidence
Senior Clerics Become Officials
The Nasserist Challenge and the Saudi Bid for Islamic Leadership
9 WAHHABISM AND RELIGIOUS RADICALISM IN SAUDI ARABIAThe Trauma of Juhayman
The "Awakening"
Jihadism
10 IBN 'ABD AL-WAHHAB'S LEGACY BibliographyFurther ReadingIndex
About the author
Michael Crawford is an independent consultant and writer on the Middle East. He served the British government in London and overseas, including in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Yemen and Pakistan, from 1981 to 2009. He previously gained a First in Jurisprudence and an M.Phil in modern Middle Eastern studies from Oxford. He was called to the Bar in 1978.
Summary
A biography on the founder of the Wahhabi movement and first Saudi state
