Sayyid Muhammad Rashid Rida Al-Hussaini | |
|---|---|
سيد محمد رشید رضا الحسيني | |
 Sayyid Muhammad Rashid Rida Al-Hussaini | |
| Title | Allamah,[1][2] Shaykh al-Islam, Imam[3] |
| Personal life | |
| Born | Sayyid Muḥammad Rashīd ibn ʿAlī Riḍā ibn Muḥammad Shams al-Dīn ibn Muḥammad Bahāʾ al-Dīn ibn Munlā ʿAlī Khalīfa Al-Hussaini[4] (1865-09-23)23 September 1865[5] or(1865-10-17)17 October 1865[6] Al-Qalamoun, Beirut Vilayet,Ottoman Empire (present-day Lebanon) |
| Died | 22 August 1935(1935-08-22) (aged 69)[6] Cairo, Egypt |
| Cause of death | Heart attack[9] |
| Resting place | Cairo, Egypt |
| Nationality |
|
| Era | 19th to early 20th century |
| Region | Middle East[7] |
| Other names | Muhammad Rashid Rida |
| Occupation | Mufti,Mufassir,Faqīh,Muhaddith[8] |
| Religious life | |
| Religion | Islam |
| Denomination | Sunni |
| Jurisprudence | Shafiʽi[10]Ijtihad[11][12] |
| Creed | Athari[13][14] |
| Movement | |
| Muslim leader | |
Sayyid Muhammad Rashīd Rida Al-Hussaini (Arabic:سيد محمد رشيد رضا الحسيني,romanized: Muḥammad Rashīd Riḍā; 1865 – 22 August 1935) was anIslamic scholar,reformer, theologian andrevivalist. An earlySalafist, Rida called for the revival ofhadith studies[18] and, as a theoretician of anIslamic state,[26] condemned the rising currents ofsecularism andnationalism across theIslamic world following theabolition of the Ottoman sultanate. He championed a globalpan-Islamist program aimed at re-establishing aCaliphate to unite diverse peoples under a single global Islamic authority.[27][28][26]
As a young hadith student who studiedal-Ghazali andIbn Taymiyya, Rida believed reform was necessary to save the Muslim communities, eliminateSufist practices he considered heretical, and initiate anIslamic renewal.[29] He leftSyria to work withAbduh inCairo, where he was influenced by Abduh'sIslamic Modernist movement[30][31][32][33] and began publishingal-Manar in 1898. Throughal-Manar's popularity across theIslamic world, Rida became one of the most influential Sunnijurists of his generation, leading the ArabSalafi movement and championing its cause.[34][35][36]
He was Abduh'sde facto successor and was responsible for a split in Abduh's disciples into one group rooted in Islamic modernism and the other in therevival of Islam.Salafism, also known asSalafiyya, which sought the "Islamization of modernity," emerged from the latter.[37][38][34]
During the 1900s Rida abandoned his initial rationalist leanings and began espousing Salafi-oriented methodologies such as that of theAhl-i Hadith movement. He later supported theWahhabi movement,[38][33][39][40][41] revived works byIbn Taymiyyah, and shifted the Salafism movement into a more conservative and strict Scripturalist approach. He is regarded by a number of historians as "pivotal in leading Salafism's retreat" from the rationalist school of Abduh.[42][43][44][29][45] He strongly opposed liberalism, Western ideas,freemasonry,Zionism, and Europeanimperialism, and supported armedJihad to expel European influences from the Islamic World.[46] He also laid the foundations foranti-Western,pan-Islamist struggle during the early 20th century.[47]
Muhammad Rashid Rida was born inal-Qalamoun,Beirut Vilayet, present-day Lebanon, in 1865 into a distinguishedSunni Shafi'i clerical family. His family relied on money earned from their limited olive tree holdings and fees earned by family members who served asulama (scholars). The Rida ulama had been in charge of theal-Qalamounmosque for several generations. Rida's father was animam (prayer leader) in the mosque. The family, who wereSayyids, claimed descent from theAhl al-Bayt, specificallyHusayn ibn Ali.[4][48][29]
Rida received a traditional religious education, attending elementary school at the localkuttab inQalamūn before moving to the Ottoman government school inTripoli. He then enrolled in ShaykhḤusayn al-Jisr [fr]'s National Islamic School, where helearned hadith andfiqh.[49] He also earned a diploma ofulema in 1897. During his education, he studied the books and treatises of scholars such asIbn Taymiyyah,Ibn Qayyim,Ibn Qudama,al-Ghazali,al-Mawardi,Razi,Taftasani, andIbn Rajab.[50][51] Rida began preaching at the communal level and taughttafsir and other religious sciences at the village's central mosque. He also taught separateibadah classes for women. Around this time, he first readal-Urwa al-Wuthqa, a periodical that was highly influential to him.[48][52][53] It was published byJamal al-Din al-Afghani andMuhammad Abduh. According to Lebanese-British historianAlbert Hourani, Rida belonged to the last generation of traditionally trained Islamic scholars who could be "fully educated and yet alive in a self-sufficient Islamic world of thought."[54]
Rida metMuhammad Abduh, one of the editors ofAl-Urwah al-Wuthqa, as an exile in Lebanon in the mid-1880s and quickly came to view Abduh as hismentor. In 1897, Rida decided to study under Abduh's co-editorJamal al-Din al-Afghani, who at that time was inIstanbul. Rida suspected theHamidian administration was responsible for al-Afghani's death later that year and left Istanbul to rejoin Abduh, one of Afghani's students, now in Egypt.[55] They started the monthly periodicalal-Manar, where Rida worked as its chief editor and owner until his death in 1935. At this time, he also studiedIbn Taymiyya and his disciples, which eventually led him to embrace ideas including revulsion against folkSufism, criticism oftaqlid, and the desire to revivehadith studies. All of these became foundational themes of the Salafism.[56]
Following Abduh's death in 1905, Rida was seen as hisde facto successor despite privately holding reservations about Abduh's ideas.[57] Rida published several new editions of Abduh's works to make them conform more to the dogmas of thetraditionalist creed than to Abduh'smodernist beliefs.[57] When interest in Abduh was revived in Egypt around the 1930s, the difference in narrative became more apparent. While Abduh's other disciples, Uthman Amin,Mustafa 'Abd al-Raziq, andMuhammad Naji, painted him as a rationalist, Rida continued to ascribe his own beliefs to Abduh's legacy, either ignoring or outright removing Abduh's more liberal ideas from the new editions of his works. Eventually, Rida's narrative became the dominant perception.[58] Abduh's disciples eventually divided into two camps: one, which includedSaad Zaghloul andAli Abdel Raziq, was founded in modernism and Westernized secularism, and the other, theal-Manar party, was based in therevival of Islam.Salafism, also known asSalafiyya, which sought the "Islamization of modernity," emerged from the latter.[37][10][17][59][60]
In 1897, Rida, along withRafiq al-'Azm andSaib Bey, formed the Ottoman Consultative Society inCairo. The group consisted ofTurks,Armenians, andCircassians living in Egypt and called for Islamic unity underOttomanism; at this time, their ideas were consistent with those of theYoung Turks. They condemned the autocraticHamidian rule and European imperialism, and their ideas were distributed inArabic andTurkish viaal-Manar. The society disbanded in 1908 following theYoung Turk Revolution, after which Azm joined theCommittee of Union and Progress to pursue modernism and Rida became a vocal critic of the Young Turks.[61][62]
In 1898, Rida began publishing articles encouraging Ottoman authorities to adopt a new religious strategy within the existingcaliphal andpan-Islamic policy underSultan Abd al-Hamid II. He recommended trainingscholars andsharia judges responsible for issuingfatwas (legal rulings) and discussing religious affairs by standardising the creation of different institutions.[39] In one article, he suggested a World Islamic Congress, which would standardise creed, law, and teachings as its fundamental principle. He envisioned the "greatest branch" of thecaliph inMecca for two reasons: thepilgrimage would bring branch leaders to Mecca, where the caliph would be able to disseminate knowledge; and because it was away "from the intrigues and suspicions of [non-Muslim] foreigners."[63] He envisioned a Congress-published religious journal to counterinnovative andheretic ideas and to share translations of religious works. The caliph would oversee affairs but was otherwise just like any other Congress member. Scholars would compile legal works frommadhāhib (law schools) and adapt them to contemporary situations, and resulting legislation would be implemented by the caliph in all Muslim societies.[63] The desire for a Muslim Congress would reappear in later works.
This global religious society, according to Rida, would pave the way for a spiritual caliphate. Islamic unity required the abolition of sectarian differences as well as the revival of doctrines practiced by theSalaf, the first three generations of Islam, which pre-dated different sects andmadhāhib. He further advocated for a centralising policy that returned all Muslims, schools, and sects to the fundamentals of faith and that united Muslims againstEuropean colonialism. He believed thatshura was a basic feature of anyIslamic state and saw the caliphate as a necessarytemporal power to defend Islam and defend Islamic law, orsharia.[64] Ottoman authorities were unreceptive and at times hostile to Rida's proposals, in particular criticising his suggestion of making the caliph an ordinary member of society. While they were open to considering a Muslim Congress, they preferredIstanbul as a hub rather than Mecca, as it would establish a parliamentary forum in the capital of the Empire.Sultan Abdul Hamid II himself opposed the idea of a Congress altogether, claiming it to be a ploy for Arab separatism andHejazi autonomy. The proposals were also in direct contradiction to the established Ottoman policy on the Sultan's ability to enforce absolute authority.[65][66][67][68]
Rida's denunciation ofSufism and condemnation of theRifaʽi andQadiriyya orders for ritualising innovated practices enragedAbū l-Hudā al-Sayyādī, the Sultan's Syrian advisor. Ottoman authorities began harassing Rida's family inSyria and al-Sayyādī requested that his brother-in-law Badrī Bāšā, the governor ofTripoli, send military authorities after Rida's brothers. They later attempted to confiscate his family mosque and Rida wrote that al-Sayyādī planned to assassinate him in Egypt. Rida's journalal-Manar was subsequently banned in Ottoman regions[42] though the censorship did not dissuade him from continuing to write and publish. In 1901,Abd al-Rahman al-Kawakibi publishedUmm al-Qura, which detailed the idea of a World Muslim Congress for the first time. Al-Kawakibi also set the Congress in Mecca, which was seen as a staunch anti-Ottoman elaboration of thepan-Islamist movement, as he argued for replacing Ottoman rule with an ArabicQurayshi caliphate elected by the Congress. He also condemned Sufism. Rida expanded this idea in a series of articles inal-Manar.[69][70]
Despite rejection from the Empire, Rida continued supporting the preservation of thesultanate during theHamidian Era through the first decade of the 1900s. He believed that the dynastic nature of the Ottoman state was reconciled with the classical legal approach that allowed caliphs to rule through force rather than withshura, consent, and adherence to Islamic law. While holding the Ottoman rule to be based ontribalism, he eventually decided not to rebel so openly against the Empire out of concern that it would damage the only Islamic temporal power. Instead, he focused on advocating reform forconsultative governance within the confines of the state and writing to condemning partisanship inmadhāhib and all forms of factionalism. He continued supportingpan-Arabism and promoted Arab eminence and Islamic unity. Rida believed that Arabs were better suited for Islamic leadership, thus linking Arab revival to Islamic unity.[71][66] He condemned ethnic prejudice,[72][73] strongly believing that racial conflict was the cause of "Muslim weakness in the past."[74]
Rida's resentment for Abdul Hamid grew following the31 March incident and subsequent1909 Ottoman countercoup, which Rida saw as delegitimising Hamid's rule and hisdeposition asGod putting an end to tyranny. After the revolution in October, he visited Istanbul hoping to establish a school for Islamic missionaries and to reconcile Arabs and Turks in the Empire. Both of his goals were rejected and he became a sworn enemy of theYoung Turks and theCommittee of Union and Progress (CUP). His initial optimism about the newly-appointedSultan Mehmed V was short-lived as the effective power focused on supporting the Young Turks. Rida re-asserted his belief that the Young Turks had abandonedIslamism andOttomanism to pursue a nationalistTurkification policy.[72][75][66][76]
When Rida supported the Young Turks, he put aside concerns about CUP's nationalism; by 1909, however, he accused the group of spreading heresy, Westernising Islamic government, and creating chaos. He wrote a number of articles in the Turkish press condemning policies based on nationalism and race and warned that nationalism was a European concept that violated Islamic principles, and would lead to the collapse of the multi-ethnic, multi-racial Ottoman Empire. He sought decentralisation of the Empire without challenging the legitimacy of the Ottoman Sultan, and made sure to distinguish between his opposition to CUP and his loyalty to the Ottoman state.[76] Until World War I, Rida advocated autonomy for Ottoman territories while seeking to maintain the caliphate inIstanbul.[72][77] In 1911, he wrote: "Islam is a religion of authority and sovereignty... Muslims all over the world believe that the Ottoman state is fulfilling the role of defender of the Muslim faith" and that mistakes made by sultans would disappear once European colonisation was no longer a threat.[76]
By the1912 general elections, CUP (Committee of Union and Progress) was the dominant power in the Ottoman Empire and had strong allyships with conservativescholars. CUP maintained its power in the election and Salafi persecution began again, this time on a larger scale. Rida and his disciples were accused of plotting secession and seeking an Arab caliphate.[78] Despite this, Rida attacked CUP members as early as 1910, calling them atheists and freemasons, alleging their exploitation of Islam was for selfish political gain, and that they sought destruction of the Islamic world. After theBattle of Tripoli in 1911 and theFirst Balkan War, Rida became deeply concerned about the imminent collapse of the Ottoman state and worried that colonial European empires would seize power from the Ottomans.[79] A pamphlet inal-Manar addressingamirs and Arab leaders inHejaz,Najd,Yemen, and tribes in theArabian Peninsula and thePersian Gulf, called for Arab unity. It warned of the imminent European threat toSyria and the Arabian Peninsula, which would be followed by the occupation of Islamic holy cities. He also warned that sacred Islamic relics would be stolen and displayed in European museums.[80]
Around this time Rida established the Society of the Arab Association (Jam'iyyat ul-Jami'a al-Arabiyya), a secret society seeking union between the Arabian Peninsula and the Ottoman Arab provinces.[79][81][82] TheEgyptian nationalists, especially theWatani Party, attacked the society, calling it a conspiracy that sought conflict with the Turks, secession of Arab countries from the Ottoman Empire, and establishment of an Arab caliphate. Rida denied these allegations, but later explicitly advocated via the Society for Arab secessionism from the Ottoman Empire.[80][83][66]
He sought to pressure the Ottoman state on behalf of Arabs, urging them to prepare a contingency plan for defense against European ambitions in the event that the Ottoman Empire fell. He corresponded withIbn Sa'ud ofNajd,Imam Yahya ofYemen andaI-Sayyid al-Idrisi of'Asir in an attempt to convince them of how crucial it was. Sa'ud asked Rida to send a messenger to explain the plan from a religious and political standpoint to persuade his followers. Rida sent a messenger along with numerous religious treatises. However, due to outbreak of theWorld War I, his materials were confiscated inBombay and never made it to ibn Sa'ud. In 1912, Rida met withMubarak Al-Sabah, the shaykh ofKuwait, but his relationships with Yahya and al-Idrisi were ruptured by the war.[79][82] Rida was convinced that Ottoman statesmen had developed a "European complex" that threatened the security of Arabs and Turks. He also believed that Europeanisation of the Ottoman Empire was impossible to reform since it was solely dependent on Europe. He proposed that Istanbul be made amilitary outpost and shift the capital either toDamascus or theAnatolian city ofKonya. He wrote that Arabs and Turks should then create "local Asiatic military formations" capable of defending themselves in case of foreign danger, with priority given to defending theHejaz andtwo holy sanctuaries inMecca andMedina and the lands adjacent to them.[84]
In 1913 CUP (Committee of Union and Progress) launched acoup to establish aone-party state under ade factotriumvirate of theThree Pashas, which consisted ofEnver Pasha,Talaat Pasha, andDjemal Pasha. During the years of the World War, Arabs and Salafis were harshly persecuted by Djemal Pasha, a CUP leader holding military and civilian power in Syria. Many Arabists would be court-martialed and executed, and many Salafi scholars exiled, leading prominent Salafis such as Rida andTahir al-Jaza'iri to support the British-backedArab Revolt led bySharif Hussain.[78] Rida condemned the coup and continued to call the Young Turks an "enemy of Arabs and of Islam." By 1913, he began organizing against the Ottoman government to establish a new Islamic pan-Arab empire, which would include the Arabian Peninsula, Syria, and Iraq.[83][66]
Rida joined the ranks ofSa'ud's boosters in the Arab world. Rida saw him as a strong Muslim ruler capable of preventing British imperial designs on the Arab world.[85][86] In March 1914, Rida wrote inal-Manar that CUP was assisting Zionists in Palestine and accused Zionists of seeking to establish aJewish state from "Palestine to the Euphrates". He warned that not a single Muslim would remain in thePromised Land ofJudaism.Al-Manar became a chief source of spreading Arabanti-semitism in the months leading up to World War I, portraying Jewish people as thecontrollers of European finances.[81]
DuringWorld War I, Rida's activities primarily involved negotiating with the British andSharif Hussein ofMecca, attempting to persuade them on the issue of establishing a unitedpan-Islamic state with autonomy for different regions to prepare for the eventual collapse of the Ottoman Empire. He had always been suspicious of the British and became even more so after theSykes–Picot Agreement, which was intended to divide Ottoman Arab provinces between Britain and France. Rida saw this as an attack on all Muslims, not just Arabs.[87]
Rida's militant opposition to Westernisation reached its peak in the aftermath of the war. In his 1922–23 workal-Khilafa aw al-Imama al-'Uzma (The Caliphate or the Supreme Imamate), he proposed comprehensive pan-Islamism and called upon Muslims to come together under their shared Islamic faith to shun emerging nationalist movements. He stressed the importance of Arab leadership in unifying Muslim ranks. Among the most important parts of his agenda was to thwartBritish imperialist goals in theArabian Peninsula.[88][89][90] Sharif Hussein's rejection of these ideas and his continued allegiance with the British eventually became irreconcilable to Rida. In 1923, after Hussein's seizure ofHejaz, Rida called upon Arabian emirs to free Hejaz from Hashemite rule. He sawSa'ud of theSultanate of Najd as the most suitable candidate for this task, not only because he favoured the Wahhabis as the best hope for Arab andIslamic revival, but also because of their promising military-political capabilities to bring stability and security to the Hejaz, and to defend it from any European aggressions. Sa'ud and his followers were orthodox Muslims in line with the doctrines of theSalaf, which attracted Rida. He remained devoted to Sa'ud to his end despite mixed results from rehabilitation campaigns and difficulties encountered by Rida's own disciples. Rida considered him the best available Muslim statesman and believed his kingdom offered the best prospect of becoming the political arm of the balancedIslahi movement. At this point, based on past experiences, Rida had come to understand that reform required money as well as political support.[91]
TheAllied Powers'post-World War Order and the betrayal of Sharif Hussein led to a radical phase in Rida's pan-Islamist enterprise and he became a key figure in injecting militantanti-Westernism into Syrian and Egyptian Islamic politics. He had become vehemently anti-British, calling democracy "colonial deceit," and withheld any more attempts at mediation with Western powers. He proposed a Universal Islamic System to replace the failedWilsonian Peace.[85][92][93][94] When Sharif Husseindeclared himself Caliph of Muslims in March 1924 following theTurkish Abolition of Caliphate, Rida called him aheretic dangerous to the entireMuslim community and saw his seizure of power as a desecration of Islam.[90][89][85][95][96] Rida later published the treatiseThe Wahhabis and Hijaz, where he argued for Wahhabi rule over Hejaz and condemnedSharif Hussein and hisfamily for their selling of Arab lands in complicity with thecolonial powers' agenda for the sake of their personal dynastic ambitions. He warned ofBritish manipulations dominating the region and subjugatingMuslims.[85]
Rida's views of Wahhabism became more favorable upon his arrival in Egypt in the 1890s, when he read about the movement andal-Jabartī andal-Nāṣiri, though he was still critical of what he perceived as a lack of moderation in the group, as he considered moderation foundational to Salafism.[97][98] As early as the 1900s, Rida applaudedSa'ud's victories during theSaudi–Rashidi War.[99] He became a major proponent of Wahhbism following World War I, when he began seeingMuslim scholars as pro-Westernisation Muslim intelligentsia.[27] His opposition to innovation and mysticism in Islam was another of his principles seen within Wahhabism, which called for "pristine Islam" and a total rejection of saints and superstitions.[70] He eventually began advocating for their rehabilitation into the Islamic world.[89][42]
In 1919 he publishedMuhammad ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab'sKashf al-Shubuhat (Removal of Doubts) and in 1920 pushed Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab as amujaddid of Islam. During the 1920s, more than 20 Wahhabi works were published through the al-Manar Publishing House, includingfatwas condemning theIkhwan.[100] Rida argued that the Wahhabi movement would have expanded and led Islamic revival if it were not for the excessive zeal of some of its supporters and the conspiracies of its adversaries.[101][99] In 1922, he distributed(Majmūʿat al-Rasāʾil waʾl-Masāʾil al-Najdiyya (The Compendium of Najdī Epistles and Responsa).[100]Majmuʿat al-Tawhid al-Najdiyya (Monotheistic Collection from Najd) another work published by Rida, was a four-volume collection of essays with writings byIbn Taymiyya,Ibn Qudama, andIbn Rajab, reportedly at the request of a Najdi merchant. This created friction between Sufi and Salafi factions in Syria.[102][103]
By 1926 references to "excessive zeal" had disappeared and the Wahhabi's initial failure was instead blamed on corrupt Ottomans and the British Empire.[104] Rida asked followers of hisIslah movement to support Wahhabis against three hazards that threatened thecommunity from within: the "Shi'a fanatics," Sufism, and "Westernised preachers ofatheism".[99] In 1927, Rida wrote that the Wahhabis had become a large group in Egypt, with adherents among the religious scholars at institutions such asAl-Azhar University. He had begun to adopt some of the Wahabbis' more uncompromising attitudes to religious reform.[105] Detractors accused him of becoming an official spokesperson for the Wahhabis due to financial assistance from Sa'ud, which Rida denied.[106]
Rida's endorsement of Wahhabism was the decisive factor in the spread of its influence beyond the Kingdom's borders. Wahhabi scholars consistently emphasised their affinity to mainstream Sunni legal schools and affirm that their tradition was among the several manifestations of Salafism. Al Sa'ud encouraged Saudi Muslims to tone down their dogmatic views and in the 1920s facilitated the movement of several of Rida's disciples to Hejaz, where, through education, their beliefs were shifted from exclusivist, narrow-mindedClassical Wahhabism prone totakfirism to a more tolerant and accepting people.[107][108]Dar al-Tawhid, a religious educational institute inTa'if overseen byMuhammad Bahjat Athari, one of Rida's disciples, put forth one of the biggest reeducation efforts. Najdi scholarIbn Bulayhid clashed with Rida's disciples over his belief in theflat earth. While Rida did damage control on the rumours, prominent Wahhabi scholars likeMuhammad ibn 'Abd al-Latif Al al-Shaykh refuted his beliefs and affirmed thesphericity of earth. In anal-Manar article about education and the dangers of stagnation, Rida criticized flat-earthers and enemies of science.[109]
Rida strongly championedSa'ud's campaigns inHejaz in 1924 and 1925. He wrote inal-Manar that the nascent Saudi state was the best hope for Islamic revival and portrayed it as the last major bastion of Islamic resistance to the colonial order. He celebrated Sharif Hussein's defeat in theBattle of Mecca, which he called a historic event. Sa'ud united Hejaz and Northern Arabia over the next several years, making his rule an Islamic alternative toAtatürk in Turkey. Rida saw his independence, religiosity, and pragmatism as an exemplification of balanced reform.[89][99][110]
Rida defended thenew Saudi regime from its detractors, calling the Wahhabis "the best Muslims," as they observed the doctrines of ImamIbn Hanbal andIbn Taymiyyah. Rida madeanti-Shi'ism "a major trait of his school" and called for aWahhabi demolition of the shrines of al-Baqi. He called subsequently outragedShi'itesrafidites and instruments of thePersians.[111] Sa'ud continued to impress Rida by condemning rumours of Wahhabis desecrating graves and slaughtering women and children in their conquests as "British propaganda."[90][89]
Rida's subsequent political efforts focused on two fronts: campaigning for Syrian independence and supporting Saudi efforts tounify the Arabian Peninsula. He was a member of theSyrian National Congress until its dissolution in 1920 by the French. When theGreat Syrian Rebellion broke out in 1925, Rida and theSyro-Palestinian Congress provided it full support, with financial backing from the nascent Saudi state. By 1927, the rebellion had been stymied andnationalist factions of Syro-Palestinian Congress approached the British Empire andFrench Third Republic to seek a compromise. This angered Rida and only served to strengthen his respect of Sa'ud, who he believed the only sovereign Islamic ruler who stood up to colonial powers and guarded the holiest sites of Islam.British Intelligence inCairo, concerned about Rida's influence, monitored his activities.[95][92]
Rida was a delegate in the preparatory subcommittee for the 1926 Islamic Congress for Caliphate held in Cairo, which declared that the caliphate was still possible. He was not, however, an active participate in the Cairo Congress itself and considered its organizers to be inefficient. He enthusiastically joined the Pan-Islamic Congress established by Sa'ud the same year. He became a prominent delegate and organizer of the Congress, whose objectives were international Islamic recognition of theSaudi rule of Hejaz, consultations onHajj services, and erasure of past reputation of sectarianism associated with the Wahhabis. Rida drafted conference protocols on behalf of Sa'ud and wrote the King's opening address. Rida pressed for a collective oath of Congress delegates to pledge to rid the Arabian Peninsula of its foreign influences, and proposed an Islamic pact between Muslim governments, envisioning the assembly as a precursor to a league of Muslim nations. Despite his enthusiasm, no significant resolutions were passed and no subsequent congresses were held in Mecca due to the deep religious, doctrinal, and political differences across the Muslim world. Still, with prominent figures likeGrand Mufti of Jerusalemal-Husseini in attendance, the conference marked the consolidation of the alliance betweenpan-Islamists and the leaders of the new Wahhabi state.[85][112][113][114] In defense of the Wahhabis' religious credentials, Rida citedTarikh Najd, a treatise composed by'Abd Allah ibn Muhammad Aal-al Shaykh, the son ofal-Wahhab. He asserted that Wahhabis had sincere zeal for the Islamic faith and were among the most hostile to foreign influences.[85] Rida later backed Sa'ud's campaign to eradicate fanaticalIkhwan rebels.
Rida's early exposure to the Hanbali school in Syria informed his vision of a puritanical renewal based on the revival of the values of theSalaf, the first three generations of Islam,[115] and argued that Salafism was "an Islam purged of impurities and Western influences".[60][116][117]
In 1905 he spoke of the Salafis as a collective noun, theologically distinct from theAsh'aris, and considered Wahhabis Salafis. He published an article inal-Manar calledSpeculative Theology is abid'ah according to the Pious Predecessors, as well as a discussion of the importance of following theSalaf in the promotion ofhadith sciences, the spread of which he identified with theIslamic revival.[118][119][120] In 1914, Rida definedmad'hab al-salaf as "nothing other than to act according to the Qur'an."[121] The termSalafi was historically used by Sunni scholars to denote Muslims who claimedAthari theology. This was how Rida initially learned to view the term. He and Syrian reformerJamal al-Din al-Qasimi later referred to Salafi more distinctly as Sunni Muslims who adopted Athari theologyand rejected allegorical interpretations of God's attributes.[122][120]
He was critical ofspeculative interpretation (ta'wil) which went beyond what he considered to be the literal meaning of the text. Though he was influenced byal-Ghazali in childhood, Rida criticised his work for his practice ofta'wil and mystical interpretation of the injustices ofsharia. LikeIbn Taymiyya, Rida was more sharply critical ofIbn Arabi for his metaphysical doctrine,Wahdat al-Wujud.[28] However, Rida argued that allegorical interpretation of Qur'an was sometimes appropriate because he believed that many Muslims would have abandoned their faith without them. He counseled Najdi scholars on the necessity of balancedreform and sent them copies ofTafsir al-Manar to study. In a letter toal-Sa'adi, he wrote that "[i]t is necessary that you distinguish between natural sciences... and philosophy, both ancient and modern. Philosophy consists of opinions and theoretical thoughts whereas natural sciences are an expression of the science by which God gave benefits to His creation, such as water, steam, [and] air."[123][124]
In the 1920s Rida came to see Salafism as religious fervour and puritanical revival of old Islamic practices. He also became a committed supporter ofSaudi military expansions.[125] While politically pan-Islamist,[126] Salafism became increasingly puritanical and faced opposition by conservative quarters likeAl-Azhar University. It did, however, find support from the Arabian Peninsula and the Ahl-i Hadith movement on the subject of Wahhabi revival.[108]Muhammad Hamid al-Fiqi, one of Riḍā's disciples, was appointed president of the Meccan Department of Printing and Publication, where he started a newal-Manar-adjacent Islamic journal,al-Islah, on Riḍā's recommendation. The journal pushed the key doctrines of Salafism and integrated Arabia into the transnational network of Islamic reformist efforts while fostering a broader sense of Islamic identity among theArab elite.[127][128][129][130]
In 1912, Salafi scholarsMuhibb al-Din al-Khatib and Abd al-Fattah al-Qatlan had begun working with Riḍā and their Salafiyya Bookstore was relocated and merged into Riḍā's Manar Bookstore.[131] He was also invited that year toDarul Uloom Nadwatul Ulama byNadwatul Ulama leaderShibli Nomani. The seminary's goals were compatible with Salafism[132][133] and Riḍā did two lectures at theirLucknow campus, where he met several influential Ahl-i Hadith scholars.[134] He then visitedDarul Uloom Deoband, where he sawDeobandi scholarAnwar Shah Kashmiri give a talk on the Qur'an,hadith,Hanafifiqh, theDeobandi school, and Indian Islamic revivalistShah Waliullah Dehlawi. Riḍā highly praised this lecture.[135]
From the 1920s onwards Riḍā and his disciples conceptually expanded Salafism in a legal sense. He claimed to use scriptural proofs on legal issues as the Salaf had done. Despite promoting the non-madhab or pre-madhab approach to Islamic law, Riḍā and his followers did not dismiss the classical system offiqh. They maintained thatall four schools of law were virtuous, and promoted reconciliation between them, while still condemning sectarianism between schools.[136] In a 1913 article inal-Manar, Riḍā declaredNajd as the region in which Salafi theology was most widespread.[97]
Riḍā believed onlyhadith scholars were capable of revivingsunnah. Starting in 1915, he began emphasizing that scholars of the earlyAhl al-Hadith school were the ones who preserved the religion by resisting threats of heretical innovations. As such, he believed that the methods of themuhaddithin in scrutinizing and usinghadith reports in law had to be revived and introduced into society.[137] In the 1920s, he and his students identified themselves as following a "Salafi approach" in jurisprudence, thereby widening Salafi paradigm to impact the realm of law.[120] Riḍā perceivedAthari theology as more rational thanspeculative theology (Kalam) and defendedHanbalite condemnation of Kalam, as Athari had stronger orthodox religious foundations and defended conservative Islamic values from Western and secular ideologies more effectively. He stressed to his disciples that Salafi theology was simple for the masses to learn since it is like "walking on a straight path," whereas he saw studying Ash'ari theology as "swimming in a deep sea, where one has to struggle against the waves ofphilosophical doubts and the currents of theoretical investigation."[138] In 1922–23, he published a series of articles inal-Manar titledThe Caliphate or the Supreme Imamate, where he proposed gradualist measures of education, reformation, and purification through Salafism.[139]
Riḍā died on the return trip from Suez to Cairo after seeing offKing ibn Sa'ud.[48] Because most of his money was funneled into publishing and other revivalist efforts, Riḍā faced financial difficulties throughout his life and died in debt.[140] The Sheikh ofal-Azhar,Mustafa al Maraghi, remarked that Rida had three main opponents: Muslim modernists, non-Muslims, and religious obscurantists.[92]
Egyptianhadith scholar and Rida's disciple,Ahmad Shakir wrote:
"Islam has lost today a very high personality, an Imam, a Hujjah among the Imams of guidance, a great Mujahid and a great reformer. He lived benign and died a martyr!"[141]
Rida's vision oftawhid formed the central theme of his reformist teachings, as he believed it was supported byrationality and opposed all forms of superstitious beliefs, oppression, and ignorance. Later Muslims' deviation from puretawhid as practiced by theSalaf, Rida argued, led to their decline and subjugation.[142] Echoingibn Taymiyyah, Riḍā also condemned the practice oftawassul asreligious innovation.[143] Riḍā called for the destruction of tombs and structures built above graves and banning practices associated withgrave veneration, which he condemned aspolytheism.[144] Among these acts were worshipping creatures as deities besides God; believing God granted part of his divine powers or shares aspects of his dominion with the humans; and believing in the lordship of God, but worshipping worldly beings, such as seeking aid from the dead during sorrow.[145]
Muhammad Abduh, Rashid Rida's early mentor, had adopted an Ash'ari methodology of metaphorical and interpretive view of what he viewed as potentially anthropomorphic descriptions ofattributes of God. Rashid Riḍā, who was advocatingSalafi theology after theFirst World War, began writing lengthy refutations of his teachers views. In his commentary toRisalah al Tawhid, he criticized Abduh for straying away from the literalist Salafi approach. In response to Abduh's statement that the most important aspect oftawhid was belief in "God's oneness in His essence and the creation of the universes"; Riḍā remarked thatAbduh failed to mentiontawḥīd al-ʾulūhiyyah, the view ofAllah as the only god, and disagreed with Abduh's stance on divine attributes. As a Salafi, Riḍā pushed back against the Ash'ari andMaturidite schools and advocated thetraditionalist doctrine of Qur'anic letters, recitation, and voice being uncreated (ghayr Makhluq) word of God, a belief based on the works ofibn Taymiyyah. In Riḍā's editions of Abduh's works, his views that contradicted traditionalist creed were either deleted or critiqued in commentaries to conform to Salafi doctrines.[146][147]
Riḍā believed that the early Muslims' upholding oftawhid andsunnah were the primary reasons for their spiritual and material success. He praised their independence, free fromblind adherence and motivated by Quranic teachings. He believed Muslim decline began after the end of theIslamic caliphates in the 13th century, when the Arab rule, and the influence of their adherence tosunnah, ended. Riḍā also believed that non-Arab rulers engaged in religiously-harmful innovation and superstition. Based on his reading ofhadith, he believed that a second Islamic victory was prophesised and undertook initiatives for global revivalism as a result.[142] He thought the Muslim world faced crises in spiritual, educational, and legislative affairs, and identified Islamic religious reform as a "triple unification of doctrine, law, and ethics." His adoption of Wahhabism's puritanical tenets after 1918 symbolised his adoption of a Hanbalite reformist framework. To achieve this comprehensive Islamic system, Riḍā sought to revive the classical Islamic theory of life. To him, the reconstitution of the Islamic system was only possible by directly returning to the original sources. In this, he also defended the superiority ofnaql (textual sources) overaql (rational sources), and condemnedphilosophy andSufism.[68][148]
Riḍā travelled to Europe only once, on political grounds; he did not speak English or other European languages. He disliked the social life and was critical of Christianity. Despite this, he had a robust sensitivity to challenges faced by Muslims in the modern world. He believed that theinner decay of Muslims, as well as the efforts by theCatholic Church, preventedEuropeans from embracingIslam. He wanted Muslims to accept aspects ofmodernity only to the extent to which it was essential for the recovery of Islamic strength. He considered it a duty for Muslims to study modern science and technology. He repeatedly urged legal experts and the scholars to come together and produce modernised legal works based directly from the Qur'an andhadith in a way that was accessible for allbelievers.[54]
Riḍā was a leading exponent ofSalafism[149] and was especially critical of what he consideredtaqlid (blind following) of excessiveSufism, which he believed to have distorted the original message of Islam. He encouraged both laymen and scholars to read and study directly the primary sources of Islam by themselves.[150][151] This principle enabled Riḍā to examine contemporary subjects through a modern lens. He believed that the "fragmentation of Muslims into sects and parties" resulting fromtaqlid was particularly harmful and would lead to worship of someone other than God, which was in direct contradiction oftawhid.[152]
Theologically Riḍā argued that rigid adherence tomadhāhib prevented Muslims from thinking independently and prohibited their right to access the Scriptures directly. This enabled tyrants, supported by corrupt scholars, to justify oppression and preserve their rule. He also believed thathadiths regarding theSaved Sect referred to the ahl al-Ittiba, the people who followed proof-texts. He considered those who were pro-mad'hab to be innovators and thus dangerous to Islam. Despite this, he did not ignore the legacy of the fourmad'habs and viewed their legal literature as a resource from which he derived rulings, adapting to changing circumstances. Although he placedThe Four Imams at the peak of juristic excellence, he claimed thatibn Taymiyyah was more relevant for contemporary Muslims in practice.[153][151] Riḍā believed that the Saved Sect was indisputablySunni Islam.[154]
Riḍā's criticism oftaqlid extended beyondsharia and Islamic theology to include socio-political developments. He believed these associations and the consequentpartisanship influencedmad'hab affiliations and fanaticism. He was more critical ofal-Mutafarnijun, Europeanised emulators who he regarded as guilty oftaqlid for abandoning the path of the Salaf. While themadhab partisans are influenced by administrative positions of power and promote governmental interests, theMutafarijun divided theMuslim community based on differences in language, nationality, and geography, and conceived new identities within the nation-states, which Riḍā considered significantly more harmful.[155]
Riḍā believed that the management of state affairs and its principles were an integral part of Islamic faith. Accordingly, he called for the restoration of anIslamic caliphate and waged fierce battles againstsecularist trends that emerged during the 20th century. He considered calls for separation of religion and state to be the most dangerous threat to Islam.[156][157] By the 1920s, Riḍā had discovered that his most formidable opponents were not the tradition-bound Sufi-Ash'aritescholars of al-Azhar but the Western-educated secularists who pushed Abduh's utilitarian principles what he considered to be too far. Riḍā made vehement denunciations and attacks against modernists such asAli Abdel Raziq and Ahmed Safwat. By this point, his main priority had shifted to repeal what he considered the "Western invasion of Islamic culture." This shift was also evident in his promotion ofWahhabism, Salafism, and the works ofibn Taymiyyah,ibn Qayyim, andibn Qudamah.[158] Riḍā admiredibn Taymiyyah andibn Abd al-Wahhab in particular and was inspired to adopt a more conservative and orthodox outlook.[159]
Riḍā called on Muslims to reject Westernisation and labelled Islamic modernists as "false renewers" and "heretics" whose efforts were harming Muslim societies. He accused Westernisedmodernizers of corruption, immorality, and treason. He was a fierce believer that any reforms going against Scripture is heresy and should be censured. His campaigns were instrumental in putting modernists likeAli Abd al-Raziq to trial for what Riḍā viewed as attacks on sharia. Riḍā was a strongliteralist[160] opposed the trend of rejectinghadith in Egypt. Prominent in this movement was the Egyptian physicianMuhammad Tawfiq Sidqi who grew out of Abduh's modernist traditions.[161] Riḍā disagreed with Sidqi's beliefs thathadith was prone to corruption due to flawed transmission and that Muslims should rely solely on the Qur'an, which Riḍā took as a minimisation of Muhammad's importance.[162] He believed modernists had gone too far into Westernism in their reformist attempts, leading Muslims to lose their faith. He used the Qur'anic termJahiliyya to refer to ignorance ofpre-Islamic Arabia and the conditions of contemporary Muslims, and believed that governance not adhering tosharia wasapostasy. This idea would become a major rationale behind thearmed Jihad of future militant organisations.[159][60]
He strongly criticised scholars who issuedfatwas aligning with modernist ideals.[163] Riḍā believed that a society that properly obeyedsharia would be successfully resistant to bothcapitalism and class-based socialism, since this ideal society would be immune to temptations.[164] He dismissed modernist advocacy of cultural synthesis, emphasizing the self-sufficiency and comprehensiveness of Islamic faith.[165] He believed that the risingindividualism,irreligion,materialism,rationalisation, andscientism in Europe following World War I would lead to their downfall.[46] In his treatiseYusr al-Islam wa Usül at-Tashri' al-'Ämm (The Accommodating Spirit of Islam and the Sources of General Jurisprudence), Riḍā explained that reform advocates who fall betweenmad'han partisanship and modernist Westernisation are "those who affirm that it is possible to resuscitate Islam and renew its true guidance."[166] His aggressive rejection of Westernisation eventually led to the formation of transnationalIslamist movements such as theMuslim Brotherhood andJamaat-e-Islami.[165]
"You complacent ones, raise your heads and open your eyes. Look at what other peoples and nations do. Do you surrender to what is being told about you in the world? Are you happy to see the newspapers of every country reporting that the poor of the weakest peoples [the Jews], whom the governments of all nations are expelling, master so much knowledge and understanding of civilization methods that they are able to possess and colonize your country, and turn its masters into laborers and its wealthy into poor?.. Think about this question (Zionism), and make it the subject of your discussion.. Then [contemplate] whether it is clear to you that you have neglected the rights of your homeland and service to your people and yourcommunity. Examine and contemplate, consider and consult, talk and discuss this matter. It is more worthy of consideration than creating disasters and insulting innocent ones."
Riḍā published an article condemningZionism in 1898, making him one of the earliest scholarly critics of the movement.[169] He warned that the Jewish people were being mobilised to migrate to Palestine with European backing to establish a Zionist state, and urged Arabs to take action,[86][169] as he thought the Zionists' ultimate ambition was to convertal-Aqsa mosque into a synagogue and to cleansePalestine of all of itsArab inhabitants.[170][171][172]
In his 1929 treatiseThawrat Filastin (The Palestinian Revolution), he claimed that the Jewish people were historically fanatic observers ofin-group solidarity and exclusivity, and refused to assimilate with other cultures. Riḍā listed a number of historical crimes against theIsraelites including polytheism,usury, and offenses against theprophets of Islam. He claimed that God was punishing them for this by taking away theirkingdom and subjecting them to centuries ofChristian persecution. In one of his final texts, published in 1935, Riḍā told Muslims to unite and "take the path traced by ourancestors, who defeated the Jewish in the first epoch [of Islam] and expelled them from theArabian Peninsula."[173] Riḍā considered the Zionist enterprise part of the wider British imperial scheme to consolidate their regional dominion and provokecivil strife among Muslims.[174]
Riḍā propagatedanti-Semitic stereotypes and conspiracy theories that would later become popular across the Arab world and various Islamist movements.[175]Al-Manar regularly featured anti-Semitic articles linking Jewish people and Freemasons who eagerly sought to exploit others' wealth. He was a strong believer in theglobal Jewish conspiracy, and, in the 1930s, he also promoted the ideas ofThe Protocols of the Elders of Zion.[15] He believed Jewish people werecontrolling the Western banking system and were behind turning Christian states against Muslims. He wrote that the establishment of a Jewish state was preparation for the arrival of theirMessiah, which Riḍā thought to be theanti-Christ and would be killed byJesus, the true Messiah in Islam. He believed that Jewish people were competent only in the financial sector and required British military backing to make up for their inadequate skills in other areas.[176] He also claimed the Jewish people were a "selfish and chauvinist, cunning and perfidious" people who sought to exploit and exterminate other people.[169]
Riḍā alleged that the Jewish people had undermined the power of the Roman Catholic Church in Europe and introducedfreemasonry, through which they manipulated theBolsheviks and theYoung Turks against theRussian andOttoman empires, respectively, and that they orchestrated theFrench Revolution. In November 1910, he publicly asserted that the Young Turk Revolution was a Jewish response to the Hamidian regime's rejection of Zionist plans to reclaim of theirThird Temple inJerusalem and its surrounding territories, through which they sought to reestablish theirkingdom.[172][170][171] He identified theYoung Turks, who he thought were conspiring with Zionists in building a Jewish Kingdom ofZion in Palestine, as the masonicfifth columnists and were engineering a war between the Islamic and Western worlds.[47][177][171] He believed Jewish people created capitalism as a tool of manipulation[86][169] and that they were attacking religious governments across the world to spread atheism andcommunism.[175]
Riḍā believed that the term "freemason" itself referred to the re-construction ofSolomon's Temple inJerusalem. He claimed and emphasized that while the founders of Freemasonry came from both Judaism and Christianity, the Jewish people led and dominated the movement.[178][179][180][181] He also argued that Jewish people wielded immense influence over theCommittee of Union and the treasury of the Ottoman Empire.[170][182] Within two years of the Young Turk Revolution, Riḍā convinced that theOttoman Empire had succumbed to a "Zionist-Masonic influence."[172] He issued afatwa in 1933 forbidding Muslims from selling land to Jewish people in Palestine, ruling that such sales represented the "betrayal of Islam" and complicity with Zionism. Although Riḍā's theology was ideologically at odds withNazi doctrines, he commended them for ridding the world of heresies and false beliefs, as this would allow for the ultimate triumph of the Islamic faith. Riḍā also viewedKemalism and communism as the immediate enemies of Islam, both of which were directly threatening Muslim territories.[183] Ferventanti-Zionism linked with themes ofJudeo-Bolshevism were a predominant component of Rida's writings until his death.[173]
Riḍā was highly sensitive to the openly hostile andIslamophobic attitudes prevalent amongOrientalists and European Christians of his era. Before promoting the vision of acaliphate as a means of Islamic revival, Riḍā was trying to counteract the activities ofChristian missionaries, who had founded a society for organised Islamicda'wah outside of Islamic Ottoman territories. He was also concerned by what he regarded as sympathies of nativeArab Christians tocolonial powers.[184] Riḍā believed the only 'true' mission of solid faith in Christian history was that of Jesus' disciples and that any later missionary attempt was false. He perceived Christian missions as an integral part of the colonial presence in theMuslim world and was convinced that Europe used religion as a political instrument for mobilising European Christians by inflaming their 'fanatic' feelings against other nations.[185]
In spite of this, Rida did promote efforts to reconcile between Muslims and Christians.[42] His caliphate proposal recognised both Judaism and Christianity and granted non-Muslims the right to serve in administration and the judicial system, with the exception of the Islamicsharia courts.[184]
Habib Jamati said in his eulogy for Riḍā that Riḍā "had also befriended Christians and struggled alongside them for their common nation."[92] He did, however, accuseOriental Christians in general of being the tools of colonial powers and of conspiring with "atheist Westerners" against Islam. In a series of articles published in 1911 compiled under the titleal-Muslimun wa-l-qubt (The Muslims and the Copts), he condemned Muslims for dividing over nationalism. In his view,nationalist slogans were exploited by the colonial powers and would only favor theCoptic minority. He mocked the Copts' claim to be descended from the "heathen, God-hating"Pharaohs and their demand for positions of power despite what he viewed as inexperience. Riḍā applauded the 1911 Muslim Congress, which was organised in response to the 1911 Congress of Asyut that demanded Coptic minority rights. He believed Western civilisation could not be considered Christian, only materialistic, and predicted that its vices would lead to self-destruction. He alleged that the West sought to turn Muslims away from their religion, either by degrading their moral values, converting them to Christianity, or both.[186]
Riḍā gradually became a sharp critic ofShi'ism throughout his life. In a 1929 book, he wrote that he was once willing to work with the balanced reformers among Shias but that the situation has changed. He alleged that they "worship the dead," attributing to their incessionary practices towardsAwliyaa in their shrines. He called upon Shias to condemn these practices and, while he did not censure all Shias, he left them with few options but to comply. Pan-Islamic unity was still conceivable, but it had to be on Salafi terms. In 1927, followingheightened communal tensions,al-Manar published a series of anti-Shi'i articles written by Riḍā's discipleMuhammad Taqi ud din al-Hilali.[187]
Rida condemned the Shia for "supporting the Tatar and Crusader invasions" and alleged thatRaafidi doctrines were formulated by a Jewish-Zoroastrian conspiracy aimed at "perverting Islam and weakening the Arabs."[86] Rida called upon "moderate Shi'is" to dissociate themselves from the stagnant Shia clergy and condemn intercessory practices such as beseeching their religious figures from theAhl al-Bayt andAwliyaa in their graves, which he equated with polytheism. He thought this was the only way they would be incorporated into the pan-Islamicecumenical paradigm.[187] Despite all of this, Riḍā heavily influence modern Shiiteexegesis. His prolific Quaranic commentary,Tafsir, is studied by both Sunni and Shiite scholars.[188]
Riḍā considered theBaháʼí Faith to be a completely separate religion from Islam with its own laws. He thought they to bepolytheists andesotericists pretending to be Muslim and that they were a destructive internal threat to Islam. He saw Abduh's friendship with Baháʼí leader'Abdu'l-Baha Abbas as abetrayal to Islam.[189][190][191]
Riḍā believed that men and women were treated equally in Islam in terms of spiritual obligations and their ability to earn God's favor. To supportIslamic gender roles, which defined a woman's position in both household and society, he pointed to issues such as sexual freedom, women's exploitation in the workplace, and the rising cases of illegitimate children, which he thought were all creating problems in European societies. He believed these gender roles represented the proper solution to these social problems, and that, while men are heads of the household, Muslim women were allowed to choose a spouse and were clearly given stipulated rights and responsibilities in a marriage. He also asserted that consent from themale guardian of a woman was essential for amarriage to be valid, since it stabilised the domestic order and befits the honor of both women and men. He criticised followers of theHanafi school who didn't adhere to this stipulation as bigoted partisans tomad'habs guilty of abandoning theQur'an andsunnah in favour of their law schools.[192]
Riḍā was also a firm defender of traditional Islamic views onpolygamy, presenting it as a solution to the emerging social ills afflicting societies, such as free mixing of men and women in workplaces and consequent sexual freedoms. In one of his last treatises,A Call to the Fair Sex (1932), he argued that polygamy not only solved the problems associated with promiscuity and its resultant evils, but also addressed the difficulties produced by the loss of men in war. The book condemned the calls for equality between men and women in the workplace and in politics and warned about the folly of imitating Western women in their misguided ways. Rida declared that calls for "theliberation of women" and other social reforms by themodernisers were destroying the very fabric of Islamic societies. Riḍā discussed the etiquettes ofveiling, emphasizing modesty for Muslim women, and addressed legal issues such asdivorce. Although Riḍā wanted Muslim women not to be involved in politics, he encouraged association-based female Islamic activism that called upon the government to outlaw free-mixing, wine-drinking, and fronts of prostitution, and demanded expansion of Islamic education for both males and females. In marital affairs, he held the view that wives were not obliged to cook, clean, or take care of their children insharia and decried the hypocrisy of men who demanded more from their wives. Still, he believed husbands could discipline their wives using force, if necessary.[192][163][193]
Riḍā encouraged Muslim women to participate in the social life of Islam as they did in earlier Islamic eras, but stressed that men were more capable and superior in terms of strength, intelligence, learning, and physical labour, which is why they havelegal guardianship over women. However, like a ruler over his subjects, male authority should be exercised throughshura and that they should strive to be likeMuhammad, who exemplified kind treatment of wives. Riḍā also defendedIslamic slavery, asserting that it protected women from harm and gave everyone chance to bear children, and therefore is not in conflict with justice. Riḍā wrote that every woman should have a legal guardian, so that women who are "prevented from being wife or mother [are] not thereby prevented from enjoying protection and honour."[194] He felt that Muslim men, but not Muslim women, could marry non-Muslims to expand the reach of Islam.[195][196][197]
Riḍā considered that certain types ofusury (riba) may be permitted in certain cases, such as extreme poverty or larger public interest. He was influenced by both ibn Qayyim and Abduh in his beliefs aboutriba, though some of the beliefs he glossed from Abduh were tweaked to fit his agenda.[198][199][200][201] Riḍā believed that only the first increase in a termed loan was permissible insharia, classifying it asriba al-fadl, a term used byibn Qayyim. Based on his analysis of the reports inTafsir al Tabari that described the practice ofriba during the pre-Islamic period, Riḍā distinguished the former from the usury practised during thepre-Islamic period (Ribā Âl-Jāhilīyyá). However, he considered any further increase in returns or postponement of maturity date unlawful.[202] Riḍā wrote thatriba rendered capitalism fundamentally at odds with an Islamic system as it directly violated Divine command.[203]
When state-sponsored Turkish translations of the Qur'an in the newly establishedTurkish Republic were published in 1924, Riḍā characterised the project as a long-term plot to displace the Arabic Qur'an and to tamper with Islamic rituals. He wrote thatMustafa Kemal's regime promoted heretical ideas to undermine Islam and that God "revealed it to the Arabian Prophet Muhammad in the clear Arabic tongue."[204] Riḍā issued afatwa prohibiting Qur'anic translations. Among his objections were that identical translation of the Qur'an was impossible; translation would serve to sever "Islamic ties of unity" by stoking racial divisions; and the translation would be lesser in quality, as the reader would be "limited" by the translator's understanding. He was clear, however, that the prohibition was only on translations meant to substitute the Arabic Qur'an.[205] He viewed the Arabic language as the common medium uniting Muslims of all nations and promoted Arabic as an integral pillar of his reform efforts and later issued afatwa stipulating that knowledge of Arabic is obligatory for every Muslim.[60]
Riḍā believed thatsharia was intended and suited to be a comprehensive legal structure for Islamic society.[206][207] He wrote that fixed Shar'i principles inmuamalat (social transactions) were of only a general character, allowing for considerable adaptation by successive generations of Muslims to understand their modern problems.[53]Ibadah (governing matters of ritual and worship), on the other hand, did not allow for interpretive change. Riḍā believed that theHanafi principle ofistihsan (ruling in which a benefit to the community is confirmed) is essentially an application of the spirit.[208] However, he expanded the legal realm of theibadah to incorporate personal and civil laws, including marriage anddivorce.[209]
Riḍā dividedmuamalat into moral issues and morally irrelevant issues. The former are similar toibadat rules, moral norms defined by God, therefore making them unchangeable. Violators of these rules, he thought, were sinfultransgressors. The latter could be solved through the process of analogical reasoning, orQiyas, which is a fundamental principle necessary for the relevant application to the law.[210] Medieval jurists such asal-Qarafi andibn Taymiyya consideredistislah as a logical extension ofQiyas, whereby a consideration of utility neither explicitly enjoined nor excluded by the revealed texts would be assumed as a valid basis for judgment. Riḍā adopted this rationale, acknowledging that conclusions ofistislah were not legally binding as a firmly-groundedQiyas (as opposed toQiyas without precise textual basis), as "no individual is entitled to require or forbid others to perform an act without Divine authorization".[211]
He believed that this rationale did not prevent the government from enacting ordinances based on utility in public policy, provided that the government rested on propershura among qualified authorities, and that these ordinances did not conflict withDivine Revelation. Based on writings fromal-Shatibi, Riḍā suggested that most legal rulings could be reached throughistislah rather than the more meticulous process ofQiyas. In reference toal-Qarafi, he wrote that many scholars feared that tyrants would usepublic interest as an excuse for following their desires and imposing absolutism upon their population. Riḍā's conclusion was that politics had to be reformed so decisions of public policy and law would be up to a qualified body (ahl al-hall wal-aqd orulul amr) through mutual consultation. This, he thought, would negate the fear that public interest could be a means for corruption, thus lifting the restrictions on deduction of legal ordinances.[211] Overturningmuamalat rulings were predicated on the condition of compulsion (darurah) and were only to be undertaken by a competentjurist, who may derive the appropriate ruling based on hisijtihad.[207][209]
Riḍā thought that the best possible way to bring about a strong caliphate was through a detailed application "of the rules of theShariah." One of these rules involved the appointment ofahl al-hal wa-l 'aqd, a group of Muslim representatives with the right to take council with a caliph and the power to both appoint and remove him of behalf of the community. As the state would use Islamic law as its guiding principle,scholars were not only responsible for the sacred mission of reforming the society, but also responsible for correcting the monarch, by holding him accountable tosharia.Jurors were also to engage inijtihad by referring to the Scriptures, and evaluate contemporary conditions to enhance the vitality of the law.[66][67][68]
Drawing onHanbali andShafi'i legal traditions that supported the continuity ofijtihad, Riḍā employed its doctrine into practice. He defined the application ofijtihad strictly in terms of "pure adherence to the provisions of theQur'an andsunnah and upon the understanding of theSalaf" and restricted its scope by enforcing the authority ofscholarly consensus.[157][152] This position was a middle-ground between themodernist conceptualisation ofijtihad as an all-inclusive creative endeavour, and the minimalist view which restricted it to a narrow legal spectrum ofmad'hab partisanship.[153] During Riḍā's life, whentaqlid tradition was predominant,fatwas (religious rulings) were not issued byijtihad. He began this practice in 1903 by answering questions sent in by readers toal-Manar. He viewedfatwas as hisijtihad. This act imparted a major influence on future Islamic revivalist movements.[152] Although Riḍā believed thatijtihad was unlawful in the realm ofIslamic theology, he sought to tone down the religious hostilities betweenSalafis,Asharis, andMaturidis, as well as betweenSunnis,Ibadis, andShi'is.[212] He called upon allMuslims to unite by taking theSalaf as their role models. Early issues ofal-Manar emphasized the virtues of the Salaf and extolled their feats, such as their intellectual dynamism and especially theearly Islamic conquests. Riḍā believed that the period of the earlyMuslim community epitomized pristine Islam to its perfection.[213]
However, Riḍā was clear in specifying that general principles cannot supersede clear-cut texts. He stated that a soundly transmitted Scriptural text could only be superseded by a specific text which is more superior or by general texts of Qur'an and authentichadiths that allow believers to prevent damage to themselves or to commit prohibited actions in a state of emergencies. He wrote that this permission was only valid during cases of extreme necessity and that the degree of allowance was proportional to the scope of necessity. Maintaining that Revealed texts were superior tomaslaha, Rida's legal approach towards them was based on the criterion and mechanisms elaborated by classical jurists such as al-Shatibi andal-Tufi. In addition, Riḍā's legal doctrine continued the juristic traditions of a number of prominentjurists between the 10th and 14th centuries such asal-Ghazali,Fakhr al-Din al-Razi, al-Qarafi, andibn Taymiyyah. During these four centuries, Islamic jurists had commonly employedmaslaha as an amenity for legal resolution and juristic dynamism. As Riḍā saw it, the classical jurists had sufficiently elaborated the "philosophical, moral and hermeneutical controls" for valid use of the principles ofmaslaha. Riḍā credited al-Ghazali and al-Shatibi for his revivalism ofmaslaha, which revamped the principle within the traditional legal framework ofQiyas.[214]
Riḍā's doctrines were later extended bymodernists to upholdmaslaha as an independent legal source, makingQiyas dispensable and formulating positive laws directly onutilitarian grounds, for the "wisdom behind the Revealed Laws is no longer inscrutable," which created new implications. Riḍā vehemently denounced these ideas and Egyptian lawyer Ahmed Safwat for promoting "non-adherence" to theQur'an andsunna, in particular matters in the name of public utility. Though Riḍā believed thatmujtahids were obliged to take a broad view of all considerations affecting the public interest, "textual limits" had to be respected. The general public was obliged to follow the qualifiedmujtahids unquestionably onwordly Transactions and their consensus was a legal source (hujja shar'iyya).[215]
Riḍā believed that problems faced by Muslims required political reform and hisanti-imperialism was characterized by radicalpan-Islamist stances.[58][139] Riḍā contended that those who engaged in defence of Islam, its propagation, and its teaching should not engage in politics, in line with orthodoxSunni doctrine, though he was also vehemently against secularist calls for separation of religion and state.[156] The corruption and tyranny of Muslim rulers throughout history was a central theme in his criticisms. He celebrated the rule ofMuhammad and theRightly Guided Caliphs, and leveled his attacks at subsequent rulers who could not maintain Muhammad's example. He thought it was feudal monarchs and depraved scholars who ruined the idealcaliphate system, leading to social chaos and the institutionalisation of corruption of authoritarian rulers.[67] He also blamed the weakness and corruption of Muslim societies on Sufist pacifism and excess,[42] the blind imitation of the past (taqlid), the stagnation of thescholars, and the resulting failure to achieve progress in science and technology.[216] He criticized Islamic scholars for compromising their integrity, and the integrity of the Islamic law, by associating with corrupt worldly powers.[217]
In advocating the restoration of the caliphate, he reiterated the unity of both the spiritual and temporal aspects of Islam, which was in direct opposition to the emerging tides ofsecularism across the Arab and Turkish worlds. He suggested conditions necessary for the revival of the ideal caliphal rule and proposed ways to prevent the return to theOttoman imperial system. Instead of criticisingSufism based on its perceived role in the Islamic historical scheme, Riḍā opposed Sufis because he considered their activities to beinnovations without textual precedents or any sanction in the practices of the earliest generations.[58][160]
Riḍā opposedsecularistcriticisms accusing religion of being responsible for wars and human suffering, asserting that thematerialist andirreligious conceptions of humanity were the prime instigators of warfare and bloodshed throughout history. In Riḍā's view, wars were an integral component of human history, andIslamic law regulated conflicts tojust wars based on the doctrine ofJihad. He praised thereligious campaigns ofMuhammad andRashidun Caliphate as an exemplary model ofJihad to be emulated against the European imperial powers.[46] He sawJihad as a binding duty for all capable male Muslims, not only to defend the religion but also to bring non-Muslims into the Islamic faith. However, since the obligation ofJihad could only be fulfilled by strong men, the more immediate task was to acquire scientific and technical knowledge. Riḍā nonetheless distinguished between wars to spread Islam (Jihad al-Talab) and wars to defend Islam (Jihad al-Daf). While the latter was always obligatory, the expansion of Islam into non-Muslim territories was not obligatory unless Muslims were not allowed to live according tosharia or unless Islamicpreaching efforts were hampered by the non-Muslim state.[218]
Riḍā's final substantial treatise,The Muhammadan Revelation (al-Waḥī al-Muḥammadī), published in 1933, was amanifesto in which he proclaimed that Islam was the only saviour for the deteriorating West. Insisting thatIslam called for the unity of all people, opposing all forms of racist hierarchies that were responsible for theWorld War I and the corruptedLeague of Nations, Riḍā presented a Universal Islamic Order as a substitute for the crumblingWilsonian system.[219][92] He wrote that "[w]hen Islam came into the world, humankind was widely divided; on the basis of origin, color, language, geography, religion, tribal affiliation, government, and politics. Moreover, on the basis of anyone of these differences, humans went to war." He asserted that Islam was widespread during the first century of the Muhammadan Revelation and blamed ignorance and tyranny for stymieing an Islamic state at that time.[220]
Rashid Riḍā is widely regarded as one of "the ideological forefathers" of contemporaryIslamist movements[221][77][222][223][224] and many of his ideas were foundational to the development of the modernIslamic state. He "was an important link between classical theories of thecaliphate... and 20th-century notions of the Islamic state."[225] Though Riḍā held some unconventional ideas, his work was highly influential.[130] Salafi scholar Albani wrote thatal-Manar was "a good nucleus that drew the attention of Muslims to take care of thehadiths of the Prophet Peace be upon him."[226]
The status of Riḍā and his works, however, are a matter of contention among some contemporarypurist Salafis, who disagree with his idea that rulers who legislate man-made laws contrary tosharia are guilty ofkufr akbar (major non-belief) and that Muslims are obliged to force rulers to annul such laws; overthrow them; or lose the land's status asDar-al-Islam (abode of Islam).[227][228] Some Salafi Purists criticise Riḍā for straying fromquietist Salafi principles. The pro-governmentMadkhali Salafists condemn Riḍā for his influence onSalafi activists,Islamists, andSalafi-Jihadists.[229] Others, however, including Salafi scholars such as Albani, generally praise him and popularised his treatises inJordan, while also making commentaries on Rida's works.[230][231] Ali al-Halabi, a disciple of Albani, has praised Riḍā for his contributions to Salafi revival in Jordan.[232]Salafi activists (harakis) also used Riḍā's works to build a revivalist platform focused on Islamic socio-political and cultural reforms (Islah) with a long-term objective to establish anIslamic state. Prominent figures in this rival camp include Abu Hanieh,Safar al-Hawali,Abu Qatada,Muhammad Surur, andAbdurrahman Abdulkhaliq. Abu Qatada and Abu Hanieh established aJordan-based movement known as Ahl Al-Sunnah Wal Jama'a and published a newal-Manar magazine to commemorate Riḍā's monthly publication.[233]
Riḍā's political doctrines deeply influenced Islamists likeHasan al-Banna andSayyid Qutb, as well as subsequentfundamentalist movements across theArab world.[234][235] Al-Banna was highly influenced by Riḍā's Salafism movement as well hispan-Islamist activities through socio-political means to re-generate anIslamic state and established theMuslim Brotherhood, a mass political party which sought to establish an Islamic state inEgypt within the existing constitutional framework. The movement demanded the Egyptian government to recognizesharia as the supreme source of law and remove the European law codes.[236][237][126][85] Riḍā's anti-Western sentiments set the foundations of futureSalafi-Jihadist ideologies.[116][238]
Riḍā publishedMajmuʿat al-rasaʾil wa al-masaʾil al-najdiyya (Collection of Treatises and Questions from Najd) in 1928; this was one of the earliest occurrences wherein the doctrine ofloyalty and disavowal was emphasised alongsidetawhid in the Salafi context. This doctrine in particular later became important in militantJihadist circles.[239] Riḍā'sIslamic state theory was adopted byUsama Bin Laden andAyman al Zawahiri, who followed the terminology used by Riḍā and later by Hasan al-Banna to differentiate between an Islamic State and the caliphate. In contrast to other Islamist movements likeHizb ut-Tahrir, who believed the caliphate to be the only valid government, the twoAl-Qaeda leaders believed in the legitimacy of multiple Islamic national states, referring to them as Emirates, such as theIslamic Emirate of Afghanistan andSaudi Arabia, until the 1990s, when, according to Bin Laden, it lost legitimacy.[240] Riḍā's strategy to establish an Islamic State is also believed to have influencedISIS in their 2014declaration of caliphate in Mosul.[241]
Under Saudi rule, Sufi institutions in Mecca were closed and replaced with Riḍā's Salafi comrades and Najdi scholars. In 1961, theIslamic University of Medina was founded and served as an international seminary for the propagation of Salafida'wa.[242] Riḍā's efforts were instrumental in fostering the modern transnational network of Salafi scholarship across the world. Early Salafi Egyptian scholars built extensive relations with Wahhabi scholars through education, travel, and religious gatherings. Thesescholars would continue writing to condemn innovations and various Sufi practices within the theological framework laid down byibn Taymiyyah, the Najdis, and Riḍā. Their organisation, Ansar al-Sunnah al Muhammadiyyah, became the bastion of Salafism schooling in Egypt.[243] Riḍā and his Salafi disciples also formed theYoung Men's Muslim Association (YMMA), an Islamist youth organisation that spearheaded attacks against liberalism and Western cultural trends, in the 1920s.
In his treatiseThe Exoneration written in response toSayyed Imam Al-Sharif, Salafi-jihadist leaderAyman al-Zawahiri cited Riḍā's anti-colonialfatwa, which he issued to condemn theTunisian naturalization issue, to argue that a Muslim who applies for Western citizenship by his own choice is guilty ofnon-belief.[244] Islamic scholarYusuf al-Qaradawi described Riḍā as "the truemujaddid of Islam of his time" and viewed him as the most prominent scholar who advocated traditionalism in contemporary Islamic history. Qaradawi described Rida's thought as a "lighthouse" that "guided the ship of Islam in modern history".[245] The Egyptian Salafihadith scholarAhmad Shakir conferred the title ofHujjat al-Islam to Riḍā and extolled his Qur'anic commentaryTafsir al-Manar as a "real defense of religion" in the contemporary era, encouraging everyone to read it and spread its message.[3] Saudi scholaribn 'Uthaymeen listed Riḍā as his chief source of scholarly influence alongsideibn Taymiyyah and commended him as an exemplar scholar ofsharia who had the combined knowledge of religious sciences as well political and economic affairs.[246][247][248]
Riḍā's religious efforts not only influenced theArab world, but also made major impact in South Asia and Southeast Asia. Riḍā received requests forfatwas from his followers inIndonesia and Southeast Asia and answered them throughal-Manar. Thesefatwas were regarded by the indigenousreform-oriented scholars as their main source of inspiration and became influential in shaping the intellectual thought of religious circles in 20th century Indonesia, introducing them toSalafi reformist ideals.[115] The influentialSalafi activist organisation Islamic Assembly of North America (IANA), which played a crucial role in the spread of Salafism across North America, drew inspiration from Riḍā. The official publication of the organisation was a magazine titledal-Manar al-Jadid ("the New Lighthouse") in honour of his legacy; they stated that the Muslim community continued to face "the same tribulations" as during Riḍā's era. The organisation included notable scholars and figures likeBilal Philips, Muhammad Adly, Jamal Zarabozo, and Abdel Rahman al-Dosari. After9/11, IANA was subject to intense federal scrutiny and was eventually forced to disband; many members were deported, and others, likeAli al-Timimi, were jailed.[249]
Riḍā was an important source for many 20th century Salafi scholars, includingal-Hilali,al-Khatib,al-Qasimi,ibn Uthaymin,Abdur Razzaq Malihabadi,Vakkam Abdul Qadir Moulavi, and, most notably,al-Albani.[250][251][130][252]
Published works by Riḍā include:[205]
Albānī's son 'Abd Allāh calls Rashīd Riḍā muḥaddith Miṣr ("the ḥadīth scholar of Egypt")...
Although he was a Shāfiʿī, Riḍā defended the Ḥanbalī Wahhābīs.
He rejected the ulema unquestioning imitation of their medieval predecessors (taqlid), and the practice of blindly following a particular school of jurisprudence (madhhab).
(Rida)... claimed to be Salafi in creed and relied more heavily on transmitted knowledge (naql) than did Muhammad Abduh.
... the early progressive liberalism of these modernists quickly gave way to the arch-conservatism of Athari thinkers who held even greater contempt for the ideas of the nonbelievers (as well as liberals). This shift was most pronounced in the person of Rashid Rida (d. 1935), once a close student of 'Abduh, who increasingly moved to rigid Athari thought under Wahhabite influences in the early twentieth century. From Rida onward, the "Salafism" of al-Afghani and 'Abduh became increasingly Athari-Wahhabite in nature, as it remains today.
"At the turn of the nineteenth century, the Jews' love for money, selfishness, and racial solidarity were discussed in al-Manar... An article entitled "The Jews, the Freemasons, and the Novelty of Nationalism,".. claimed that "there is no other nation as the people of Israel, which is so associated with money and racial solidarity ('asabiyya)" and so eager to exploit all nations' wealth for its own benefit."... "by the 1930s,... (Rida).. embraced the spirit and the letter of the Protocols without explicitly quoting them".
Section: 'Muhammad Rashid Rida: Taking the Modernist-Salafiya Movement Toward Conservatism' "Under Rida Islamic reformism took a more conservative turn.. Despite Rida's commitment to Islamic reform and the important role of al-Manar, his modernism gave way to an increasing conservatism after WWI..... Rida became increasingly literalist in his understanding of the driving force behind the Salafiyya movement.... his later salaforientation was closer to the approach of contemporary groups that go under the banner of Salafism than to that of `Abduh."
Rashīd Riḍā presented these core ideas of Traditionalist Salafism, especially the purported interest in ḥadīth of the early generations of Muslims, as a remedy for correcting Islamic practice and belief during his time.
Rida was motivated by celebrated revivalist influences – the doctrine of the conservative Sunni Hanabali school, Ibn Taymiyya, and the Wahabbi movement – and became increasingly Islamist throughout his lifetime....
The suspicion of Sufism... was one of the factors which in later years was to draw him nearer to the teachings of Ibn Taymiyya and the practices of Wahhabism... Sympathy with Hanbalism led him, in later life, to give enthusiastic support to the revival of Wahhabism...
{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)The basic premise of Islamism was that Islam was the natural, authentic setting for all believing Muslims. In Rashid Rida's words, it was "the religion of innate disposition." In that sense, Islamism... was meant to resolve the problem of ideology.
Rida... became increasingly Islamist throughout his lifetime....Rida's views against modernity added a strong anti-Western element to the Islamist ideology, and were reinforced by the Muslim Brotherhood and other like-minded organizations with a greater intensity...
Ridä's intellectual career symbolizes in some ways the political failure of the whole Islamic modernist movement. Without any particular shifts in doctrine his position evolved,.. from that of liberal reformer to radical fundamentalist to orthodox conservative.
Rashid Rida during the later years of his life, made a dramatic shift towards Wahhabism and grew closer to the Wahhabis and their ideational approach.
Rashid Rida was ... one of the most influential scholars and jurists of his generation.
Muhammad Rashīd Riḍā was one of the most prominent religious scholars of Sunni Islam in the first third of the twentieth century...
The development of Rida's thought brought him closer to the Puritanical doctrine known as Hanbalism and especially to that of its Wahhabi adherents,.. Rida's fundamentalist turn manifested itself above all in his defence of the Wahhabis.. In his articles he tirelessly reiterated- .. that the Wahhabis were the best Muslims
After the fall of the Caliphate in 1924, Rida ... promoted Hanbali-Wahhabism.
Rida's endorsement of Wahhabism was a major factor in the spread of its influence.. It was also one of the reasons why he has been described as advocating return to a medieval, sectarian past...
The most glaring example of such developments and differences of opinion is Rashid Rida's transformation in the last phase of his life into a spokesman for the Wahhabi movement in the Arabian Peninsula...
... he was very different from his Shaikh Muhammad Abduh,.. when it comes to a leaning toward the salaf. He was a strong supporter of ibn Taimiyyah—publishing his works—as well as of the scholars of Najd.... Through his magazine, al-Manaar, Muhammad Rasheed Ridha greatly contributed to the spread of ibn Abdul-Wahhaab's teachings in the whole Muslim world.
...Rashid Rida, who later became an admirer of Wahhabism..." "..After the death of Muhammad 'Abduh, his disciple Rashid Rida drew closer to the traditional Salafi teachings... he became seriously involved in the editing and publication of the works of Ibn Taymiyya.. His writings,... also expressed traditional Salafi theological and legal positions..
Muhammad Rashid Ridda (1865-1935), ... later on became more aligned with Wahhabi Salafism..." "A number of historians regard him as pivotal in leading Salafism's retreat from Sheikh Mohammad Abduh's school of thought.
{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)(Rida).. is often seen as one of the fathers of the modern Salafist movement.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)Syrian authorities also harassed Riḍā's family members... Sayyādī requested Badrī Bāšā, his brother-in-law and the governor of Tripoli, to hand Riḍā's brothers to military authoritie... They also beat one of his brothers on his way from Tripoli to al-Qalamūn at night and stole their horse; and they also attempted to confiscate their family mosque in the village. Riḍā further asserted that Sayyādī was ̣planning to assassinate him through one of his people in Egypt.
...Rida was a central figure of pan-Islamic networks.
Hamid al-Fiqqi, a student of Rashid Rida" ... "fact that Rida taught al-Fiqqi
{{cite journal}}:Missing or empty|title= (help)[not specific enough to verify]Muhammad Rashid Ridä focused his attention on the Zionist Movement for the first time in two extensive articles published in al-Manür in 1898 and 1902. The main goal of these articles was to alert Arabs to the threat posed by the Zionists' interest in Palestine and to incite them to act
(Jews).. founded freemasonry — the word itself would be a reference to the reconstruction of the Temple of Solomon — and, through it, they manipulated the Bolsheviks against the Russian Tsar and the Young Turks, against the caliphate
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location (link)Rida's adoption of Wahhabism would also seem to be connected with a very disturbing feature of his later thought. ... . From the late 1920s onwards, he mined the most hostile traditions to Jews in Islam and combined such material with the conspiracy theories of European anti-Semitism to attack the Zionist project and Jews in general. He claimed that the Torah exhorted Jews to exterminate people that they conquered, and that the Jews rebelled against God by killing the prophets he sent them after Moses. They invented Freemasonry and the Western banking system, and in recent years had created capitalism in Western Europe and Communism in Eastern Europe with which to plot against the European nations. From this final period in his life, we can see the origins of the anti-Semitism which has infected some parts of the Arab and Muslim struggle against Zionism and is now reflected,.. in the Hamas charter and the propagation of Holocaust denial in sections of the Arabic media.
...conspiracy theories accusing Freemasons and Jews of seeking to topple the existing order through secret machinations were translated into Arabic, and spread throughout the region...The Egyptian newspaper Al-Manar, belonging to Muhammad Rashid Rida, played a critical role in spreading these conspiracy theories... In his articles, Rida maintained that the Jews stood behind the Young Turk revolution in the Ottoman Empire in 1908 and had also orchestrated the French Revolution of 1789 and the 1905 rebellion in Russia.
They founded freemasonry — the word itself would be a reference to the reconstruction of the Temple of Solomon
Rida's analysis of the Freemasons, which once again mentioned their role in the French and Young Turk revolutions, emphasized that while the founders were Christians as well as Jews, the Jews led and dominated the movement, which benefited them most.... They dominated the Freemasons, who concealed their ultimate goal of establishing a religious Jewish state and who had brought down the religious governments in Europe, Russia, and Turkey, where Islamic law had been replaced with an atheist government that sought to eliminate Islam.
The Jewish people, Rida says, refuses to be assimilated into other peoples when it finds itself in the minority... Freemasonry is a Jewish invention and one of the tools the Jews use in their bid to re-establish a Jewish state and rebuild Solomon's temple in Jerusalem: the name 'Freemason' refers to the construction of the temple.... The Jesuits, their sworn enemies, were able to combat them in the Catholic countries, but the Jews managed to defeat the Orthodox Church by diffusing atheism in Russia and then establishing Bolshevism there, just as they managed to make Muslim Turkey an atheist country. (The allusion is to the Freemasons' role in the Young Turk movement.)
The Jews, Freemasons, and Wealth
Only two years later, Rida changed his mind about the potential of Zionism. Evaluating the Young Turk revolution, he became convinced that the Ottoman Empire had fallen under Zionist-Masonic influence. He adopted, without reservation, a narrative of a grand, ongoing, global Jewish conspiracy... In November 1910, Rida described that the Jews, oppressed by the Church in Europe, had orchestrated through the Freemasons the French Revolution, the (failed 1905) Russian Revolution,.. the Jews had also orchestrated the Young Turk revolution. That revolution was, according to Rida, the Jewish response to the former Ottoman regime's rejection of the Jewish ambition to regain possession of their temple in Jerusalem and all that surrounded it in order to reestablish their kingdom... Three months later,... Rida argued that Jews wielded immense influence over the Committee of Union and Progress (which had come to power in the Young Turk revolution) and, in particular, the treasury of the Ottoman government... Rida had proclaimed that Arab leaders had learned about the Zionist plan to purchase Palestine from their fellow Freemasons in the Turkish leadership and warned that the Arabs intended to resist this plan by force... In March 1914, sensing that the final demise of the Ottoman Empire was near, Rida reached a new conclusion as to why Zionist ambitions were feasible... believed that the Zionists had already managed to convince the Committee of Union and Progress to support Jewish rule in Palestine as a buffer against the Arabs and as a means to divide them.
The Masons found it advisable not to differentiate between the religions in membership in their association, claiming that it does not touch on religion, even though their objective is the destruction of all the religions.
{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)Rule, in Islam, is for the people, theummah; its form is to beshura, or mutual consultation; and its leader is to theimam orkhalifah, the one who implements theShari'ah. Theummah, in turn, is to determine whether theimam stays or goes... Those in authority are those who are most competent in finding solutions to issues, whose opinions are informed, who have the best interests of the ummah in mind, and who enjoy the confidence and support of theummah
{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)Jamal al-Din al-Afghani (1838–1897), Muhammad Abduh (1849–1905), and Rashid Rida (1865–1935), were the ideological roots of Islamism (Islamcılık in Turkish) in the Ottoman Empire during this period.
Rida was the leading pan-Islamic activist of that age, a significant intellectual influence on Hassan al-Banna,.. Rida's mix of European conspiratorial thought and political Islam left a lasting mark.
..Rida advocated the re-implementation of Islamic statehood. He argued against the dangers of a Muslim embrace of Western ideas of secularism and nationalism, contending that a return to Islam would deliver the Muslim people to their rightful position in the modern age.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)After Abduh's death in 1905, Rida continued to develop... revolutionary ideas that formed the foundations of the political thought of Hasan al-Banna and his group Al-Ikhwan Al-Muslimoon.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location (link){{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location (link)I have made it clear that a "Muslim" in their midst by choice and desire who acquires their nationality and who enters into complete or virtually complete loyalty to them is, if not a non-believer, close to non-belief. I cited the fatwas of Ibn Hazm, al-Wansharisi, Alish, Rashid Rida, and others.
