> ## Content Index
> Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further.

# Salafism: Origins, Beliefs and the Arguments Around It
- URL: https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/salafism/
- Published: 2026-09-27T12:24:29.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-01T23:50:58.000Z
- Description: Where the name came from, what Salafis actually believe, and what Ashʿarī, Sufi and madhhab scholars say against it. A careful look at a word heard as praise and as insult in the same masjid.
- Author: Mohammad Siddiqui
- Tags: Deen

New to the Qur'an? Start with [The Qur'an: What It Is, How It Came Down, and How It Was Kept](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/the-quran/), then read [Muhammad ﷺ: A Life](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/prophet-muhammad/). All articles: [Deen: Start Here](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/deen/).

Schools of thought, a companion piece

Few words in Muslim life carry as much freight as "Salafi". For some it names the most faithful way to follow the Prophet ﷺ; for others it suggests harshness, foreign money, or worse. Sit in almost any Sydney masjid long enough and you will hear it used as praise, as insult, and sometimes simply as a description of how a brother prays. Most of the heat comes from people meaning different things by the same word.

This article tries to separate those meanings. It sets out what Salafis say about themselves, from their own best-known scholars, then gives the strongest objections from the Ashʿarī, Māturīdī, Sufi and madhhab traditions, and from academic historians, along with the Salafi replies. It ends with what nearly everyone agrees on, which turns out to be more than the arguments suggest. It is a research article, not a fatwa. For a question about your own belief or practice, sit down with a qualified scholar you trust.

A full interactive tree of the schools of thought, Sunni and Shia, legal and theological, is now up on this site at [Schools of thought](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/schools-of-thought/). Salafism sits on that tree in an awkward place, which is part of the argument.

#### The short version

1. "The salaf" means the first three generations of Muslims. Every Sunni school honours them. The dispute is over who follows them most faithfully, and how.
2. "Salafi" has been used for at least five different things: the early ahl al-ḥadīth creed of Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, the revival of Ibn Taymiyya, the Cairo reformers around ʿAbduh and Riḍā, the Najdi movement of Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb, and the modern global movement shaped by al-Albānī, Ibn Bāz and Ibn ʿUthaymīn.
3. The core Salafi positions are a threefold division of tawḥīd, affirmation of the divine attributes without likening them to creation or emptying them of meaning, suspicion of binding taqlīd, and a broad definition of blameworthy bidʿah.
4. Most Salafis are quietist or activist, not violent. Their senior scholars have repeatedly condemned al-Qaeda and ISIS, while critics argue that some Salafi ideas were borrowed by those groups.
5. Saudi state policy has moved markedly since 2017, and the kingdom's religious outreach has changed with it.
6. Salafis and their critics share far more than they dispute: the Qur'an, the authentic Sunnah, love of the Companions, and the belief that God is utterly unlike His creation.

#### Contents

- 1[The word and the generations](#word)
- 2[Five things "Salafi" has meant](#meanings)
- 3[Creed: tawḥīd and the attributes](#creed)
- 4[Law and method](#method)
- 5[Bidʿah and devotional practice](#bidah)
- 6[Quietists, activists and jihadis](#strands)
- 7[How it spread](#spread)
- 8[The critiques and the replies](#critiques)
- 9[What is actually agreed](#agreed)
- 10[If someone at your mosque says…](#terms)
- 11[Dates and names](#dates)
- 12[Sources](#sources)

## Section 1The word and the generations

*Salaf* in Arabic means those who went before, predecessors. In religious usage the phrase *al-salaf al-ṣāliḥ*, "the righteous predecessors", refers to the earliest Muslims, and the proof text that anchors it is a hadith narrated by ʿAbdullāh ibn Masʿūd.

خَيْرُ النَّاسِ قَرْنِي، ثُمَّ الَّذِينَ يَلُونَهُمْ، ثُمَّ الَّذِينَ يَلُونَهُمْ

"The best of people are my generation, then those who come after them, then those who come after them."

Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 2652; Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim 2533 (both from Ibn Masʿūd, in both Ṣaḥīḥs, hence ṣaḥīḥ by agreement)

The report continues with a warning: after those generations will come people whose testimony runs ahead of their oaths and whose oaths run ahead of their testimony, a picture of trust breaking down. Muslim's wording opens "the best of my community".[1](#src-1)

Alongside it, Salafi writers cite a Qur'anic verse that praises the first Muslims and those who follow them:

وَٱلسَّـٰبِقُونَ ٱلْأَوَّلُونَ مِنَ ٱلْمُهَـٰجِرِينَ وَٱلْأَنصَارِ وَٱلَّذِينَ ٱتَّبَعُوهُم بِإِحْسَـٰنٍۢ رَّضِىَ ٱللَّهُ عَنْهُمْ وَرَضُوا۟ عَنْهُ

"As for the foremost, the first of the Emigrants and the Helpers, and those who follow them in goodness: Allah is pleased with them and they are pleased with Him."

Sūrat al-Tawba 9:100[3](#src-3)

Who exactly counts? The usual answer is three layers: the Companions (*ṣaḥāba*), their Successors (*tābiʿūn*), and the Successors' successors (*atbāʿ al-tābiʿīn*). In practice that runs to roughly the end of the second Islamic century and a little beyond, and it takes in the founders of the four Sunni schools. Abū Ḥanīfa (d. 150/767) and Mālik (d. 179/795) are usually placed inside it; al-Shāfiʿī and Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal sit at its edge. The boundary was never fixed to the year; even the length of a *qarn*, "generation", was debated by the commentators.

The premise is not in dispute. An Ashʿarī in Cairo, a Deobandi in Karachi and a Salafi in Riyadh all claim to follow the salaf. The argument is whether they are best reached directly, through their reported words, or through the schools that grew out of them.

## Section 2Five things "Salafi" has meant

Historians now tend to agree that "Salafism" as a named movement is modern, while the attitude it claims is old. Keeping the layers apart saves a lot of confusion.

### (a) The early ahl al-ḥadīth and the Atharī creed

In the ninth century the "people of hadith" (*ahl al-ḥadīth*) were scholars who put transmitted reports ahead of speculative theology (*kalām*). Their most famous figure is Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal (780–855), and his reputation was made in the **Miḥna**, the inquisition begun by the caliph al-Maʾmūn in 833\. Judges and scholars were required to affirm that the Qur'an was created, a position associated with the Muʿtazila. Aḥmad refused, was imprisoned and flogged under al-Muʿtaṣim, and became the emblem of resistance. The policy was abandoned under al-Mutawakkil around 848, though historians date its end anywhere from 847 to 851.[9](#src-9)[10](#src-10)

The creed of this circle is usually called **Atharī**, from *athar*, a transmitted report. Its instinct was to accept the Qur'an's and the hadith's descriptions of God as they came, without asking "how" and without explaining them away. Today's Salafis see themselves as its heirs and often call their creed Atharī.

### (b) Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn al-Qayyim

Taqī al-Dīn Ibn Taymiyya was born in Ḥarrān in 1263 and died on 26 September 1328 in Damascus, a prisoner in the citadel.[9](#src-9) He was a Ḥanbalī jurist of enormous range who argued that later theology and some popular devotion had drifted from the practice of the salaf. His short creed *al-ʿAqīda al-Wāsiṭiyya* is still taught in Salafi circles. He opposed travel undertaken specifically to visit graves, a position that helped put him in prison, and he wrote at length against the philosophers and the Ashʿarī theologians. His student Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya (1292–1350), who died in Damascus on 15 September 1350,[10](#src-10) carried the project forward, especially in legal theory and spirituality. Both remain towering figures for Salafis. Ibn Taymiyya's critics, then and now, regard him as brilliant but idiosyncratic, and note that his views on the attributes and on visiting the Prophet's grave ﷺ were contested in his own lifetime.

### (c) The Cairo reformers, and a label they may not have used

Textbooks written in the mid-twentieth century speak of a "modernist Salafiyya" founded by Jamāl al-Dīn al-Afghānī (d. 1897) and Muḥammad ʿAbduh (d. 1905), and carried on by Rashīd Riḍā (d. 1935), whose journal *al-Manār* first appeared in Cairo in 1898\. This was a real reform project: it wanted Muslims to reopen ijtihād, shed what it saw as stagnation, and reconcile faith with modern science and politics.

The historian Henri Lauzière has argued that the label is largely a scholarly construction. In an article in the *International Journal of Middle East Studies* (2010) and then in *The Making of Salafism: Islamic Reform in the Twentieth Century* (Columbia University Press, 2016), he traced how the French orientalist Louis Massignon, writing in the *Revue du monde musulman* from 1919, linked the word *salafiyya* to al-Afghānī and ʿAbduh through what Lauzière calls a series of plausible but untenable connections.[4](#src-4)[5](#src-5) On his reading, al-Afghānī and ʿAbduh did not use "Salafi" as a name for a movement. Riḍā did use *salafī*, mostly to describe a creed, and it was in his orbit, through figures such as the Moroccan scholar Taqī al-Dīn al-Hilālī, that the word gradually hardened into the name of the purist movement we know. Lauzière's view has been widely discussed and some reviewers think he overstates the break. Either way, most modern Salafis do not regard ʿAbduh as one of their own, and would find his rationalism closer to what they oppose.

### (d) The Najdi daʿwa of Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb

Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb (1703–1792) was a scholar from central Arabia whose *Kitāb al-Tawḥīd* attacked practices he considered shirk: seeking help from the dead, venerating trees and tombs, and trusting in amulets. In 1744 (some sources say 1745) he made a pact with Muḥammad ibn Saʿūd, ruler of al-Dirʿiyya: the preacher would support the ruler, and the ruler would support the preaching. Britannica describes the alliance being sealed by mutual oaths.[9](#src-9) Out of it came the first Saudi state, and the later kingdom's religious establishment.

Outsiders called the movement "Wahhabi". Adherents almost always reject the name, for two reasons. They say they follow no man, only the Qur'an and Sunnah as the salaf understood them, so naming them after a scholar misrepresents them. And the word was historically used by opponents, and in British India by colonial officials, as a term of abuse. They have preferred *ahl al-tawḥīd*, *al-muwaḥḥidūn*, *ahl al-sunna*, or simply Salafi. Critics answer that the teachings are distinct enough to deserve a name.

### (e) The modern global movement

What most people mean today took shape after 1960, and three scholars dominate it. Muḥammad Nāṣir al-Dīn al-Albānī (1914–1999), born in Shkodër in Albania and raised in Damascus, was a largely self-taught hadith scholar who spent his life re-examining the authenticity of narrations; he taught at the new Islamic University of Madinah from 1961 until 1963 and died in Amman on 2 October 1999.[10](#src-10) ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn Bāz (d. 13 May 1999) was Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia from 1993, when King Fahd revived the office.[10](#src-10)[32](#src-32) Muḥammad ibn Ṣāliḥ al-ʿUthaymīn (1929–2001) of ʿUnayza, a prolific teacher of creed and fiqh, died in Jeddah on 10 January 2001.[10](#src-10)

The **Islamic University of Madinah**, founded in 1961, brought students from across the world on scholarships and sent them home as teachers. One of them was Muqbil ibn Hādī al-Wādiʿī (d. 21 July 2001), who studied there and then founded the Dār al-Ḥadīth seminary at Dammāj in northern Yemen, which drew students from several continents. In South Asia an older, independent current, the **Ahl-i Ḥadīth**, grew in the nineteenth century around scholars such as Sayyid Nadhīr Ḥusayn of Delhi and Nawwāb Ṣiddīq Ḥasan Khān of Bhopal, rejecting taqlīd of the schools; the All-India Ahl-i Ḥadīth Conference was founded in 1906.[10](#src-10) Ṣiddīq Ḥasan Khān himself objected strongly to being called Wahhabi. Today the Ahl-i Ḥadīth and the Arab Salafis recognise each other as kin.

## Section 3Creed: tawḥīd and the attributes

### The threefold division

Salafi teaching divides *tawḥīd*, the oneness of God, into three:

- **Tawḥīd al-rubūbiyya**, oneness of lordship: God alone creates, owns and governs.
- **Tawḥīd al-ulūhiyya** (or *al-ʿibāda*), oneness of worship: God alone is to be worshipped, prayed to and relied on.
- **Tawḥīd al-asmāʾ wa-l-ṣifāt**, oneness in the names and attributes: God is described as He described Himself, and nothing shares His attributes.

The division matters because of what it is used to argue. Salafis point out that the Qur'an describes the Makkan idolaters as acknowledging that God created the heavens and the earth, yet they still worshipped others: "If you ask them \[O Prophet\] who created the heavens and the earth and subjected the sun and the moon \[for your benefit\], they will certainly say, 'Allah!'" (29:61), and of their idols they said, "We worship them only so they may bring us closer to Allah" (39:3).[42](#src-42) So, the argument runs, believing in God as Creator is not enough; directing any act of worship, such as supplication, to anyone else breaks tawḥīd even if the person affirms God's lordship.

Critics from the Ashʿarī and Sufi traditions object on two fronts. First, they say the scheme was systematised by Ibn Taymiyya and has no explicit statement among the salaf; Salafis reply that it is an inductive summary of the Qur'an, like the categories of Arabic grammar, and point to earlier authors who they say used the same categories, among them al-Ṭabarī, Ibn Manda and the Ḥanbalī Ibn Baṭṭa (d. 387/997).[23](#src-23)[24](#src-24) Second, and more seriously, critics say the scheme is used to treat ordinary Muslims who ask the Prophet ﷺ or a saint for intercession as if they were the idolaters of Makka, and that this is the root of much unjust takfīr.[25](#src-25) Most Salafi scholars answer that they distinguish between an act and the person who commits it, and that declaring an individual Muslim an unbeliever needs conditions to be met and obstacles removed.[26](#src-26) Critics reply that the distinction is not always observed on the ground.

### The attributes: "without likening, without negating"

The Qur'an speaks of God's hand, face, eyes, His rising over the Throne (*istiwāʾ*) and His descending. How should these be read? Everyone begins from one verse:

لَيۡسَ كَمِثۡلِهِۦ شَيۡءٞۖ وَهُوَ ٱلسَّمِيعُ ٱلۡبَصِيرُ

"There is nothing like Him, for He \[alone\] is the All-Hearing, All-Seeing."

Sūrat al-Shūrā 42:11[3](#src-3)

The Salafi position, as Ibn ʿUthaymīn and others teach it, is to affirm every attribute the texts mention, with its apparent meaning, while denying any likeness to creatures: *bi-lā tashbīh wa-lā taʿṭīl*, without likening and without stripping away, and without asking how (*bi-lā kayf*). God's hand is real, but it is not a hand like ours, and its "how" is unknown. Salafis often quote a saying attributed to Imām Mālik about istiwāʾ, reported in several versions: the rising is known, its manner is not comprehended, believing in it is obligatory and asking about it is an innovation.

The Ashʿarī and Māturīdī schools, which represent most Sunni scholarship historically, take two routes. **Tafwīḍ** means affirming the wording while consigning its meaning to God, and many of them say this was the way of most of the salaf. **Taʾwīl** means interpreting the wording in a way fitting to God: "hand" as power or favour, istiwāʾ as dominion. Their concern is that affirming the "apparent meaning" of a hand or a direction leads, whatever the disclaimer, to thinking of God in bodily terms. Salafis reply that taʾwīl substitutes the theologian's reason for the text, and that tafwīḍ, if it means the words have no known meaning at all, makes the Qur'an unintelligible at its most important points. Each side accuses the other of departing from the salaf; each quotes the same early figures.

There is common ground. The creed of Abū Jaʿfar al-Ṭaḥāwī (d. 321/933), a Ḥanafī scholar of Egypt, is taught in Salafi, Ashʿarī and Māturīdī institutions alike, though each reads it through a different commentary: Salafis usually through the commentary of Ibn Abī al-ʿIzz (d. 792/1390), whose hadith al-Albānī checked and graded, and others through Māturīdī commentators.

### Intercession, tawassul and shrines

All Sunni schools affirm the intercession of the Prophet ﷺ on the Day of Judgement; the disagreement is about asking in this world. Salafis accept three kinds of *tawassul* (seeking a means of approach to God): by His names and attributes, by one's own good deeds (the story of the three men trapped in a cave, in al-Bukhārī), and by asking a living righteous person to pray for you. For the last they cite the report in Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī (no. 1010) that ʿUmar, during a drought, asked al-ʿAbbās, the Prophet's uncle, to pray for rain, saying they used to ask the Prophet and now asked his uncle. Salafis read it as the Companions turning to a living man rather than to the Prophet's grave.[2](#src-2)[27](#src-27)

Most Ashʿarī, Māturīdī and Sufi scholars permit tawassul through the rank of the Prophet ﷺ and of the righteous, living or dead. Their main text is the hadith of the blind man whom the Prophet ﷺ taught to pray, "O Allah, I ask You and turn towards You by Your Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, the Prophet of Mercy" (Jāmiʿ al-Tirmidhī 3578; ḥasan ṣaḥīḥ gharīb in al-Tirmidhī's words, ṣaḥīḥ per Darussalam), alongside other narrations and centuries of practice.[40](#src-40)[28](#src-28) Salafis read the same hadith as tawassul through the Prophet's own prayer for the man while he was alive, not through his person.[41](#src-41) They distinguish that, as a request to God, from worshipping the one mentioned. Salafis also oppose building over graves, and in Arabia this led to the levelling of many tombs and domes, notably in Makka and Madina, which remains a source of grief and anger to many Muslims outside the movement.

It was partly to stop these disputes spilling into mutual excommunication that the **Amman Message** was issued in November 2004, followed by a conference of some 200 scholars in July 2005\. Its first point says it is not permissible to declare an apostate anyone who holds the Ashʿarī creed, practises real Sufism, or "subscribes to true Salafi thought".[12](#src-12) The qualifiers "real" and "true" carry weight, and the text was endorsed by scholars from across the spectrum.

## Section 4Law and method

In law, the Salafi slogan is a return to the Qur'an and Sunnah "according to the understanding of the salaf". In practice that means three things.

First, a rejection of **binding taqlīd**. Salafis do not object to a layperson asking a scholar; they object to the idea that a Muslim is obliged to follow one school even when a clear, authentic hadith points the other way. They distinguish *taqlīd* (accepting a view without knowing its evidence) from *ittibāʿ* (following a view because its evidence is known). The four imams, they point out, each said something to the effect that if a hadith is authentic, that is my school. The argument is set out more fully in [Following a madhhab](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/following-a-madhhab/).

Second, a close **relationship with Ḥanbalī fiqh**, at least in Arabia. Saudi scholars such as Ibn Bāz and Ibn ʿUthaymīn were trained in the Ḥanbalī school, taught its manuals, and often issued Ḥanbalī answers, while reserving the right to depart from it on evidence. Al-Albānī, by contrast, was hostile to what he called madhhab partisanship and argued rulings directly from hadith. So there is no single "Salafi fiqh", and Salafis differ among themselves on many legal questions.

Third, the **hadith project**. Al-Albānī spent decades re-grading narrations in the major collections outside al-Bukhārī and Muslim, producing series such as *Silsilat al-aḥādīth al-ṣaḥīḥa* and *Silsilat al-aḥādīth al-ḍaʿīfa wa-l-mawḍūʿa*, and separating the "sound" from the "weak" in the Sunan. His *Ṣifat ṣalāt al-Nabī* reconstructed the Prophet's prayer ﷺ from hadith alone. Many ordinary Muslims today have met hadith through his gradings without knowing it: sunnah.com shows them throughout its editions of Abū Dāwūd and al-Tirmidhī. How those gradings are made, and why they can differ, is covered in [How a hadith is judged](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/how-a-hadith-is-judged/).

His work was also contested. Scholars of the schools, and some hadith specialists, criticised particular gradings and his method of assessing narrators. The Egyptian hadith scholar Maḥmūd Saʿīd Mamdūḥ wrote a book-length objection to his weakening of certain narrations in Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim, and Saʿīd Ramaḍān al-Būṭī wrote against the "anti-madhhab" stance associated with him. Traditional scholars add a structural point: a legal school weighs a hadith alongside other evidence, such as the practice of Madina or a Companion's fatwa, so finding a sound hadith is where their reasoning begins, not where it ends.

## Section 5Bidʿah and devotional practice

Salafis are best known to most Muslims for what they object to. The basis is two hadith:

مَنْ أَحْدَثَ فِي أَمْرِنَا هَذَا مَا لَيْسَ فِيهِ فَهُوَ رَدٌّ

"Whoever introduces into this affair of ours something that is not part of it, it is rejected."

Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 2697 (from ʿĀʾisha; also Muslim 1718)

And in a sermon narrated by Jābir in Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim (no. 867): وَكُلُّ بِدْعَةٍ ضَلاَلَةٌ, "and every innovation is misguidance".

For Salafis, following the Mālikī jurist al-Shāṭibī (d. 790/1388) in *al-Iʿtiṣām*, "every" means every: any devotional act given a set time, form or reward the Sunnah did not give it is blameworthy, however good the intention. Worldly inventions are a separate matter. On this basis they object to a public celebration of the Prophet's birthday, the **Mawlid**; to singling out the night of **15 Shaʿbān** for special prayers; and to many Sufi practices such as collective rhythmic dhikr, set litanies with promised rewards, and visiting shrines on appointed days.

Their opponents in the schools answer with a distinction going back to al-Shāfiʿī, as al-Bayhaqī reports him,[39](#src-39) and systematised by al-ʿIzz ibn ʿAbd al-Salām (d. 660/1262): new things are either good or bad according to whether they fit the principles of the Sharīʿa. They cite ʿUmar, who, on gathering the people behind one reciter for the Ramadan night prayer, said, نِعْمَ الْبِدْعَةُ هَذِهِ, "what an excellent innovation this is" (Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 2010).[2](#src-2) Salafis reply that ʿUmar meant it in the linguistic sense, since the Prophet ﷺ had himself led that prayer in congregation. Both readings are old.

For the Mawlid in particular, the evidence on each side is gathered in [The Mawlid Sourcebook](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/the-mawlid-sourcebook-2/), and the mid-Shaʿbān question, where the hadith are unusually mixed and even Salafi scholars disagree on some narrations, is treated in [The 15th of Shaʿbān](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/the-15th-of-shaban/). It is worth noticing that Ibn Taymiyya himself, while calling the Mawlid an innovation in *Iqtiḍāʾ al-ṣirāṭ al-mustaqīm*, wrote that some who hold it may be rewarded for their love of the Prophet ﷺ and their good intention.[29](#src-29) The harsher tone of some modern writing is not the only Salafi voice.

## Section 6Quietists, activists and jihadis

The most cited map of the movement is Quintan Wiktorowicz's "Anatomy of the Salafi Movement", in *Studies in Conflict & Terrorism* 29 (2006), pp. 207–239.[6](#src-6) His argument is that Salafis share a creed but divide over how to apply it to the world, giving three broad factions. Later researchers have called it too neat, but it remains a useful starting point.

Compare the three strands at a glance 

| Strand                | Attitude to rulers                                                    | Method                                                                       | Usually associated with                                                                         |
| --------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Purists (quietists)   | Obey a Muslim ruler; advise him privately, never oppose him in public | Teaching creed, correcting worship, staying out of party politics            | al-Albānī, Ibn Bāz, Ibn ʿUthaymīn; in sharper form the Madkhalī current[6](#src-6)[11](#src-11) |
| Politicos (activists) | Public criticism and petitions for reform                             | Salafi creed joined to Muslim Brotherhood ideas of politics and organisation | The Saudi Ṣaḥwa: Salmān al-ʿAwda, Safar al-Ḥawālī[7](#src-7)                                    |
| Jihadis               | Declare rulers unbelievers (takfīr) and rebel against them            | Armed violence, justified in the language of tawḥīd and al-walāʾ wa-l-barāʾ  | Al-Qaeda and ISIS, condemned by quietist and activist scholars alike[8](#src-8)[14](#src-14)    |

Wiktorowicz's own labels are purists, politicos and jihadis.[6](#src-6) Real people and groups often sit between the boxes.

### Purists or quietists

Probably the largest group. They focus on teaching creed and correcting worship, avoid party politics, and hold that a Muslim ruler must be obeyed and advised privately rather than opposed in public, since rebellion brings bloodshed worse than the ruler's faults. The great scholars of the last generation, al-Albānī, Ibn Bāz and Ibn ʿUthaymīn, are usually placed here. The **Madkhalī** current, named after Rabīʿ ibn Hādī al-Madkhalī (d. 9 July 2025)[11](#src-11)[35](#src-35), who headed the Sunnah department at the Islamic University of Madinah, is a sharper version: it is strongly loyal to governments and devotes much energy to "criticism and praise" (*al-jarḥ wa-l-taʿdīl*) of other preachers, especially those linked to the Muslim Brotherhood. Critics, including other Salafis, say its constant refutations split communities; admirers see it as guarding the creed. In Libya, armed groups with Madkhalī ties have fought on the side of Khalifa Haftar, a reminder that "quietist" describes an attitude to rulers, not necessarily to force.[11](#src-11)

### Politicos or activists: the Ṣaḥwa

The *Ṣaḥwa* ("awakening") in Saudi Arabia combined Salafi creed with the political and organisational ideas of the Muslim Brotherhood. Stéphane Lacroix's *Awakening Islam: The Politics of Religious Dissent in Contemporary Saudi Arabia* (Harvard University Press, 2011) is the standard account.[7](#src-7) Its moment came after Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990 and US troops were based in the kingdom. Preachers such as Salmān al-ʿAwda and Safar al-Ḥawālī criticised the decision and the state's policies, and in 1991–92 petitions demanded reform. Both were imprisoned in 1994 and released in 1999.[7](#src-7)[15](#src-15) Al-ʿAwda later became a moderate voice with a very large following online.

### Jihadis

A small minority used Salafi vocabulary to justify armed revolt: against their own governments, and later against the West. Al-Qaeda and, later, ISIS drew heavily on the language of tawḥīd, *al-walāʾ wa-l-barāʾ* (loyalty and disavowal) and takfīr of rulers. Thomas Hegghammer's *Jihad in Saudi Arabia: Violence and Pan-Islamism since 1979* (Cambridge, 2010) argues that Saudi jihadism was driven more by pan-Islamist grievance than by theology alone, and his work with Lacroix on Juhayman al-ʿUtaybī, who seized the Grand Mosque of Makka in November 1979, shows how a millenarian group emerged from a pious, apolitical milieu.[8](#src-8)

This needs saying clearly. The mainstream quietist and activist scholars condemn these groups. On 19 August 2014 the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia, ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Āl al-Shaykh, described extremism and the groups practising it, naming ISIS and al-Qaeda, as "the enemy number one of Islam".[14](#src-14) Quietists call the jihadis *khawārij*, after the early sect that rebelled against ʿAlī, and jihadis in turn despise the quietists; when al-Madkhalī died in 2025, jihadi channels celebrated.[36](#src-36) Critics outside the movement reply that the overlap in vocabulary is not an accident, and that ideas taught in a mosque as abstract creed can be weaponised elsewhere. That is a real debate among researchers, and it should not be confused with the claim that Salafis in general endorse violence, which the evidence does not support.

### Saudi Arabia since 2017

State policy in the kingdom has changed sharply. In September 2017 Salmān al-ʿAwda was arrested, along with other clerics and intellectuals; in September 2018 prosecutors said they would seek the death penalty against him, according to Human Rights Watch, on charges that were about speech and associations.[15](#src-15) Safar al-Ḥawālī was arrested in July 2018 after publishing a book critical of the royal family.[15](#src-15) On 24 October 2017 Crown Prince Muḥammad bin Salmān told an investment conference in Riyadh that Saudi Arabia would return to "moderate Islam".[16](#src-16) Cinemas, concerts and women's driving followed. In January 2022 a royal decree created Founding Day, dating the state to 1727, when Muḥammad ibn Saʿūd came to power, rather than to the 1744 pact. Analysts read that as a quiet reduction of the Wahhabi alliance's place in the national story.[17](#src-17) The religious establishment remains, but it is now plainly subordinate to the state.

Āl al-Shaykh, Grand Mufti since 1999, died on 23 September 2025.[31](#src-31)[32](#src-32) In October 2025 King Salmān appointed Ṣāliḥ al-Fawzān, then about ninety and a long-serving member of the Council of Senior Scholars, in his place. His books on creed are staples of Salafi teaching, and some observers found the choice surprising given how far the place of religious law in the kingdom has shifted over the past decade.[32](#src-32)

## Section 7How it spread

It is often said that Salafism spread on Saudi oil money. That is partly true, and worth stating carefully. A 2024 Carnegie Endowment paper by Hesham Alghannam describes how the kingdom invested heavily in promoting Salafism worldwide, especially under King Fahd (1982–2005), through scholarships to Madinah, funding for mosques and schools, and free literature, and how that outreach has since been scaled back and redirected. The kingdom handed over control of the Grand Mosque of Brussels and closed the King Fahd Academy in Germany.[18](#src-18)

Money alone does not explain the reach. The message has a clarity that appeals to the young, to converts and to migrants: straight to the texts, an answer with a hadith attached. Research on Indonesia makes the point. An ISEAS paper by Aʾan Suryana (January 2025) notes that the Saudi-funded college LIPIA, established in Jakarta in 1980, produced many Salafi preachers, but that its graduates went in different directions, some into Brotherhood-style party politics, and that much of the funding came because Indonesian institutions asked for it.[19](#src-19)

In **South Asia** the Ahl-i Ḥadīth predate Saudi funding by a century, and have their own seminaries, such as Jāmiʿa Salafiyya in Varanasi, and political organisations in Pakistan. In **Europe**, Salafi preaching grew from the 1990s among second-generation Muslims and converts, with mosques and bookshops in the UK, France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany, and researchers there distinguish carefully between the quietist majority and the violent fringe.

Two very different sources give a sense of scale and texture in the West. Germany's domestic intelligence service, the Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz, puts the number of people it counts as Salafists at 11,200 and describes Salafism as numerically the most significant Islamist current in the country (figures page updated August 2026).[37](#src-37) That is a security agency's count, made with its own definitions for its own purposes, and it says more about official concern than about how most Salafis live. For that, ethnography is a better guide. Anabel Inge's *The Making of a Salafi Muslim Woman: Paths to Conversion* (Oxford University Press, 2016) rests on more than two years of fieldwork, from 2010 to 2012, mostly in London, with 23 women aged 19 to 29\. She asks why they chose Salafism over other ways of being Muslim, why they stayed despite a real social cost, and how they handled study, work, marriage and family life.[38](#src-38)

In **Australia**, Salafi-leaning mosques, study circles and bookshops exist in Sydney and Melbourne in particular, many led by graduates of Madinah and other Gulf institutions who returned with fluent Arabic and a clear method. The community is small. In a national survey of Muslim Australians published in 2020, Halim Rane and colleagues found that 2.8 per cent of respondents identified as Salafi, and a 2023 study by Shaheen Whyte and Salih Yucel notes criticism of Salafi materials in some Australian mosques and schools for intolerance towards Shia and non-Salafi Sunnis.[20](#src-20) The broader history of how the various communities arrived, and brought their scholars with them, is told in [How Islam came to Australia](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/how-islam-came-to-australia/).

## Section 8The critiques and the replies

### From the madhhab tradition

The most famous critique came from the Syrian Shāfiʿī scholar Muḥammad Saʿīd Ramaḍān al-Būṭī (d. 2013), whose book *al-Salafiyya: marḥala zamaniyya mubāraka lā madhhab islāmī*, "Salafiyya: a blessed historical period, not an Islamic school", appeared in 1988.[21](#src-21) The title is the argument. The salaf were an era, not a sect; every Sunni follows them; turning their name into a party badge divides Muslims and implicitly accuses the rest of deviance. Al-Būṭī also argued that bypassing the schools asks laypeople to do what only mujtahids can, and that the result is not freedom from taqlīd but taqlīd of a few modern scholars.

Salafis reply that they use the name to describe a method, not to found a new school, and that the early scholars themselves spoke of following "the way of the salaf". They add that the schools are not rejected; their imams are honoured, and their books taught. The objection is to fanaticism, when a school's position is defended against a clear text.

### From the Ashʿarīs and Māturīdīs

Here the objection is theological. The creedal schools that have taught most Sunni seminaries for a thousand years, from al-Azhar to Deoband, see Salafi language on the attributes as close to anthropomorphism (*tajsīm*), and object to what they see as Salafis claiming sole ownership of the title *ahl al-sunna*. The sharpest expression was the conference in Grozny, Chechnya, in August 2016, whose closing statement defined Ahl al-Sunna as Ashʿarīs and Māturīdīs in creed, the four schools in law, and the Sufism of al-Junayd, and omitted Salafis. The Saudi Council of Senior Scholars condemned it, and al-Azhar, whose Grand Imam had attended, later distanced itself.[13](#src-13)[30](#src-30)

Salafis answer that the Ashʿarīs themselves arrived later than the salaf, that Abū al-Ḥasan al-Ashʿarī (d. 324/935–6) in his final works affirmed the attributes much as Aḥmad did, and that the burden of proof lies with whoever interprets a text away from its apparent sense.

### From the Sufis

Sufi critics say that Salafis mistake expressions of love for acts of worship. Visiting the righteous, sending blessings on the Prophet ﷺ in gatherings, and keeping a teacher are, in their view, the living texture of the religion the salaf passed on, and stripping them away leaves a faith that is correct but cold. Salafis reply that they accept *tazkiya*, purification of the soul, and *zuhd*, and read the early ascetics with admiration, while rejecting the later structures of orders, saint veneration and speculative mysticism. Ibn al-Qayyim's *Madārij al-sālikīn* is itself a commentary on a Sufi manual.

### From academics

Historians add that "Salafism" as a stable category is partly an artefact of modern scholarship (Lauzière), that the movement is more varied than its labels,[22](#src-22) and that its growth owes as much to print, the internet, migration and Gulf prestige as to theology. Salafis tend to see this as religion reduced to sociology, though the points about dates and labels stand on their own evidence.

## Section 9What is actually agreed

After all that, the common ground is large. The Qur'an is the uncreated speech of God: Aḥmad was flogged for saying so, and Ashʿarīs and Māturīdīs say it too. Salafis and their Sunni critics honour the Companions, treat the two Ṣaḥīḥs as the most reliable books after the Qur'an, and hold the first generations to be the best. None of them believes God resembles His creation, or that anyone but He answers prayer. The four schools are accepted as legitimate paths of Sunni law, even by those who dispute how binding they are. And the senior scholars of every one of these traditions have called the violence of groups like ISIS a crime.

The actual disputes are about how to read certain attributes, whether some forms of tawassul and grave visitation are allowed, how widely to define bidʿah, and how far a layperson must stay within one school. They are serious questions, argued by capable scholars for centuries, and the signatories of the Amman Message held that none of them, in good faith, puts a Muslim outside Islam.

## Section 10If someone at your mosque says…

A few words come up in conversation, often without explanation. Plainly:

"What's his manhaj?"

*Manhaj* means method: how someone derives and applies the religion, including attitudes to rulers, to other groups and to politics. In Salafi talk, "his ʿaqīda is fine but his manhaj isn't" usually means someone holds the right creed but is thought too political or too soft on opponents.

"Check his ʿaqīda."

*ʿAqīda* means creed, the articles of belief. Among Salafis it often means specifically the position on the divine attributes and on tawḥīd al-ulūhiyya.

"He's Atharī."

He follows the creed of the early hadith scholars: affirming the attributes without interpretation. Most Salafis would say this of themselves; some Ḥanbalīs who are not otherwise Salafi say it too.

"He's Madkhalī."

Usually said by critics, and rarely accepted by those described. It means a quietist Salafi who is strongly loyal to rulers and quick to refute other preachers by name.

"He's Ikhwānī."

Literally, of the Muslim Brotherhood (*al-Ikhwān al-Muslimūn*). In Salafi usage it can describe anyone thought to put politics or organisation ahead of creed, whether or not they belong to the Brotherhood.

"He's Ṣūfī."

Someone who follows the path of Sufism, often through an order (*ṭarīqa*) and a teacher. Among Salafis it can be a criticism; among many other Muslims it is simply a description of a tradition that includes many of Islam's greatest scholars.

## Section 11Dates and names

### Timeline

| Year    | Event                                                                                                                                 |
| ------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| 833     | Al-Maʾmūn begins the Miḥna on the createdness of the Qur'an                                                                           |
| c. 848  | Al-Mutawakkil ends the Miḥna (dated 847–851 by different historians)                                                                  |
| 855     | Death of Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal in Baghdad                                                                                                  |
| 1328    | Ibn Taymiyya dies in the citadel of Damascus, 26 September                                                                            |
| 1350    | Ibn al-Qayyim dies in Damascus, 15 September                                                                                          |
| 1744    | Pact of al-Dirʿiyya between Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb and Muḥammad ibn Saʿūd (some sources: 1745)                                   |
| 1792    | Death of Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb                                                                                                  |
| 1898    | Rashīd Riḍā launches *al-Manār* in Cairo                                                                                              |
| 1906    | All-India Ahl-i Ḥadīth Conference founded                                                                                             |
| 1919    | Massignon links "salafiyya" to al-Afghānī and ʿAbduh in *Revue du monde musulman*                                                     |
| 1961    | Islamic University of Madinah founded; al-Albānī teaches there until 1963                                                             |
| 1979    | Juhayman al-ʿUtaybī's group seizes the Grand Mosque of Makka, November                                                                |
| 1980    | LIPIA college opens in Jakarta                                                                                                        |
| 1988    | Al-Būṭī publishes *al-Salafiyya: marḥala zamaniyya mubāraka lā madhhab islāmī*                                                        |
| 1990–92 | Gulf crisis; Ṣaḥwa preachers criticise the state; reform petitions                                                                    |
| 1994    | Salmān al-ʿAwda and Safar al-Ḥawālī imprisoned (released 1999)                                                                        |
| 1999    | Deaths of Ibn Bāz (13 May) and al-Albānī (2 October)                                                                                  |
| 2001    | Deaths of Ibn ʿUthaymīn (10 January) and Muqbil al-Wādiʿī (21 July)                                                                   |
| 2004–05 | Amman Message (November 2004) and its three points (July 2005)                                                                        |
| 2006    | Wiktorowicz, "Anatomy of the Salafi Movement"                                                                                         |
| 2014    | Saudi Grand Mufti calls ISIS and al-Qaeda "enemy number one of Islam", 19 August                                                      |
| 2016    | Grozny conference on "who are Ahl al-Sunna", 25–27 August                                                                             |
| 2017    | Al-ʿAwda arrested, 7 September; crown prince pledges "moderate Islam", 24 October                                                     |
| 2018    | Al-Ḥawālī arrested, 12 July; death penalty sought for al-ʿAwda, September                                                             |
| 2022    | Saudi Founding Day decree dates the state to 1727, 27 January                                                                         |
| 2025    | Death of Rabīʿ al-Madkhalī, 9 July; death of Grand Mufti ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Āl al-Shaykh, 23 September; Ṣāliḥ al-Fawzān appointed, October |

### Who's who

| Name                            | Died          | Place           | Role                                                            |
| ------------------------------- | ------------- | --------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal                | 855           | Baghdad         | Hadith scholar, eponym of the Ḥanbalī school, hero of the Miḥna |
| Abū Jaʿfar al-Ṭaḥāwī            | 933           | Egypt           | Ḥanafī jurist; author of the widely shared creed                |
| Ibn Taymiyya                    | 1328          | Damascus        | Ḥanbalī jurist and theologian; the key medieval reference       |
| Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya          | 1350          | Damascus        | Student of Ibn Taymiyya; law, spirituality                      |
| Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb     | 1792          | Najd            | Preacher of the Najdi daʿwa; *Kitāb al-Tawḥīd*                  |
| Ṣiddīq Ḥasan Khān               | 1890          | Bhopal          | Leading Ahl-i Ḥadīth scholar                                    |
| Rashīd Riḍā                     | 1935          | Cairo           | Editor of *al-Manār*; bridge between reformism and Salafism     |
| Ibn Bāz                         | 1999          | Saudi Arabia    | Grand Mufti from 1993                                           |
| Muḥammad Nāṣir al-Dīn al-Albānī | 1999          | Damascus, Amman | Hadith scholar; re-graded the Sunan                             |
| Muḥammad ibn Ṣāliḥ al-ʿUthaymīn | 2001          | ʿUnayza, Jeddah | Teacher of creed and Ḥanbalī fiqh                               |
| Muqbil ibn Hādī al-Wādiʿī       | 2001          | Dammāj, Yemen   | Founder of Dār al-Ḥadīth                                        |
| Saʿīd Ramaḍān al-Būṭī           | 2013          | Damascus        | Shāfiʿī-Ashʿarī critic of Salafism                              |
| Rabīʿ al-Madkhalī               | 2025          | Saudi Arabia    | Hadith critic; namesake of the Madkhalī current                 |
| Salmān al-ʿAwda                 | detained 2017 | Saudi Arabia    | Ṣaḥwa preacher                                                  |
| Safar al-Ḥawālī                 | detained 2018 | Saudi Arabia    | Ṣaḥwa preacher                                                  |

Death dates are CE. For the two Ṣaḥwa figures I have given the year of their most recent arrest. Both were still reported to be in detention at the latest reports I could find: Amnesty International said in May 2025 that al-ʿAwda remained in solitary confinement with his trial unresolved, and the London-based rights group Sanad reported in August 2026 that al-Ḥawālī was still held.[33](#src-33)[34](#src-34)

This is a research article, not a fatwa. On any question of your own creed or practice, consult a qualified scholar who knows you and your situation.

**Spotted a mistake, or know a better source?** I check and correct these pages when readers point things out. Please email [mohammad.siddiqui@icloud.com](mailto:mohammad.siddiqui@icloud.com?subject=Correction%3A%20Salafism%3A%20Origins%2C%20Beliefs%20and%20the%20Arguments%20Around%20It) with the passage, what you think is wrong, and your source (Qur'an reference, hadith with collection and number, or a book with page).

## Section 12Sources

1. Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 2652, [sunnah.com/bukhari:2652](https://sunnah.com/bukhari:2652?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com); Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim 2533, [sunnah.com/muslim:2533a](https://sunnah.com/muslim:2533a?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
2. Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 2697, [sunnah.com/bukhari:2697](https://sunnah.com/bukhari:2697?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com); Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim 867, [sunnah.com/muslim:867a](https://sunnah.com/muslim:867a?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com); Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 2010, [sunnah.com/bukhari:2010](https://sunnah.com/bukhari:2010?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com); Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 1010, [sunnah.com/bukhari:1010](https://sunnah.com/bukhari:1010?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
3. Qur'an 9:100 and 42:11, [quran.com](https://quran.com/9/100?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com) (Mustafa Khattab, *The Clear Quran*; the dashes of his 9:100 replaced by commas, and 42:11 shortened to its last sentence).
4. Henri Lauzière, "The Construction of Salafiyya: Reconsidering Salafism from the Perspective of Conceptual History", *International Journal of Middle East Studies* 42.3 (2010), pp. 369–389, [Cambridge Core](https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/international-journal-of-middle-east-studies/article/construction-of-salafiyya-reconsidering-salafism-from-the-perspective-of-conceptual-history/66CCD646C4CF983740ADC9FD6DC354FA?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
5. Henri Lauzière, *The Making of Salafism: Islamic Reform in the Twentieth Century* (Columbia University Press, 2016), [publisher page](https://cup.columbia.edu/book/the-making-of-salafism/9780231175500/?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
6. Quintan Wiktorowicz, "Anatomy of the Salafi Movement", *Studies in Conflict & Terrorism* 29 (2006), pp. 207–239, [Taylor & Francis](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10576100500497004?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
7. Stéphane Lacroix, *Awakening Islam: The Politics of Religious Dissent in Contemporary Saudi Arabia* (Harvard University Press, 2011), [publisher page](https://www.hup.harvard.edu/books/9780674049642?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
8. Thomas Hegghammer, *Jihad in Saudi Arabia: Violence and Pan-Islamism since 1979* (Cambridge University Press, 2010); Thomas Hegghammer and Stéphane Lacroix, "Rejectionist Islamism in Saudi Arabia: The Story of Juhayman al-ʿUtaybi Revisited", *IJMES* 39.1 (2007); list at [hegghammer.com](https://hegghammer.com/publications/?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
9. Britannica, ["Ibn Taymiyyah"](https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ibn-Taymiyyah?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com); ["Ahmad ibn Hanbal"](https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ahmad-ibn-Hanbal?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com); ["Saudi Arabia: The Wahhābī movement"](https://www.britannica.com/place/Saudi-Arabia/The-Wahhabi-movement?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
10. Wikipedia, ["Mihna"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mihna?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), ["Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn%5FQayyim%5Fal-Jawziyya?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), ["Al-Albani"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Albani?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), ["Ibn Baz"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn%5FBaz?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), ["Al-Uthaymin"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Uthaymin?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), ["Muqbil al-Wadi'i"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muqbil%5Fal-Wadi%27i?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), ["Islamic University of Madinah"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic%5FUniversity%5Fof%5FMadinah?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), ["Ahl-i Hadith"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahl-i%5FHadith?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), ["Al-Manār (magazine)"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Man%C4%81r%5F%28magazine%29?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com) (used for dates, cross-checked where possible).
11. Laurent Bonnefoy, ["Rabiʿ al-Madkhali, death of a Saudi Salafi ideologist"](https://orientxxi.info/rabi-al-madkhali-death-of-a-saudi-salafi-ideologist,8421?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), Orient XXI, 2025.
12. The Amman Message, ["The Three Points of the Amman Message"](https://ammanmessage.com/the-three-points-of-the-amman-message-v-1/?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com) and [FAQ](https://ammanmessage.com/frequently-asked-questions/?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
13. "2016 international conference on Sunni Islam in Grozny", [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016%5Finternational%5Fconference%5Fon%5FSunni%5FIslam%5Fin%5FGrozny?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
14. Al Arabiya, ["ISIS is enemy No. 1 of Islam, says Saudi grand mufti"](https://english.alarabiya.net/News/middle-east/2014/08/19/Saudi-mufti-ISIS-is-enemy-No-1-of-Islam-?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), 19 August 2014.
15. Human Rights Watch, ["Saudi Arabia: Prominent Cleric May Face Death Penalty"](https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/09/12/saudi-arabia-prominent-cleric-may-face-death-penalty?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), 12 September 2018; Al Jazeera, ["Who are the key Sahwa figures Saudi Arabia is cracking down on?"](https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2019/6/5/who-are-the-key-sahwa-figures-saudi-arabia-is-cracking-down-on?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), 5 June 2019.
16. CNN, ["Saudi crown prince promises 'a more moderate Islam'"](https://edition.cnn.com/2017/10/24/middleeast/saudi-arabia-prince-more-moderate-islam/index.html?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), 24 October 2017.
17. Simon Henderson, ["Saudi Arabia Adjusts Its History, Diminishing the Role of Wahhabism"](https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/saudi-arabia-adjusts-its-history-diminishing-role-wahhabism?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), Washington Institute, 11 February 2022.
18. Hesham Alghannam, ["Influence Abroad: Saudi Arabia Replaces Salafism in its Soft Power Outreach"](https://carnegieendowment.org/research/2024/12/influence-abroad-saudi-arabia-replaces-salafism-in-its-soft-power-outreach?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 23 December 2024.
19. Aʾan Suryana, ["The Impact and Complexity of Saudi Funding on Dissemination of Wahhabism and Salafism in Indonesia"](https://www.iseas.edu.sg/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/ISEAS%5FPerspective%5F2025%5F4.pdf?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), ISEAS Perspective 2025/4.
20. Halim Rane et al., ["Islam in Australia: A National Survey of Muslim Australian Citizens and Permanent Residents"](https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/11/8/419?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), *Religions* 11.8 (2020); Shaheen Whyte and Salih Yucel, ["Australian Muslim Identities and the Question of Intra-Muslim Dialogue"](https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/14/2/233?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com), *Religions* 14.2 (2023).
21. Muḥammad Saʿīd Ramaḍān al-Būṭī, *al-Salafiyya: marḥala zamaniyya mubāraka lā madhhab islāmī* (1988).
22. Roel Meijer (ed.), *Global Salafism: Islam's New Religious Movement* (Hurst/Columbia, 2009).
23. Islam Question & Answer (ed. Muḥammad Ṣāliḥ al-Munajjid), "What is the evidence for dividing Tawhid into three categories?", [islamqa.info 26338](https://islamqa.info/en/answers/26338/what-is-the-evidence-for-dividing-tawhid-into-three-categories?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com) (a Salafi statement of the case).
24. Islamweb Fatwa Centre, "The categorization of Tawheed into three types was induced by the early Muslims", fatwa 278728, quoting Bakr Abū Zayd, [islamweb.net](https://www.islamweb.net/en/fatwa/278728/the-categorization-of-tawheed-into-three-types-was-induced-by-the-early-muslims?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
25. General Iftaa' Department of Jordan, "Ruling on Dividing Tawheed into three Categories", as republished at [islamqa.org](https://islamqa.org/shafii/darul-iftaa-jordan/228882/ruling-on-dividing-tawheed-into-three-categories/?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com) (accepts the division for teaching, warns against its use for takfīr).
26. Islam Question & Answer, "What Is Takfir?", [islamqa.info 85102](https://islamqa.info/en/answers/85102?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com) (conditions and impediments before judging an individual).
27. Islamweb, "Permissible and prohibited Tawassul", [islamweb.net article 157717](https://www.islamweb.net/en/article/157717/permissible-and-prohibited-tawassul?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com) (the Salafi threefold scheme).
28. Dar al-Ifta al-Misriyyah, "Supplication through the Prophet Muhammad (al-tawassul)", [dar-alifta.org](https://www.dar-alifta.org/en/article/details/163/supplication-through-the-prophet-muhammad-al-tawassul?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com) (the majority Ashʿarī-Māturīdī case).
29. Islamweb Fatwa Centre, fatwa 28549, on Ibn Taymiyya's treatment of the Mawlid in *Iqtiḍāʾ al-ṣirāṭ al-mustaqīm*, [islamweb.net](https://www.islamweb.net/ar/fatwa/28549/?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com) (Arabic).
30. Hala Al-Dosari, "Saudi Arabia's Struggle for Sunni Leadership", Sada, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 7 September 2016, [carnegieendowment.org](https://carnegieendowment.org/sada/2016/09/saudi-arabias-struggle-for-sunni-leadership?lang=en¢er=global&ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
31. The National, "Saudi Arabia appoints new Grand Mufti, kingdom's top religious scholar", 23 October 2025, [thenationalnews.com](https://www.thenationalnews.com/news/gulf/2025/10/23/saudi-arabia-appoints-new-grand-mufti-kingdoms-top-religious-scholar/?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
32. Dominik Krell, "The New Grand Mufti and the Future of Islamic Law in Saudi Arabia", Islamic Law Blog, 23 April 2026, [islamiclaw.blog](https://islamiclaw.blog/2026/04/23/the-new-grand-mufti-and-the-future-of-islamic-law-in-saudi-arabia/?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
33. Amnesty International, "Saudi Arabia: Unjustly Detained Reformist Cleric Tortured: Salman Alodah", MDE 23/9380/2025, 12 May 2025, [amnesty.org](https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/mde23/9380/2025/en/?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
34. Sanad, "Safar Al-Hawali, His Sons and Associates: Eight Years of Detention, Retaliation and Harsh Sentences", 27 August 2026, [sanad.uk](https://sanad.uk/2026/08/27/safar-al-hawali-his-sons-and-associates-eight-years-of-detention-retaliation-and-harsh-sentences/?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
35. The New Arab, "Who was Rabee al-Madkhali and what is Madkhalism?", 11 July 2025, [newarab.com](https://www.newarab.com/news/who-was-rabee-al-madkhali-and-what-madkhalism?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
36. MEMRI Jihad and Terrorism Threat Monitor, "Jihadis Celebrate Death Of Prominent Quietist Salafi Scholar Rabee Al-Madkhali, Call Him 'Polytheist, Enemy Of Mujahideen'", 2025, [memri.org](https://www.memri.org/jttm/jihadis-celebrate-death-prominent-quietist-salafi-scholar-rabee-al-madkhali-call-him-?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
37. Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz, "Islamismus und islamistischer Terrorismus: Zahlen und Fakten" (updated 12 August 2026): [verfassungsschutz.de](https://www.verfassungsschutz.de/DE/themen/islamismus-und-islamistischer-terrorismus/zahlen-und-fakten/zahlen-und-fakten%5Fartikel.html?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com) (German).
38. Anabel Inge, *The Making of a Salafi Muslim Woman: Paths to Conversion* (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016); fieldwork details as summarised in J. P. Eggert's review, *Fieldwork in Religion* 12.1 (2017): [equinoxpub.com](https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/inge-anabel-2016-making-salafi-muslim-woman-paths-conversion-new-york-oxford-university-press-xiii-303pp-22-99-isbn-9780190611677-pbk-e-book-also-available-reviewed-je/?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
39. IslamQA (Arabic), answer 300961, on al-Shāfiʿī's division of new matters into praised and blameworthy, quoting al-Bayhaqī, *Manāqib al-Shāfiʿī* 1/469, with the Salafi reading of it as linguistic: [islamqa.info](https://islamqa.info/ar/answers/300961?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
40. Jāmiʿ al-Tirmidhī 3578, ʿUthmān b. Ḥunayf, the blind man's prayer; al-Tirmidhī: ḥasan ṣaḥīḥ gharīb; Darussalam: ṣaḥīḥ: [sunnah.com/tirmidhi:3578](https://sunnah.com/tirmidhi:3578?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
41. IslamQA, answer 97600, on the hadith of the blind man and tawassul through the Prophet's duʿāʾ in his lifetime (a Salafi reading): [islamqa.info](https://islamqa.info/en/answers/97600?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).
42. Qur'an 29:61 and 39:3, quran.com (Mustafa Khattab, *The Clear Quran*; both shortened): [quran.com/29/61](https://quran.com/29/61?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com); [quran.com/39/3](https://quran.com/39/3?ref=mohammadsiddiqui.com).

#### Related reading

- [The Qur'an: What It Is, How It Came Down, and How It Was Kept](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/the-quran/): revelation, compilation and preservation of the text
- [Muhammad ﷺ: A Life](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/prophet-muhammad/): from Mecca to Medina, with a timeline and family tree
- [The People Around Muhammad ﷺ: Companions, Wives and Family](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/companions/): short sourced profiles of those closest to him
- [Sufism: Origins, Orders and Critiques](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/sufism/): the ṭarīqas and the arguments around them
- [Belief in God, the Prophets and the Unseen](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/creed/): the schools of theology set side by side
- [Islamic Schools of Thought: The Complete Tree](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/schools-of-thought/#salafi): opened at the Salafi node, under the Atharī creed
- [Following a Madhhab: Taqlīd, Ijtihād and Mixing Schools](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/following-a-madhhab/): why jurists answer differently, and whether you may switch
- [How a Hadith Is Judged](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/how-a-hadith-is-judged/): what ṣaḥīḥ, ḥasan and ḍaʿīf mean
- [The House and the Schools](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/the-house-and-the-schools/): the Imams, and how each tradition derives law
- [The Mawlid Sourcebook](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/the-mawlid-sourcebook-2/): the verses, hadith and scholars on each side
- [The People Behind the Hadith: Narrators, Chains and How They Were Judged](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/hadith-narrators-and-chains/): five real isnāds to step through
- [Every Hadith on This Site: An Index](https://www.mohammadsiddiqui.com/deen/hadith-index/): each report quoted here, with its grade