The Wahhabi movement started as a revivalist and reform movement in the Arabian Peninsula during the early 18th century, whose adherents described themselves as "Muwahhidun" (Unitarians). A young cleric named Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab (1703–1792 C.E/ 1115–1206 A.H), the leader of the Muwahhidun and eponym of the Wahhabi movement, called upon his disciples to denounce certain beliefs and practices associated with cult of saints as idolatrous impurities and innovations in Islam (bid'ah). His movement emphasized adherence to the Quran and hadith, and advocated the use of ijtihad. Eventually, Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab formed a pact with a local leader, Muhammad bin Saud, offering political obedience and promising that protection and propagation of the Wahhabi movement meant "power and glory" and rule of "lands and men".. "the two ... concluded a pact. Ibn Saud would protect and propagate the stern doctrines of the Wahhabi mission, which made the Koran the basis of government. In return, Abdul Wahhab would support the ruler, supplying him with 'glory and power'. Whoever championed his message, he promised, 'will, by means of it, rule and lands and men'."
18th and 19th century European historians, scholars, travellers and diplomats compared the Wahhabi movement with various Euro-American socio-political movements in the Age of Revolutions. Calvinist scholar John Ludwig Burckhardt, author of the well-received works "Travels in Arabia" (1829) and "Notes on the Bedouins and Wahábys" (1830), described the Muwahhidun as Arabian locals who resisted Turkish hegemony and its "Napoleonic" tactics. Historian Loius Alexander Corancez in his book "Histoire des Wahabis" described the movement as an Asiatic revolution that sought a powerful revival of Arab civilisation by establishing a new order in Arabia and cleansing all the irrational elements and superstitions which had been normalised through Sufi excesses from Turkish and foreign influences. Scottish historian Mark Napier attributed the successes of Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab's revolution to assistance from "frequent interpositions of Heaven".
After the Unification of Saudi Arabia, Wahhabis were able spread their political power and consolidate their rule over the Islamic holy cities of Mecca and Medina. After the discovery of petroleum near the Persian Gulf in 1939, Saudi Arabia had access to oil export revenues, revenue that grew to billions of dollars. This moneyspent on books, media, schools, universities, mosques, scholarships, fellowships, lucrative jobs for journalists, academics and Islamic scholarsgave Wahhabi ideals a "preeminent position of strength" in Islam around the world..
Origins
The patronym of Wahhabism, Muhammad ibn ʿAbd-al Wahhab, was born around 1702–03 in the small oasis town of 'Uyayna in the Najd region, in what is now central Saudi Arabia.. "What is the Wahhabi Mission?... A neutral observer could define the Wahhabi mission as the religious reform movement associated with the teachings of Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab (1703–1792)" During this era, numerous pre-Islamic beliefs and customs were practiced by the Arabian Bedouin. These included various folklores associated with ancestral worship, belief in cult of saints, animist practices, solar myths, fetishism, etc. which had become popular amongst the nomadic tribes of central Arabia.
Ibn Abd al-Wahhab was born to a family of Hanbali jurists. As part of his scholarly training, Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab travelled in his youth to various Islamic centres in Arabia and Iraq, seeking knowledge. He travelled to Mecca and Medina to perform Hajj and studied under notable hadith scholars. After completing his studies, he travelled to Iraq and returned to his hometown in 1740. During these travels, Ibn Abd al-Wahhab had studied various religious disciplines such as Fiqh, theology, philosophy and Sufism. Exposure to various rituals and practices centered on the cult of saints would lead Ibn Abd al-Wahhab to grow critical of various superstitious practices and accretions common among Sufis, by the time of his return to Uyayna. Following the death of his father, Ibn Abd al-Wahhab publicly began his religious preaching.
Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab: Early Preaching
When Muhammad ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab began preaching his dawah in the regions of Central Arabia, where various beliefs and practices related to veneration of Muslim saints and superstitions were prevalent among Muslims, he was initially rejected and called a "deviant". Later, however, his call to dawah became increasingly popular. Realising the significance of efficient and charismatic religious preaching (da'wa), Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab called upon his students to master the path of reasoning and proselytising over warfare to convince other Muslims of their reformist ideals. Thus, Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab carried out his reforms in a manner that reflected the socio-political values of the Arabian Bedouins to accommodate local sentiments.
According to Islamic beliefs, any act or statement that involves worship to any being other than God and associates other creatures with God's power is tantamount to idolatry (shirk). The core of the controversy between Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab and his adversaries was over the scope of these acts. According to Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab, those who made acts of devotion such as seeking aid (istigatha) from objects, tombs of dead Muslim saints (Awliyaa), etc. were heretics guilty of bidʻah (religious innovation) and shirk (polytheism). Reviving Ibn Taymiyya's approach to takfīr (excommunication), Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab declared those who adhered to these practices to be either infidels (kuffār) or false Muslims (munāfiḳūn), and therefore deemed them worthy of death for their perceived apostasy (ridda). Those Muslims that he accused to be heretics or infidels would not be killed outright; first, they would be given a chance to repent. If they repented their repentance was accepted, but if they didn't repent after the clarification of proofs they were executed under the Islamic death penalty as apostates (murtaddin)..
Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab was a major proponent of the 'Udhr bil Jahl (excuse of ignorance) doctrine, wherein any person unaware of core Islamic teachings had to be excused until clarification. As per this doctrine, those who fell into beliefs of shirk (polytheism) or kufr (disbelief) are to be excommunicated only if they have direct access to Scriptural evidences and get the opportunity to understand their mistakes and retract. Hence he asserted that education and dialogue was the path forward and forbade his followers from engaging in reckless accusations against their opponents. Following this principle, Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab delegated the affairs of his enemies to God and in various instances, withheld from fighting them.
The doctrines of Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab were criticized by a number of Islamic scholars during his lifetime, accusing him of disregarding Islamic history, monuments, traditions and the sanctity of Muslim life. His critics were mainly ulama from his homeland, the Najd region of central Arabia, which was directly affected by the growth of the Wahhabi movement, based in the cities of Basra, Mecca, and Medina. His beliefs on the superiority of direct understanding of Scriptures (Ijtihad) and rebuke of Taqlid (blindfollowing past legal works) also made him a target of the religious establishment. For his part, Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab criticised the nepotism and corruption prevalent in the clerical class.
The early opponents of Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab classified his doctrine as a "Kharijite sectarian heresy". By contrast, Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab profoundly despised the "decorous, arty tobacco-smoking, music happy, drum pounding, Egyptian and Ottoman nobility who traveled across Arabia to pray at Mecca each year", and intended to either subjugate them to his doctrine or overthrow them. He further rejected and condemned allegations charged against him by various critics; such as the claim of Takfir (excommunication) on those who opposed him or did not emigrate to the lands controlled by Muwahhidun. Responding to the accusations brought against him, Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab asserted:"as for the lie and slander, like their saying that we make generalized takfīr, and that we make emigration obligatory towards us,. .. All of this is from lying and slander by which they hinder the people from the religion of Allāh and His Messenger. And when it is the case that we do not make takfir of those who worship the idol which is on the grave of 'Abd al-Qadir, or the idol upon the grave of Ahmad al-Badawi; and their likes – due to their ignorance and an absence of one to caution them – how could we then make takfir of those who does not commit shirk, when they do not migrate to us, nor make takfir of us, nor fight us?"
With the support of the ruler of the townUthman ibn Mu'ammarIbn 'Abd al-Wahhab carried out some of his religious reforms in 'Uyayna, including the demolition of the tomb of Zayd ibn al-Khattab, one of the Sahaba (companions) of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and the stoning to death of an adulterous woman after her self-confession. However, a more powerful chief (Sulaiman ibn Muhammad ibn Ghurayr) pressured Uthman ibn Mu'ammar to expel him from 'Uyayna.
Alliance with the House of Saud
The ruler of a nearby town, Muhammad ibn Saud, invited Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab to join him, and in 1744 a pact was made between the two.. Ibn Saud would protect and propagate the doctrines of the Wahhabi mission, while Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab "would support the ruler, supplying him with 'glory and power'". Whoever championed his message, Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab promised, "will, by means of it, rule the lands and men". Ibn Saud would abandon non-shari'i practices such as taxations of local harvests, and in return God might compensate him with booty from conquest and sharia compliant taxes that would exceed what he gave up. The alliance between the Wahhabi mission and Al Saud family has "endured for more than two and half centuries", surviving defeat and collapse. The two families have intermarried multiple times over the years, and in today's Saudi Arabia the minister of religion is always a member of the Al ash-Sheikh family, i.e. a descendant of Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab.
According to Natana J. DeLong-Bas, Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab was restrained in urging fighting with perceived unbelievers, preferring to preach and persuade rather than attack. Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab followed a non-interference policy in Ibn Saud's state consolidation project. While Ibn Saud was in charge of political and military issues, he promised to uphold Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab's religious teachings. However, the military campaigns of Ibn Saud weren't necessarily met with approval by Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab. Delineating the specific roles of Amir (political leader) and Imam (religious leader), Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab stipulated that only the imam (religious leader) could declare the military campaign as jihad after meeting the legal religious stipulations.. Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab had only authorized jihad when the Wahhabi community were attacked first, as a defensive measure. His main objective was religious reformation of Muslim beliefs and practices through a gradual educational process. With those who differed with his reformist ideals, Ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab called for dialogue and sending invitations to religious discussions and debates, rather than a "convert or die" approach. Military resort was a last-case option; and when engaged in rarely, it abided by the strict Islamic legal codes.