Muhammad Qutb
Encyclopedia
Muhammad Qutb, (1919–present) is an Islamist author, scholar and teacher best known as the younger brother of the Egypt
ian Islamist thinker Sayyid Qutb
. He was a supporter and promoter of his older brother's ideas after his brother was executed by the Egypt
ian government.
, and is several years younger than his elder brother Sayyid, born sometime after 1906. Little is known in English sources about his upbringing and education but it is known that he lived with his famous brother, their two sisters and mother in Helwan near Cairo
for several years starting in 1926. He was arrested a few days before Sayyid (on July 29, 1965) for his alleged co-leadership along with his brother in a plot to kill leading political and cultural figures in Egypt and overthrow the government. His life was spared (although his brother died on the gallows in 1966), and in 1972 he was released from prison. Subsequently he took refuge, with other members of the Muslim Brotherhood
, in Saudi Arabia
.
There he edited and published Sayyid's books and taught as a professor of Islamic Studies at (according to different sources) either Mecca
's Umm al-Qura
University, and/or King Abdulaziz University
in Jeddah
, and that either Osama bin Laden
or Ayman al-Zawahiri
(al Qaeda's #2 and leading theorist), was a student. Osama bin Laden recommends to Muslims the book "Concepts that Should be Corrected by Sheikh Muhammad Qutb," in a 2004 videotape. According to Lawrence Wright
, who interviewed Muhammad and bin Laden's close friend in college Mohammed Jamal Khalifa, bin Laden "usually attended" Muhammad Qutb's weekly public lectures at King Abdel-Aziz University.
In addition to making available his brother's work, M. Qutb worked to advance his ideas by "smoothing away" differences between his brother's radical supporters and more conservative Muslim
s, particularly other members of the Brethren
. Muhammad took a less literal interpretation of his brother's famous statement that the Muslim world and Muslim governments were jahiliyya (returned to pagan ignorance, and thus no longer Muslim). He denied that the country that had given him refuge was jahiliyya, and in 1975 came out publicly against Takfir
, or judging Muslims as unbelievers.
Muhammad was an author in his own right and his writings are widespread in the Arab
world and nearly as prolific as his brother's. Jahiliyya in the Twenty-First Century is perhaps his best-known work, and gained notoriety as an alleged terrorist handbook (along with his brother's (Milestones
) when the government claimed to find the two in police searches of plotters' homes and environs.
Another very popular work, Islam: the Misunderstood Religion, expands on his brother's ideas, describing the ways in which fundamentalist Islam is superior to the "perverted ... inhuman ... crazy ... savage and backward" Western world
. It has been called a classic example of contemporary Muslim apologetics.
As of 2006, he was apparently still alive and living in Mecca.
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
ian Islamist thinker Sayyid Qutb
Sayyid Qutb
Sayyid Qutb was an Egyptian author, educator, Islamist theorist, poet, and the leading member of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood in the 1950s and '60s....
. He was a supporter and promoter of his older brother's ideas after his brother was executed by the Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
ian government.
Background
Muhammad Qutb was the second eldest of five children born in the Upper Egyptian village of Musha near AsyutAsyut
Asyut is the capital of the modern Asyut Governorate in Egypt; the ancient city of the same name is situated nearby. The modern city is located at , while the ancient city is at .- Etymology :...
, and is several years younger than his elder brother Sayyid, born sometime after 1906. Little is known in English sources about his upbringing and education but it is known that he lived with his famous brother, their two sisters and mother in Helwan near Cairo
Cairo
Cairo , is the capital of Egypt and the largest city in the Arab world and Africa, and the 16th largest metropolitan area in the world. Nicknamed "The City of a Thousand Minarets" for its preponderance of Islamic architecture, Cairo has long been a centre of the region's political and cultural life...
for several years starting in 1926. He was arrested a few days before Sayyid (on July 29, 1965) for his alleged co-leadership along with his brother in a plot to kill leading political and cultural figures in Egypt and overthrow the government. His life was spared (although his brother died on the gallows in 1966), and in 1972 he was released from prison. Subsequently he took refuge, with other members of the Muslim Brotherhood
Muslim Brotherhood
The Society of the Muslim Brothers is the world's oldest and one of the largest Islamist parties, and is the largest political opposition organization in many Arab states. It was founded in 1928 in Egypt by the Islamic scholar and schoolteacher Hassan al-Banna and by the late 1940s had an...
, in Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia , commonly known in British English as Saudi Arabia and in Arabic as as-Sa‘ūdiyyah , is the largest state in Western Asia by land area, constituting the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and the second-largest in the Arab World...
.
There he edited and published Sayyid's books and taught as a professor of Islamic Studies at (according to different sources) either Mecca
Mecca
Mecca is a city in the Hijaz and the capital of Makkah province in Saudi Arabia. The city is located inland from Jeddah in a narrow valley at a height of above sea level...
's Umm al-Qura
Umm al-Qura
Umm al-Qura University is a public university in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. It was established as the College of Shari`a in 1949 before being joined by new colleges and renamed Umm al-Qura by royal decree in 1981....
University, and/or King Abdulaziz University
King Abdulaziz University
King Abdulaziz University was founded in 1967 in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Designed by English architect John Elliott, it had 2,000 teachers and more than 37,000 students in 2000/2001....
in Jeddah
Jeddah
Jeddah, Jiddah, Jidda, or Jedda is a city located on the coast of the Red Sea and is the major urban center of western Saudi Arabia. It is the largest city in Makkah Province, the largest sea port on the Red Sea, and the second largest city in Saudi Arabia after the capital city, Riyadh. The...
, and that either Osama bin Laden
Osama bin Laden
Osama bin Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden was the founder of the militant Islamist organization Al-Qaeda, the jihadist organization responsible for the September 11 attacks on the United States and numerous other mass-casualty attacks against civilian and military targets...
or Ayman al-Zawahiri
Ayman al-Zawahiri
Ayman Mohammed Rabie al-Zawahiri is an Egyptian physician, Islamic theologian and current leader of al-Qaeda. He was previously the second and last "emir" of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, having succeeded Abbud al-Zumar in the latter role when Egyptian authorities sentenced al-Zumar to life...
(al Qaeda's #2 and leading theorist), was a student. Osama bin Laden recommends to Muslims the book "Concepts that Should be Corrected by Sheikh Muhammad Qutb," in a 2004 videotape. According to Lawrence Wright
Lawrence Wright
Lawrence Wright is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American author, screenwriter, staff writer for The New Yorker magazine, and fellow at the Center for Law and Security at the New York University School of Law...
, who interviewed Muhammad and bin Laden's close friend in college Mohammed Jamal Khalifa, bin Laden "usually attended" Muhammad Qutb's weekly public lectures at King Abdel-Aziz University.
In addition to making available his brother's work, M. Qutb worked to advance his ideas by "smoothing away" differences between his brother's radical supporters and more conservative Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
s, particularly other members of the Brethren
Muslim Brotherhood
The Society of the Muslim Brothers is the world's oldest and one of the largest Islamist parties, and is the largest political opposition organization in many Arab states. It was founded in 1928 in Egypt by the Islamic scholar and schoolteacher Hassan al-Banna and by the late 1940s had an...
. Muhammad took a less literal interpretation of his brother's famous statement that the Muslim world and Muslim governments were jahiliyya (returned to pagan ignorance, and thus no longer Muslim). He denied that the country that had given him refuge was jahiliyya, and in 1975 came out publicly against Takfir
Takfir
In Islamic law, takfir or takfeer refers to the practice of one Muslim declaring another Muslim an unbeliever or kafir...
, or judging Muslims as unbelievers.
Muhammad was an author in his own right and his writings are widespread in the Arab
Arab
Arab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing...
world and nearly as prolific as his brother's. Jahiliyya in the Twenty-First Century is perhaps his best-known work, and gained notoriety as an alleged terrorist handbook (along with his brother's (Milestones
Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq
Ma'alim fi al-Tariq, also Ma'alim fi'l-tareeq, or Milestones, first published in 1964, is a short book by Egyptian Islamist author Sayyid Qutb in which he lays out a plan and makes a call to action to re-create the Muslim world on strictly Qur'anic grounds, casting off what Qutb calls Jahiliyyah,...
) when the government claimed to find the two in police searches of plotters' homes and environs.
Another very popular work, Islam: the Misunderstood Religion, expands on his brother's ideas, describing the ways in which fundamentalist Islam is superior to the "perverted ... inhuman ... crazy ... savage and backward" Western world
Western world
The Western world, also known as the West and the Occident , is a term referring to the countries of Western Europe , the countries of the Americas, as well all countries of Northern and Central Europe, Australia and New Zealand...
. It has been called a classic example of contemporary Muslim apologetics.
As of 2006, he was apparently still alive and living in Mecca.
Books
- Shubuhāt Hawla al-Islām (literally "Misconceptions about Islam") (Islam: The Misunderstood Religion) ISBN 0-686-18500-5
- Dirāsāt fī al-nafs al-insānīyah.[1963?] (Studies in human psychology) BP166.73 .Q8 Arab
- Hal nahnu Muslimūn (Are we Muslims?) al-Qāhirah : Dār al-Shurūq, 1980, ISBN 977-705-981-7
- al-Insān bayna al-māddīyah wa-al-Islām. (Man between the Material World and Islam) B825 .Q8 (Orien Arab)
- al-Sahwah al-Islāmīyah (The Islamic Resurgence)(al-Qāhirah : Maktabat al-Sunnah, 1990)
- Jahiliyat al-qarn al-`ishrin (Jahiliyya of the Twentieth Century), 292 p. ; 23 cm. al-Qahirah : Dar al-Shuruq, ; ISBN 977-733-606-3
- The Concept of Islam and Our Understanding of It
- The Future is for Islam
- Islam and the Crisis of the Modern World 28 p. ; published by The Islamic FoundationThe Islamic FoundationThe Islamic Foundation, established in 1973 in the city of Leicester, is a centre for education, training, research and publication of issues related to Islam. The Foundation seeks to build bridges between Muslims and others....
, 1979. ISBN 0-86037-047-X - Waqena Al -moaser , 527 p. ; published by Dār al-Shurūq, 1979. ISBN 977-09-0393-0