“Salafism has influenced Islamic discourse for almost a century”

La Croix: In your book, you trace the rise of Salafism in Egypt. Can you define this movement?

Stephane Lacroix: It is an ultra-conservative Sunni puritan movement that claims to be rooted in the Islam of its origins. Unlike other currents associated with political Islam, it focuses its action on society. The majority of the Salafist movement does not engage in politics: it considers that it is through the purification of Islam and the religiosity of Muslims that society will be transformed. Consequently, the Salafists believe that action aimed at the State is of no interest. In the Arab world, they oscillate between indifference to power and support for the governments in place.

What distinguishes them from the Muslim Brotherhood, which appeared at almost the same time?

SL: In Egypt, the first Salafist association was created in 1926, two years before the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928. While the Muslim Brotherhood was politically oriented – their ultimate goal was to conquer the state in order to Islamize it – the Salafists stood back from the state and worked on society. They developed an obsession with orthodoxy, focusing their debates on the norm, on what one has the right to do or not, what one should believe and not believe, with the desire to define a framework of beliefs and practices that would constitute the only true Islam. The Muslim Brotherhood, for its part, aimed to bring together all conservative sensibilities, beyond the differences of schools, in a political logic.

You show that the rise of Salafism in a country like Egypt, marked by the traditional religiosity of institutions like Al-Azhar University, is a paradox…

SL: The Egyptian case is an enigma. If there is one country where one might have thought that Salafism would not take root, it was Egypt, where strong religious institutions are established, carrying an Islam antagonistic to Salafist Islam. It must be remembered that until the 20th century, Salafist conceptions were an ultra-minority in Egypt and elsewhere. The majority Islam of the time, of which Al-Azhar University is emblematic, is that of acharism. This current is in favor of a theology that tolerates a degree of rationality in theological reflection. It accommodates the practice of Sufism, which authorizes mystical experiences and the celebration of saints. The Salafists, for their part, abhor this popular religiosity, which they equate with superstition.

How can we explain the success of the Salafist movement in this context?

SL: The Salafists initially benefited from a certain benevolence of political power. Because they do not challenge the political order, they have often been perceived by governments as a lesser evil compared to Islamist groups that wanted to conquer power.

Then, the Salafis demonstrated a certain entrepreneurial ethos. Unlike the ulama of Al-Azhar who remained prisoners of tradition, the Salafis invested massively in the book market to place their favorite authors at its center. The latter who, until then, had been largely forgotten. After a hundred years of influence of Salafism, these authors – like the medieval theologian Ibn Taymiyya – have become central to the Islamic corpus.

The third factor is obviously Saudi Arabia. At crucial moments, whether in the 1920s or again from the 1970s with the oil bonanza, Saudi Arabia will provide not only moral and political support, but also financial support to Salafist organizations.

You describe throughout the century the relationship of competition, but also of mutual influence, between Salafists and the Muslim Brotherhood…

SL: From their inception, the two movements have been opposed to each other. The Salafists consider the Muslim Brotherhood to be bad believers who do not adhere to their puritanical norm. The Muslim Brotherhood, for its part, considers the Salafists to be useful idiots of the government, who lack political awareness. This antagonism between these two organizations continues to this day. But we must distinguish the organizations from the discourse.

From the 1970s onwards, the Salafists managed to place some of their ideas at the heart of the average religiosity of Egyptians. From then on, the Salafist discourse, through its diffuse influence, helped to redefine the debates that agitated the Muslim Brotherhood. For example, when Hassan El Banna created the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928, the antagonism between Shiites and Sunnis mattered little to him, and he advocated unity. But in the 2000s, the anti-Shiite discourse within the Muslim Brotherhood became much stronger, under the influence of Salafism. At the same time, we see the emergence of a protest politicization of certain sections of Salafism under the influence of the Brotherhood. The boundaries began to blur, without disappearing, in the 1970s.

Is Salafism still as influential today?

SL: Since the mid-2010s, after its peak at the same time as the Arab revolutions, Salafism has been experiencing a dynamic of decline. In Egypt, the Salafists fared better than the Muslim Brotherhood since they supported the army’s takeover in 2013 and were not banned. But today, their room for maneuver is much less than in the past. After a transition to politics, they have lost their aura by appearing as politicians like any other. In Saudi Arabia, the rise to power of Mohammed Ben Salman also played a role, since he distanced himself from the movement. Salafism is therefore rather in a phase of decline. Despite this, some of the effects it had on Islamic discourse for almost a century still persist.