Encyclopedia of Islam

Ibn Taymiyya, Taqi al-Din Ahmad

  

339  J

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worship. He is reported to have been a member 

of the Qadiri Order of Sufis. Ibn Taymiyya also 

opposed traditionalist approaches to the under-

standing of the 

sharia

 and favored the use of 

ijtihad

 (independent legal reasoning) by qualified 

jurists.

When the Mongols invaded s

yria

 in 1300, he 

was among those calling for 

Jihad

 against them 

and ruled that even though they had recently 

converted to Islam, they should be considered 

unbelievers. He went to e

gypt

 to win support 

to this cause and became embroiled in religio-

political disputes there. Ibn Taymiyya’s enemies 

accused him of 

anthropomorphism

, a view that 

was objectionable to the teachings of the a

shari

s

chool

 of Islamic 

theology

, and he was impris-

oned for more than a year in 1306. Upon release, 

he condemned popular Sufi practices and the 

influence of i

bn

 

al

-a

rabi

 (d. 1240), earning him 

the enmity of leading Sufi 

shaykh

s in Egypt and 

another prison sentence. He was released by the 

Egyptian sultan in 1310.

The sultan allowed Ibn Taymiyya to return to 

Damascus in 1313, where he worked as a teacher 

and jurist. He had supporters among the power-

ful, but his outspokenness and nonconformity 

to traditional Sunni doctrine and Sufi ideals and 

practices continued to draw the wrath of the reli-

gious and political authorities in Syria and Egypt. 

He was arrested and released several more times, 

although he was usually allowed to continue 

writing 

FatWa

s (advisory opinions in matters of 

law) and defenses of his ideas while in prison. 

Despite the controversy that surrounded him, Ibn 

Taymiyya’s influence reached well beyond Hanbali 

circles to members of other Sunni legal schools 

and Sufi groups. Among his foremost students 

were i

bn

 k

athir

 (d. 1373), a leading medieval his-

torian and Quran commentator, and Ibn Qayyim 

al-Jawziya (d. 1350), a prominent Hanbali jurist 

and theologian who helped spread his teacher’s 

influence after his death in 1328. Ibn Taymiyya 

died a prisoner in the citadel of Damascus and was 

buried in the city’s Sufi cemetery.

Hanbali influence subsequently declined in 

Syria and Egypt, especially after the region fell 

under Ottoman control in the 16th century. In the 

18th century, Ibn Taymiyya’s teachings influenced 

the revivalist movement led by m

Uhammad

 

ibn

a

bd

 

al

-W

ahhab

 (d. 1792) in the Arabian Pen-

insula. His books are today widely read in s

aUdi

a

rabia

, Egypt, Syria, J

ordan

, South Asia, and 

Southeast Asia. In addition to inspiring religious 

revivalists and reformers, some of his rulings 

have also been used to justify acts of violence 

committed by followers of radical Islamic groups. 

One of these was the Jihad Group responsible for 

the assassination of Egyptian president a

nWar

al

-s

adat

 (d. 1981).

See also 

saint

; s

alaFism

; s

UFism

; W

ahhabism

.