Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab
Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab was the religious reformer whose doctrine underpins the Saudi state. Born in 1703 in Uyayna in the Najd, the arid interior of Arabia, he came from a family of Hanbali jurists — his father was a qadi and his grandfather a scholar — and he memorised the Quran young and studied in Medina, Basra and possibly Iraq. He returned convinced that the Muslims around him had lapsed into shirk, the association of others with God. His targets were specific and local: visiting tombs and shrines to seek intercession, venerating trees and sacred stones, appealing to saints, and the accretions he regarded as corrupting the pure monotheism of the first generations. His central text is Kitab al-Tawhid, the book of monotheism, which argues that professing the creed is insufficient without repudiating these practices, and that those who persist in them are not Muslims — the takfiri conclusion that has proved the most consequential part of the doctrine. He acted on it. At Uyayna he cut down a tree venerated by locals, demolished the tomb of a companion of the Prophet, and had a woman stoned for adultery. The local overlord ordered his expulsion. In 1744 he reached Diriyah and made the pact with its emir Muhammad ibn Saud: the emir would provide protection and force, the scholar religious authority. The arrangement gave expansion a justification and gave the doctrine an army. He served as the movement's religious head until his death in 1792, and his descendants, the Al ash-Sheikh, have held Saudi religious offices ever since.
- Lived: 1703 CE – 1792 CE
- Nationality: Arabian
- Roles: religious_leader
