Sayyid Qutb behind bars and on trial in Cairo, Egypt, in 1966.
(Wikimedia Commons public domain image)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
One of the principal architects of modern Islamic \u201cfundamentalism\u201d and, therefore, derivatively, of modern Islamic extremism (including such groups as al-Qaeda), was Sayyid Qutb (1906-1966), an Egyptian author and educator who was a leading member and theoretician of the Muslim Brotherhood in the 1950s and 1960s.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Qutb published prolifically, including twenty-four books \u2014 among them Social Justice<\/em>, Milestones<\/em> (Ma\u2018alim fi al-Tariq<\/em>), and a thirty-volume commentary entitled In the Shadow of the Qur\u2019an<\/em> (Fi Zilal al-Qur\u2019an<\/em>) \u2014 and nearly six hundred articles. \u00a0He also left behind roughly thirty unpublished books, many of which were destroyed by the Egyptian government. \u00a0His writings are wide-ranging, including novels and literary criticism, but they are particularly focused on what he regarded as the optimal social and political role of Islam.<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
By the mid-1940s, many of his publications had been included in school, college, and university curricula, and he was followed by more than a few intellectuals, poets and other literary figures, and even some influential politicians. \u00a0He and the political leadership of Egypt eventually parted company though, and, in 1966, he was hanged after having been convicted of plotting to assassinate Gamal Abdel Nasser, the president of Egypt.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Much of his commentary and his often fierce criticism was aimed at the Islamic world, but he also strongly disapproved of the society and culture of the United States. \u00a0He had spent approximately two years in America, studying educational administration and working at Wilson Teacher\u2019s College in Washington DC (a forerunner of today\u2019s University of the District of Columbia), at the Colorado State College for Education in Greeley, and Stanford University, visiting many of the major American cities during his stay.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
We Americans are often amazed at the hostility to us of some around the world, and we commonly imagine that merely to know us would be to love us. \u00a0That certainly didn\u2019t work out for Sayyid Qutb. \u00a0He viewed America and Americans with increasingly intense dislike over the course of his sojourn in the country and beyond. \u00a0He viewed even the Americans of several generations ago as materialistic, violent, and sexually obsessed. \u00a0(In all honesty, having read some of his writing about America, it strikes me that a significant portion of the sexual obsession was\u00a0his<\/em>.)<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
As the years went by, Qutb came to believe more and more in violent, offensive jihad, and his direct or indirect influence on today\u2019s jihadis and violent Islamists is considerable.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
(And, yes, I\u2019ve relied for much of the basic information above \u2014 e.g. public and objective information such as dates, numbers of books, and the like, the sort of thing that would appear in any responsible biographical entry anywhere \u2014 on the relevant Wikipedia entry. \u00a0A note such as this, which I\u2019m creating for future use, is the skeletal framework that I will later flesh out from other sources, credited where appropriate. \u00a0The metaphor that comes to mind is a continual laying down of sediment in successive waves. \u00a0To vary the metaphor: On this blog, you\u2019re sometimes peering into my workshop, seeing various drafts. \u00a0The final<\/em> version, in sha\u2018 Allah<\/em>, will appear in print.)<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Postscript: \u00a0One eager critic demands to know why I used Wikipedia rather than the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World<\/em> for the notes above. \u00a0Well, for one thing, because I have no reason to believe that Sayyid Qutb\u2019s years of birth and death and numbers of published books vary widely from one source to another. \u00a0For another, because my copy of the Oxford Encyclopedia<\/em>\u00a0resides in my campus office, which I haven\u2019t visited in more than a month.\u00a0For yet another, because the lines above are only preliminary draft text; the Oxford Encyclopedia<\/em> is almost certainly still in the text\u2019s future. \u00a0And, by the way, it shouldn\u2019t be presumed that I\u2019m unfamiliar with the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World.<\/em> \u00a0I own a set. \u00a0Moreover, I\u2019m a contributor to it: \u00a0I wrote its article on \u201cEschatology,\u201d as well as articles on two of the most important sects of Shi\u2018ism: \u201cIsm\u0101\u02bf\u012bliyya\u201d and \u201cZaydiyya.\u201d<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u00a0 \u00a0 One of the principal architects of modern Islamic \u201cfundamentalism\u201d and, therefore, derivatively, of modern Islamic extremism (including such groups as al-Qaeda), was Sayyid Qutb (1906-1966), an Egyptian author and educator who was a leading member and theoretician of the Muslim Brotherhood in the 1950s and 1960s. \u00a0 Qutb published prolifically, including twenty-four books […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[10615,951,2809,10226,10612,66,2950,996,10609,1769,10618,10621,10606,10603,2920,2896,2893],"class_list":["post-84610","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-colorado","tag-egypt","tag-fundamentalism","tag-fundamentalist","tag-greeley","tag-islam","tag-islamic","tag-middle-east","tag-milestones","tag-muslim","tag-muslim-brotherhood","tag-nasser","tag-qutb","tag-sayyid","tag-social-justice","tag-terrorism","tag-terrorist"],"yoast_head":"\n
A first pass at Sayyid Qutb<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\" One of the principal architects of modern Islamic "fundamentalism" and, therefore, derivatively, of modern Islamic extremism (including such\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/04\/a-first-pass-at-sayyid-qutb.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A first pass at Sayyid Qutb\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\" One of the principal architects of modern Islamic "fundamentalism" and, therefore, derivatively, of modern Islamic extremism (including such\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2020\/04\/a-first-pass-at-sayyid-qutb.html\" \/>\n<meta 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![\"Qutb,](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2020\/04\/Sayyid_Qutb.jpg\")
<\/a>