Qutbism


Qutbism is an Islamist ideology developed by Sayyid Qutb, a leading member of the Muslim Brotherhood who was executed by the Egyptian government. It has been described as advancing the extremist jihadist ideology of propagating "offensive jihad" – waging jihad in conquest – or "armed jihad in the advance of Islam".
Qutbism has gained widespread attention because it is widely believed to have influenced Islamic extremists and terrorists such as Osama bin Laden. Muslim extremists “cite Sayyid Qutb repeatedly and consider themselves his intellectual descendants.”

Terminology

Like the term "Wahhabi", Qutbee is used not by the alleged proponents to describes themselves, but by their critics.

Tenets

The main tenet of Qutbist ideology is that the Muslim community — i.e. the community of those who call themselves Muslims but are not part of Qutb's vanguard fighting to reestablish true Islam — "has been extinct for a few centuries", having reverted to Godless ignorance, and must be reconquered for Islam.
Qutb outlined his ideas in his book Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq. Important principles of Qutbism include:
The most controversial aspect of Qutbism is takfir, whereby Qutb has declared Islam "extinct," so that those who call themselves Muslims — with the exception of Qutb’s Islamic vanguard — are not actually Muslim. Takfir was intended to shock Muslims into religious re-armament. When taken literally, takfir also had the effect of causing non-Qutbists who claimed to be Muslim in violation of Sharia law, a law that Qutb very much supported. Violating this law could potentially be considered apostasy from Islam: a crime punishable by death according to Islamic law.
Because of these serious consequences, Muslims have traditionally been reluctant to practice takfir, that is, to pronounce professed Muslims as unbelievers. This prospect of fitna, or internal strife, between Qutbists and "takfir-ed" mainstream Muslims, was put to Qutb by prosecutors in the trial that led to his execution, and is still made by his Muslim detractors.
Qutb died before he could clear up the issue of whether jahiliyyah referred to the whole "Muslim world," to only Muslim governments, or only in an allegorical sense, but a serious campaign of terror – or "physical power and jihad" against "the organizations and authorities" of "jahili" Egypt – by insurgents observers believed to be influenced by Qutb followed in the 1980s and 1990s. Victims included Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, head of the counter-terrorism police Major General Raouf Khayrat, parliamentary speaker Rifaat el-Mahgoub, dozens of European tourists and Egyptian bystanders, and over one hundred Egyptian police officers. Other factors played a part in instigating the violence, but Qutb's takfir against jahiliyyah society, and his passionate belief that jahiliyyah government was irredeemably evil, played a key role.

History

Spread of Qutb's ideas

Qutb's message was spread through his writing, his followers and especially through his brother, Muhammad Qutb, who moved to Saudi Arabia following his release from prison in Egypt and became a professor of Islamic Studies and edited, published and promoted his brother Sayyid's work.
Ayman Al-Zawahiri, who went on to become a member of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, was one of Muhammad Qutb's students and later a mentor of Osama bin Laden and a leading member of al-Qaeda. and had been first introduced to Sayyad Qutb by his uncle, Mafouz Azzam, who had been very close to Sayyad Qutb throughout his life and impressed on al-Zawahiri "the purity of Qutb's character and the torment he had endured in prison." Zawahiri paid homage to Qutb in his work Knights under the Prophet's Banner.
Qutbism was considered propagated by Abdullah Azzam during the war between the Soviet and Afghan mujahideens. In the scene of the war, Qutbism had merged with Salafism and Wahhabism, culminating in the formation of Salafi jihadism. Abdullah Azzam was a mentor of bin Laden as well.
Osama bin Laden is reported to have regularly attended weekly public lectures by Muhammad Qutb, at King Abdulaziz University, and to have read and been deeply influenced by Sayyid Qutb.
Late Yemeni Al Qaeda leader Anwar al-Awlaki has also spoken of Qutb's great influence and of being "so immersed with the author I would feel Sayyid was with me... speaking to me directly.”

Backlash

Following Qutb's death Qutbist ideas spread throughout Egypt and other parts of the Arab and Muslim world, prompting a backlash by more traditionalist and conservative Muslims, such as the book Du'ah, la Qudah . The book, written by MB Supreme Guide Hassan al-Hudaybi, attacked the idea of Takfir of other Muslims.

Views

Science and learning

On the importance of science and learning, the key to the power of his bête noire, western civilization, Qutb was ambivalent. He wrote that
Muslims have drifted away from their religion and their way of life, and have forgotten that Islam appointed them as representatives of God and made them responsible for learning all the sciences and developing various capabilities to fulfill this high position which God has granted them.

... and encouraged Muslims to seek knowledge.
A Muslim can go to a Muslim or to a non-Muslim to learn abstract sciences such as chemistry, physics, biology, astronomy, medicine, industry, agriculture, administration, technology, military arts and similar sciences and arts; although the fundamental principle is that when the Muslim community comes into existence it should provide experts in all these fields in abundance, as all these sciences and arts are a sufficient obligation on Muslims.

On the other hand, Qutb believed some learning was forbidden to Muslims and should not be studied, including:
principles of economics and political affairs and interpretation of historical processes... origin of the universe, the origin of the life of man... philosophy, comparative religion... sociology... Darwinist biology.

and that the era of scientific discovery was now over:
The period of resurgence of science has also come to an end. This period, which began with the Renaissance in the sixteenth century after Christ and reached its zenith in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, does not possess a reviving spirit.

However important scientific discovery was, or is, an important tool to achieve it is to follow Sharia law under which
blessings fall on all mankind, leads in an easy manner to the knowledge of the secrets of nature, its hidden forces and the treasures concealed in the expanses of the universe.

Sharia

Qutbism postulates that sharia-based society will have an almost supernatural perfection, providing justice, prosperity, peace and harmony both individually and societally.
Its wonders are such that the use of offensive jihad to spread sharia-Islam throughout the non-Muslim world will not be aggression but "a movement... to introduce true freedom to mankind." It frees humanity from servitude to man because its divine nature requires no human authorities to judge or enforce its law.

Conspiracy

Qutbism emphasizes what it sees as evil designs of Westerners and Jews against Islam, and the importance of Muslims not trusting or imitating them.

Non-Muslims

Other elements of Qutbism deal with non-Muslims, particularly Westerners, and have drawn attention and controversy from their subjects, particularly following the September 11, 2001 attacks. Though their terminology, issues and arguments are different from those of the Islamic traditionalists, Westerners also have criticism to make.

The West

In Qutb's view, for example, Western Imperialism is not, as Westerners would have Muslims believe, only an economic exploitation of weak peoples by the strong and greedy. Nor were the medieval Crusades, as some historians claim, merely an attempt by Christians to reconquer the formerly Christian-ruled, Christian holy land; some historians have disagreed because the crusaders slaughtered Arab Christians too.
Both were different expressions of the West's "pronounced... enmity" towards Islam, including plans to "demolish the structure of Muslim society." Imperialism is "a mask for the crusading spirit."
Examples of Western malevolence Qutb personally experienced and related to his readers include an attempt by a "drunken, semi-naked... American agent" to seduce him on his voyage to America, and the celebration of American hospital employees upon hearing of the assassination of Egyptian Ikhwan Supreme Guide Hasan al-Banna.
Qutb's Western critics have questioned whether Qutb was likely to arouse interest of American intelligence agents, or whether many Americans, let alone hospital employees, knew who Hasan al-Banna or the Muslim Brotherhood were in 1948.

Jews

The other anti-Islamic conspirator group, according to Qutb, is "World Jewry," which he believes is engaged in tricks to eliminate "faith and religion", and trying to divert "the wealth of mankind" into "Jewish financial institutions" by charging interest on loans. Jewish designs are so pernicious, according to Qutb's logic, that "anyone who leads this community away from its religion and its Quran can only be Jewish agent", causing one critic to claim that the statement apparently means that "any source of division, anyone who undermines the relationship between Muslims and their faith is by definition a Jew".

Western corruption

Qutbism emphasizes a claimed Islamic moral superiority over the West, according to Islamist values. One example of "the filth" and "rubbish heap of the West" was the "animal-like" "mixing of the sexes." Qutb states that while he was in America a young woman told him
Critics complain that this opinion was wildly unrepresentative and the incident highly improbable. Even at the height of the sexual revolution in America 30 years later, most Americans would disagree with his statement, but at the time of his visit to America, sex out of wedlock, let alone "animal-like" promiscuity, was rare, with the overwhelming number of Americans married as virgins or that only had premarital sex with their future spouse.

Criticism

By Muslims

While Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq was Qutb's manifesto, other elements of Qutbism are found in his works Al-'adala al-Ijtima'iyya fi-l-Islam , and his Quranic commentary Fi Zilal al-Qur'an . Ideas in those works also have come under attack from both traditionalist/conservative Muslims. They include:
Qutb may now be facing criticism representing his idea's success or Qutbism's logical conclusion as much as his idea's failure to persuade some critics. Writing before the Islamic revival was in full bloom, Qutb sought Islamically-correct alternatives to European ideas like Marxism and socialism and proposed Islamic means to achieve the ends of social justice and equality, redistribution of private property, political revolution. But according to Olivier Roy, contemporary "neofundamentalist refuse to express their views in modern terms borrowed from the West. They consider indulging in politics, even for a good cause, will by definition lead to bid'a and shirk "
There are, however, some commentators who display an ambivalence towards him, and Roy notes that "his books are found everywhere and mentioned on most neo-fundamentalist websites, and arguing his "mystical approach", "radical contempt and hatred for the West", and "pessimistic views on the modern world" have resonated with these Muslims.

Relation to Muslim Brotherhood

Controversy over Qutbism is in part an expression of the disagreement of two of the main tendencies of the Islamic revival: the more quiest Salafi Muslims, and the more politically active Muslim groups associated with the Muslim Brotherhood, the group Qutb was a member of for about the last decade and a half of his life.
Although Sayyid Qutb was never head of the Muslim Brotherhood, he was the Brotherhood's "leading intellectual," editor of its weekly periodical, and a member of the highest branch in the Brotherhood, the Working Committee and of the Guidance Council.
After the publication of Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq, opinion in the Brotherhood split over his ideas, though many in Egypt and most Muslim Brothers in other countries are said to have shared his analysis "to one degree or another." However, the leadership of the Brotherhood, led by Hasan al-Hudaybi, remained moderate and interested in political negotiation and activism. By the 1970s, the Brotherhood had renounced violence as a means of achieving its goals. In recent years his ideas have been embraced by Islamic extremist groups, while the Muslim Brotherhood has tended to serve as the official voice of Moderate Islamism.