Sayyid Qutb


Sayyid Ibrahim Husayn Shadhili Qutb, known popularly as Sayyid Qutb, was an Egyptian author, educator, Islamic theorist, poet, and a leading member of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood in the 1950s and 1960s. In 1966, he was convicted of plotting the assassination of Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser and was executed by hanging.
Author of 24 books, with around 30 books unpublished for different reasons, and at least 581 articles, including novels, literary arts critique and works on education, he is best known in the Muslim world for his work on what he believed to be the social and political role of Islam, particularly in his books Social Justice and Ma'alim fi al-Tariq. His magnum opus, Fi Zilal al-Quran, is a 30-volume commentary on the Quran.
During most of his life, Qutb's inner circle mainly consisted of influential politicians, intellectuals, poets and literary figures, both of his age and of the preceding generation. By the mid-1940s, many of his writings were included in the curricula of schools, colleges and universities.
Even though most of his observations and criticism were leveled at the Muslim world, Qutb is also known for his intense disapproval of the society and culture of the United States, which he saw as materialistic, and obsessed with violence and sexual pleasures.
He advocated violent, offensive jihad.
Qutb has been described by followers as a great thinker and martyr for Islam, while many Western observers see him as a key originator of Islamist ideology. and an inspiration for violent Islamist groups such as al-Qaeda. Today, his supporters are identified by their opponents as "Qutbists" or "Qutbi".

Life and public career

Early life

Sayyid Ibrahim Husayn Shadhili Qutb was born on 9 October 1906. He was raised in the Egyptian village of Musha, located in Upper Egypt's Asyut Province. His father was an Upper Egyptian landowner and the administrator of the family estate, but he was also well known for his political activism, holding weekly meetings to discuss the political events and Qur'anic recitation. At this young age, Sayyid Qutb first learned about melodic recitations of the Qur'an, which would fuel the artistic side of his personality. He eventually memorized the whole Qur'an at 10. A precocious child, during these years, he began collecting different types of books, including Sherlock Holmes stories, A Thousand and One Nights, and texts on astrology and magic that he would use to help local people with exorcisms In his teens, Qutb was critical of the religious institutions with which he came into contact, holding in contempt the way in which those institutions were used to form public opinion and thoughts. He had a special disdain, however, for schools that specialized in religious studies only, and sought to demonstrate that local schools that held regular academic classes as well as classes in religion were more beneficial to their pupils than religious schools with lopsided curricula. At this time, Qutb developed his bent against the imams and their traditional approach to education. This confrontation would persist throughout his life.
Qutb moved to Cairo, where between 1929 and 1933 he received an education based on the British style of schooling before starting his career as a teacher in the Ministry of Public Instruction. During his early career, Qutb devoted himself to literature as an author and critic, writing such novels as Ashwak and even helped to elevate Egyptian novelist Naguib Mahfouz from obscurity. He wrote his very first article in the literary magazine al-Balagh in 1922, and his first book, Muhimmat al-Sha’ir fi al-Haya wa Shi’r al-Jil al-Hadir, in 1932, when he was 25, in his last year at Dar al-Ulum. As a literary critic, he was particularly influenced by ‘Abd al-Qahir al-Jurjani, "in his view one of the few mediaeval philologists to have concentrated on meaning and aesthetic value at the expense of form and rhetoric." In 1939, he became a functionary in Egypt's Ministry of Education.
In the early 1940s, he encountered the work of Nobel Prize-winner French eugenicist Alexis Carrel, who would have a seminal and lasting influence on his criticism of Western civilization, as "instead of liberating man, as the post-Enlightenment narrative claimed, he believed that Western modernity enmeshed people in spiritually numbing networks of control and discipline, and that rather than building caring communities, it cultivated attitudes of selfish individualism. Qutb regarded Carrel as a rare sort of Western thinker, one who understood that his civilization “depreciated humanity” by honouring the “machine” over the “spirit and soul”. He saw Carrel’s critique, coming as it did from within the enemy camp, as providing his discourse with an added measure of legitimacy."
From 1948 to 1950, he went to the United States on a scholarship to study its educational system, spending several months at Colorado State College of Education in Greeley, Colorado. Qutb's first major theoretical work of religious social criticism, Al-'adala al-Ijtima'iyya fi-l-Islam, was published in 1949, during his time in the West.
Though Islam gave him much peace and contentment, he suffered from respiratory and other health problems throughout his life and was known for "his introvertedness, isolation, depression and concern." In appearance, he was "pale with sleepy eyes." Qutb never married, in part because of his steadfast religious convictions. While the urban Egyptian society he lived in was becoming more Westernized, Qutb believed the Quran taught women that 'Men are the managers of women's affairs...' Qutb lamented to his readers that he was never able to find a woman of sufficient "moral purity and discretion" and had to reconcile himself to bachelorhood.
It was clear from his childhood that Qutb valued education, playing the part of a teacher to the women in his village:
Syed Qutb from a young age would save up his money for a man called Amsaalih, who used to sell books around the local villages. He would have a big collection of books, and another small collection specifically for Syed Qutb. If Syed never had the money, he would tell him that I don't have the money now, so let me borrow it and I'll give it you next time you come around. And Amsaalih would let him do that. At the age of 12, he had his own library collection of 25 books, even though books were really expensive during that time. He would imitate the scholars by reading the books, and then give lectures to the rest of the village. If any women needed any information, they would wait till Syed Qutb came back from school, and ask him to share the knowledge he had to them. In many occasions he would be shy because he was a young man, but in some occasions he would go and teach the knowledge he had to the people who asked him.

Two years in the United States

Time in the United States, pursuing further studies in educational administration, cemented some of Qutb's views. Over two years, he worked and studied at Wilson Teachers' College in Washington, D.C., Colorado State College for Education in Greeley, and Stanford University. He visited the major cities of the United States and spent time in Europe on his journey home.
Before his departure from the United States, even though more and more conservative, he still was "Western in so many ways—his dress, his love of classical music and Hollywood movies. He had read, in translation, the works of Charles Darwin and Albert Einstein, Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley, and had immersed himself in French literature, especially Victor Hugo".

Criticisms of American culture and society

On his return to Egypt, Qutb published "The America that I Have Seen", where he became explicitly critical of things he had observed in the United States, eventually encapsulating the West more generally: its materialism, individual freedoms, economic system, racism, brutal boxing matches, "poor" haircuts, superficiality in conversations and friendships, restrictions on divorce, enthusiasm for sports, lack of artistic feeling, "animal-like" mixing of the sexes, and strong support for the new Israeli state. Hisham Sabrin, noted that:
As a brown person in Greeley, Colorado in the late 1940s studying English he came across much prejudice. He was appalled by what he perceived as loose sexual openness of American men and women. This American experience was for him a fine-tuning of his Islamic identity. He himself tells us on his boat trip over "Should I travel to America, and become flimsy, and ordinary, like those who are satisfied with idle talk and sleep. Or should I distinguish myself with values and spirit. Is there other than Islam that I should be steadfast to in its character and hold on to its instructions, in this life amidst deviant chaos, and the endless means of satisfying animalistic desires, pleasures, and awful sins? I wanted to be the latter man."
Qutb noted with disapproval the openly displayed sexuality of American women:
the American girl is well acquainted with her body's seductive capacity. She knows it lies in the face, and in expressive eyes, and thirsty lips. She knows seductiveness lies in the round breasts, the full buttocks, and in the shapely thighs, sleek legs – and she shows all this and does not hide it.

He also commented on the American taste in arts:
The American is primitive in his artistic taste, both in what he enjoys as art and in his own artistic works.
"Jazz" music is his music of choice. This is that music that the Negroes invented to satisfy their primitive inclinations, as well as their desire to be noisy on the one hand and to excite bestial tendencies on the other. The American's intoxication in "jazz" music does not reach its full completion until the music is accompanied by singing that is just as coarse and obnoxious as the music itself. Meanwhile, the noise of the instruments and the voices mounts, and it rings in the ears to an unbearable degree… The agitation of the multitude increases, and the voices of approval mount, and their palms ring out in vehement, continuous applause that all but deafens the ears.

Return to Egypt

Qutb concluded that major aspects of American life were primitive and "shocking"; he saw Americans as "numb to faith in religion, faith in art, and faith in spiritual values altogether". His experience in the U.S. is believed to have formed in part the impetus for his rejection of Western values and his move towards Islamism upon returning to Egypt. Resigning from the civil service, he joined the Muslim Brotherhood in the early 1950s and became editor-in-chief of the Brothers' weekly Al-Ikhwan al-Muslimin, and later head of its propaganda
section, as well as an appointed member of the working committee and of its guidance council, the highest branch in the organization.

Nasser and Qutb's death

In July 1952, Egypt's pro-Western government was overthrown by the nationalist Free Officers Movement headed by Gamal Abdel Nasser. Both Qutb and the Muslim Brotherhood welcomed the coup d'état against the monarchist government – which they saw as un-Islamic and subservient to British imperialism – and enjoyed a close relationship with the movement prior to and immediately following the coup. Nasser would go to the house of Syed Qutb and ask him for ideas about the Revolution. Many members of the Brotherhood expected Nasser to establish an Islamic government. However, the co-operation between the Brotherhood and Free Officers which marked the revolution's success soon soured as it became clear the secular nationalist ideology of Nasserism was incompatible with the Islamism of the Brotherhood.
Nasser had secretly set up an organisation that would sufficiently oppose the Muslim Brotherhood once he came to power. This organisation was called "Tahreer". It was well known that
the Brotherhood were made popular by their extensive social programs in Egypt, and Nasser wanted to be ready once he had taken over. At this time, Qutb did not realize Nasser's alternate plans, and would continue to meet with him, sometimes for 12 hours a day, to discuss a post monarchical Egypt. Once Qutb realized that Nasser had taken advantage of the secrecy between the Free Officers and the Brotherhood, he promptly quit. Nasser then tried to persuade Qutb by offering him any position he wanted in Egypt except its Kingship, saying: "We will give you whatever position you want in the government, whether it's the Ministry of Education, Ministry of Arts, etc."
Qutb refused every offer, having understood the reality of Nasser's plans. Upset that Nasser would not enforce a government based on Islamic ideology, Qutb and other Brotherhood members plotted to assassinate him in 1954. The attempt was foiled and Qutb was jailed soon afterwards; the Egyptian government used the incident to justify a crackdown on various members of the Muslim Brotherhood for their vocal opposition towards the Nasser administration. During his first three years in prison, conditions were bad and Qutb was tortured. In later years he was allowed more mobility, including the opportunity to write.
This period saw the composition of his two most important works: a commentary of the Qur'an Fi Zilal al-Qur'an, and a manifesto of political Islam called Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq. These works represent the final form of Qutb's thought, encompassing his radically anti-secular and anti-Western claims based on his interpretations of the Qur'an, Islamic history, and the social and political problems of Egypt. The school of thought he inspired has become known as Qutbism.
Qutb was let out of prison at the end of 1964 at the behest of the Prime Minister of Iraq, Abdul Salam Arif, for only 8 months before being rearrested in August 1965. He was accused of plotting to overthrow the state and subjected to what some consider a show trial. Many of the charges placed against Qutb in court were taken directly from Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq and he adamantly supported his written statements. The trial culminated in a death sentence for Qutb and six other members of the Muslim Brotherhood. He was sentenced to death for his part in the conspiracy to assassinate the President and other Egyptian officials and personalities, though he was not the instigator or leader of the actual plot. On 29 August 1966, he was executed by hanging.

Evolution of thought, views and statements

Theological stances

Qutb held that belief in matters that cannot be seen was an important sign of man's ability to accept knowledge from fields outside of science:

The concept of the imperceptible is a decisive factor in distinguishing man from animal. Materialist thinking, ancient as well as modern, has tended to drag man back to an irrational existence, with no room for the spiritual, where everything is determined by sensory means alone. What is peddled as 'progressive thought' is no more than dismal.

Secularism

Different theories have been advanced as to why Qutb turned away from his secularist tendencies towards Islamic sharia. One common explanation is that the conditions he witnessed in prison from 1954–1964, including the torture and murder of Muslim Brothers, convinced him that only a government bound by Islamic law could prevent such abuses. Another is that Qutb's experiences in America as a darker-skinned person and the insufficiently anti-Western policies of Nasser demonstrated to him the powerful and dangerous allure of ignorance – a threat unimaginable, in Qutb's estimation, to the secular mind. In the opening of his book Milestones he presents the following views:
In Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq Qutb argued that anything non-Islamic was evil and corrupt, and that following sharia as a complete system extending into all aspects of life, would bring every kind of benefit to humanity, from personal and social peace, to the "treasures" of the universe.
Qutb's experiences as an Egyptian Muslim – his village childhood, professional career, and activism in the Muslim Brotherhood – left an indelible mark on his theoretical and religious works. Even Qutb's early, secular writing shows evidence of his later themes. For example, Qutb's autobiography of his childhood Tifl min al-Qarya makes little mention of Islam or political theory and is typically classified as a secular, literary work. However, it is replete with references to village mysticism, superstition, the Qur'an, and incidences of injustice. Qutb's later work developed along similar themes, dealing with Qur'anic exegesis, social justice, and political Islam.
Qutb's career as a writer also heavily influenced his philosophy. In al-Taswiir al-Fanni fil-Quran, Qutb developed a literary appreciation of the Qur'an and a complementary methodology for interpreting the text. His hermeneutics were applied in his extensive commentary on the Qur'an, Fi zilal al-Qur'an, which served as the foundation for the declarations of Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq.
Late in his life, Qutb synthesized his personal experiences and intellectual development in the famous Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq, a religious and political manifesto for what he believed was a true Islamic system. It was also in this text that Qutb condemned Muslim governments, such as Abdul Nasser's regime in Egypt, as secular, with their legitimacy based on human, rather than divine authority. This work, more than any other, established Qutb as one of the premier Islamists of the 20th century, and perhaps the foremost proponent of Islamist thought in that era.
Qutb, dissatisfied with the condition of contemporary Islam, identified its benighted state as having two principal causes. The first was that many Muslims were forsaking their faith in the Qur'an, thereby disturbing the cosmic balance in the world. This had led to the virulent spread of a secular culture within Muslim societies, which, with the assistance of Western imperialism and colonialism that distorted the existing order, was a second important cause of the straying of many Muslims from the right path. Qutb asserted that the Islamic world had sunk into a state of Jahiliyyah.

Events prompting the move from secularism to Islam

Qutb told people of his shift from secularism to Islam.
His journey started when he studied the Qur'an in a literal way, and he slowly began to understand the principles lined in the religion. Then something happened to him in America to remove his doubts. He says; that while he was going to America, he was on the boat, and he saw the way the boat he was travelling in – was rocking in the huge sea – all under the control of Allah without it sinking or capsizing. At that point he realized the power of Allah. He said Iman entered into his heart due to this. His second scenario was in San Francisco, when he went on top of a mountain, and he could see the whole of creation in front of him, and he realized the beauty and harmony that existed amongst the creation as a whole. He said that, the sweetness of Iman hit him.

Political philosophy

Qutb's mature political views always centered on Islam – Islam as a complete system of morality, justice and governance, whose sharia laws and principles should be the sole basis of governance and everything else in life – though his interpretation of it varied. Qutb's political philosophy has been described as an attempt to instantiate a complex and multilayer eschatological vision, partly grounded in the counter-hegemonic re-articulation of the traditional ideal of Islamic universalism.
Following the 1952 coup, he espoused a 'just dictatorship' that would 'grant political liberties to the virtuous alone.' Later he wrote that rule by sharia law would require essentially no government at all. In an earlier work, Qutb described military jihad as defensive, Islam's campaign to protect itself, while later he believed jihad must be offensive.
On the issue of Islamic governance, Qutb differed with many modernist and reformist Muslims who claimed that democracy was Islamic because the Quranic institution of Shura supported elections and democracy. Qutb pointed out that the Shura chapter of the Qur'an was revealed during the Mekkan period, and therefore, it does not deal with the problem of government. It makes no reference to elections and calls only for the ruler to consult some of the ruled, as a particular case of the general rule of Shura.
Qutb also opposed the then popular ideology of Arab nationalism, having become disillusioned with the 1952 Nasser Revolution after having been exposed to the regime's practices of arbitrary arrest, torture, and deadly violence during his imprisonment.

Antisemitism

Qutb was a staunch antisemite. In 1950, he published a book Our Struggle against the Jews, which forms a central part of today's Islamist antisemitism.

View on the harmony of man

Qutb felt strongly that the world was meant to serve man if understood properly. He wrote:
"Islam teaches that God created the physical world and all its forces for man's own use and benefit. Man is specifically taught and directed to study the world around him, discover its potential and utilize all his environment for his own good and the good of his fellow humans. Any harm that man suffers at the hands of nature is a result only of his ignorance or lack of understanding of it and of the laws governing it. The more man learns about nature, the more peaceful and harmonious his relationship with nature and the environment. Hence, the notion of "conquering nature" can readily be seen as cynical and negative. It is alien to Islamic perceptions and betrays a shameless ignorance of the spirit in which the world has been created and the divine wisdom that underlies it."

Jahiliyyah versus freedom in Islam

This exposure to abuse of power undoubtedly contributed to the ideas in his famous prison-written Islamic manifesto Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq, where he advocated a political system that is the opposite of dictatorship — the Sharia, "God's rule on earth". Qutb argued:
Qutb emphasized that this struggle would be anything but easy. True Islam would transform every aspect of society, eliminating everything non-Muslim. True Muslims could look forward to lives of "poverty, difficulty, frustration, torment and sacrifice." Jahili ersatz-Muslims, Jews and Westerners would all fight and conspire against Islam and the elimination of jahiliyyah.

Criticisms

Although his work has motivated and mobilized some Muslims, Qutb also has critics. Following the publication of Milestones and the aborted plot against the Nasser government, mainstream Muslims took issue with Qutb's contention that "physical power" and jihad had to be used to overthrow governments, attack societies, and the "institutions and traditions" of the Muslim – but according to Qutb jahili – world. The ulama of Al-Azhar University school took the unusual step following his death of putting Sayyid Qutb on their index of heresy, declaring him a "deviant".
Reformist Muslims, on the other hand, questioned his understanding of sharia, i.e. that it is not only perfect and complete, but completely accessible to people and thus the solution to any of their problems. Also criticized is his dismissal of not only all non-Muslim culture, but many centuries of Muslim learning, culture and beauty following the first four caliphs as un-Islamic and thus worthless.
Conservative criticism went further, condemning Qutb's Islamist/reformist ideas—such as social justice and redistributive economics, banning of slavery, – as "western" and bid‘ah or innovative. They have accused Qutb of amateur scholarship, overuse of ijtihad, innovation in Ijma, declaring unlawful what Allah has made lawful, assorted mistakes in aqeedah and manhaj.

Legacy

Alongside notable Islamists like Maulana Mawdudi, Hasan al-Banna, and Ruhollah Khomeini, Qutb is considered one of the most influential Muslim thinkers or activists of the modern era, not only for his ideas but also for what many see as his martyr's death. According to authors Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon, "it was Sayyid Qutb who fused together the core elements of modern Islamism: the Kharijites' takfir, ibn Taymiyya's fatwas and policy prescriptions, Rashid Rida's salafism, Maududi's concept of the contemporary jahiliyya and Hassan al-Banna's political activism."
Qutb's written works are still widely available and have been translated into many Western languages. His best known work is Ma'alim fi-l-Tariq, but the majority of Qutb's theory can be found in his Qur'anic commentary Fi zilal al-Qur'an. This 30-volume work is noteworthy for its innovative method of interpretation, borrowing heavily from the literary analysis of Amin al-Khuli, while retaining some structural features of classical commentaries. For Qutb, the Qur'an was seen as the final arbiter in all matters relating to faith, while his main goal in writing the book, In the Shade of the Qur’an, was to restore the centrality of faith in the consciousness and imagination of Muslims, and to kindle a cognitive revolution that would bring about a political and social process that will lead to the renewal of the Islamic tradition.
The influence of his work extends to issues such as Westernization, modernization, and political reform and the theory of inevitable ideological conflict between "Islam and the West", the notion of a transnational umma, and the comprehensive application of jihad.
Qutb's theoretical work on Islamic advocacy, social justice and education, has left a significant mark not only on the Muslim Brotherhood, but also Muslim scholars from all backgrounds : like the founder of the Syrian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, Mustafa al-Siba'i, as well as the Indonesian Sunni scholar Hamka and the Iraqi Shia scholar Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr.
Hekmatyar, one of the most influential Afghan Islamists, says that he precisely turned Islamist in 1966, after hearing the death of Qutb on radio.
Ali al-Tamimi, considered "arguably the first American born activist Salafi preacher", has Qutb as one of his main intellectual influences.
His influence isn't limited to Sunnis either, as the current Supreme Leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei, translated his work into Persian. Having been translated into Persian from the 50s and 60s onward, and for his definitive influence on the Islamic revolution of Iran, a critical conference entitled Re-reading and Re-viewing the Views of Sayyid Quṭb, held in Tehran during February 15–16, 2015, has been described as "a vivid example of the living legacy of Sayyid Quṭb in today’s Iran."

Al-Qaeda and Islamic Jihad

Qutb had influence on Islamic insurgent/terror groups in Egypt and elsewhere. His influence on al-Qaeda was felt through his writing, his followers and especially through his brother, Muhammad Qutb, who moved to Saudi Arabia following his release from prison in Egypt and became a professor of Islamic Studies and edited, published and promoted his brother Sayyid's work.
One of Muhammad Qutb's students and later an ardent follower was Ayman Zawahiri, who went on to become a member of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad and later a mentor of Osama bin Laden and a leading member of al-Qaeda. Zawahiri was first introduced to Qutb by his uncle and maternal family patriarch, Mafouz Azzam, who was very close to Qutb throughout his life. Azzam was Qutb's student, then protégé, then personal lawyer and executor of his estate – one of the last people to see Qutb before his execution. According to Lawrence Wright, who interviewed Azzam, "young Ayman al-Zawahiri heard again and again from his beloved uncle Mahfouz about the purity of Qutb's character and the torment he had endured in prison." Zawahiri paid homage to Qutb in his work Knights under the Prophet's Banner.
.
Osama bin Laden was also acquainted with Sayyid's brother, Muhammad Qutb. A close college friend of bin Laden's, Mohammed Jamal Khalifa, told Wright, that bin Laden regularly attended weekly public lectures by Muhammad Qutb, at King Abdulaziz University, and that he and bin Laden both "read Sayyid Qutb. He was the one who most affected our generation."
While imprisoned in Yemen, Anwar al-Awlaki became influenced by the works of Qutb. He would read 150–200 pages a day of Qutb's works, describing himself during the course of his reading as "so immersed with the author I would feel Sayyid was with me in my cell speaking to me directly."
On the other hand, associate professor of history at Creighton University, John Calvert, states that "the al-Qaeda threat" has "monopolized and distorted our understanding" of Qutb's "real contribution to contemporary Islamism."

Recognition in ''The 9/11 Commission Report''

Chapter 2 of The 9/11 Commission Report, "The Foundation of the New Terrorism," cites Qutb for influencing Osama Bin Laden's worldview in these terms:
dismissed Western achievements as entirely material, arguing that 'nothing will satisfy its own conscience and justify its existence.'

Three basic themes emerge from Qutb's writings. First, he claimed that the world was beset with barbarism, licentiousness, and unbelief. Qutb argued that humans can choose only between Islam and jahiliyya. Second, he warned that more people, including Muslims, were attracted to jahiliyya and its material comforts than to his view of Islam; jahiliyya could therefore triumph over Islam. Third, no middle ground exists in what Qutb conceived as a struggle between God and Satan. All Muslim – as he defined them – therefore must take up arms in this fight. Any Muslim who rejects his ideas is just one more nonbeliever worthy of destruction.

Works

Literary
Theoretical
Co-authored with others