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Sayyid Ibrahim Husayn Shadhili Qutb [a] (9 October 1906 – 29 August 1966) was an Egyptian political theorist and revolutionary who was a leading member of the Muslim Brotherhood. He is dubbed the "father of Salafi jihadism ", the religio-political doctrine that underpins the ideological roots of global jihadist organisations such as al-Qaeda and ISIL .
Qutb further argues that returning to the path of Allah is the only way to attain a peaceful life, a life of humanity. In the application of this notion, Qutb immediately points to the Qur'an as the only source in which the true system of life can be attained. In this regard he says: "there is only one picture and method of coming back to Allah ...
- Biography
- Basic Conception
- God
- Human Nature and Purpose, Other Spiritual Beings
- Free Will and Predetermination, The Problem of Evil
- Knowledge: Revelation, Worldly Knowledge
- Ethical Values, Shari’a
- The Ideal Society (Utopia), Economics. Gender Relations
- Jahiliyya
- Human History
Sayyid Qutb (1906—1966) was and is one of the most important ideologues of the Islamist movement, which seeks to re-establish truly Islamic values and practices in Muslim societies that have become more or less Westernized. He was born and raised in an Egyptian village, attended the state primary school there, and in 1920 moved to Cairo to attend s...
Qutb saw his ideas as a necessary interpretation and corollary of the basic Muslim creed: “There is no god but God; Muhammad is the Messenger of God.” His views fall within the wide spectrum of Sunni Islamic thinking but particularly within the forms of it commonly labelled “Islamist” (stressing the application of Islamic norms to society) and “Sal...
The centrepiece of the tasawwur is God (Allah), that awesome being Whose essence and some of Whose attributes are beyond the reach of human understanding, though many attributes can be understood by the human mind. (Qutb does not discuss the relation between God’s essence and attributes, an important theme in traditional Muslim theology.) These att...
Humans hold a very special place in God’s creation, as already indicated. According to the Qur’an, God created the human body and breathed His spirit into it, and He gave humans a status above the angels, whom he commanded to prostrate to the first man. Human nature as originally created, and in its proper state, is called fitra, and this fitra has...
But are humans really free in their moral choices, given that God is directly involved in determining everything that happens? Like earlier Muslim theologians, Qutb seeks to affirm both (this is one of the ways the Islamic tasawwuris balanced). He states that the human will works within the bounds of divine determination and that this divine determ...
How do humans know of God and of the truths enshrined in the Islamic tasawwur? The human fitra can perceive something about God in the harmony of the universe that He has created and runs (that is, the Teleological Argument), but of primary importance is God’s word revealed to messengers to whom He has given a special nature that allows them to rec...
General ethical values are of course part of the Islamic tasawwur. They are fixed and do not “develop” over time, although their application may vary. They provide a “fixed axis” and “fixed framework” around and within which human activity takes place. These values are not scattered or ad hoc but are systematic, constituting a complete system for a...
The ideal society is one that recognizes the sovereignty of God alone, not the people, the nation, or the human ruler, and is governed by the Islamic Shari’a. Since the Shari’a is part of God’s overall law for the universe, a society truly governed by it will be in accord with the whole of the universe and with the human nature and needs of its mem...
Any society that is not governed according to the Shari’a is a jahili society. The term jahiliyya literally means ignorance with a connotation of barbarism and has most often been applied to the Arabian society on the eve of Muhammad’s mission. The term and general idea come from Mawdudi, but Qutb makes it more extreme. For Mawdudi, contemporary Mu...
Qutb explicitly rejects the Enlightenment idea of continuous human progress, at least in the moral area. Rather, in accordance with the traditional Muslim view, history is characterized by a series of prophetic missions, often representing moral high points, followed by decline. The first prophet was the first man, Adam. Although he and his wife di...
2011. This paper deals with the background of Sayyid Qutb’s famous work Fi Zilal al Quran. It includes discussion on how Zilal came to be written, Qutb’s approaches which are in some ways differ from other Mufassirun’s way of the Quranic interpretation, thus making his Zilal so relevant to the modern and contemporary society as it attempts to give consistent answers to the social and ...
- John Hubers, PhD
Sayyid Qutb was one such interpreter, with the main goal to revive Islam. He saw the Qur'an as a source for liberation from oppression. His egalitarian emphasis to the Qur'an was what Qutb stated as its main intended purpose. Sayyid viewed the "West" as a facade for social and political progress.
Sayyid Qutb is one the twentieth century's most influential Muslim thinkers and one of the ideological founders of the Muslim Brotherhood. This essay surveys the context which shaped his political and ideological ideas and activities and the history of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. In addition, it pays close attention to Qutb's critical reinterpretation of classical Islamic ideas jahiliyyah ...
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Who is Muhammad Qutb?
(d. 1966)Egyptian literary critic, novelist, and poet who became an important Islamist thinker and activist. Brother of Muhammad Qutb. Believed that Islam is a timeless body of ideas and practices forming a comprehensive way of life, rendering nonadherence to Islamic law inexcusable. Interpreted Islam as a call to social commitment and activism.
