The origins of al-shabab. a response to Galbeedi

[Khadafi]

It seems that most sociologists or political analysts always portray al-shabaab as a some kind of a secretive armed group with political aims.  These political analysts who are colored by orientalism have no clue into the somali pshyche and how our culture has changed in this post-colonial world.  Since the 30 years of the somali civil war, every area our culture has been in some way been influenced by a changing world but also by  war.  First of all  what most poltical analysts  remain silent about is that Somali identity  that was traditionally tied  traditionall sunni islam with the sufi tariqa has completely destroyed. Galbeedi completelt ignores this fact and thinks that   a few thousands of turkish trained commando troops  can erase them.  I rejecet this claim and say the problem is way more complicated.

Sufism has allways been a a strong tradition in southern Somalia specially in Mogadishu and the coastline. It was the coastline somallis who produced  Somali scholars as Shaykh Suufi Ashhaashi, and Shaykh Cabdiraxman Zaylaci /Zaylaciya spread to the northern parts of Somalia into the somali region of 6 and he is now buried in kilinka 5 in the city of Quluunqul. Shaykh Qasim al Barawi and Shekh Aweys continued the Qadaria-Uweysiya into southern Somalia while the Idrisiya (axmadiya, rashidiya) stayed in the bay bakool  region. 

All of these Somali scholars wrote great books of value and very knowlidge able in shafici fiq. Every student of religion in Yemen who studies in Tamim, the traditional stronghold of shafite scholarship begins the book of the maqaasid written by a Somali scholar. The pre-colonial order was that these the scholar was embedded and  respected and acted a mediator. The arrival of colonialism challenged this and the armed stuggle against the colonialists were often led by this sunni scholars. While The sunni world was in chaos  a sect within sunni fold led by Muxammad Binu Cabdul-wahaab wrote his infamous fatxul-majid and used and obscure medevil scholar Ibn Taymiya as his source and made mass takfir on his fellow sunni muslims. They fought the ottomans and anyone who resisted their rule.  The Rashidi arab tribe who sided  with the ottomans were ejected from the khaleej and fled to sudan and Eritrea? How is this relevant to Somalia?.  Somalia was only communist by name, Barre never initiated communist doctrines that tried to erase the islamic dynasty. While Mengistu was busy destroying the orthodox church Barre  respected and saught legitamacy  though famous Somali Ulama as the great Shayk Malacim Nur Siyaad, Sheekh Muxiyadin Celi,  and lasty the late Sheekh Abba and Shaykh Abbaa gode and Shaykh Maxamed Rabiic who ulltimatelty established "rabiiciya" or timoweynta ( Mocking the ways of the sublime prophet is kufr, the prophet had long hair and those timoweyn simply wanted look like the prophet, their afro did not stop their desire but its choking to see modern day scholars who are clean shaven in the head mocking them for this. One thing that they do lack is studying fiq as the south and integrating themselves with the society.).

The late Said S Samatar also commented in his book that the only multi-clan settlement that clan eventually become non.irrelevant was for example The uweysi settlements. You could D-block xerow students from Qabridahr with H-block living 60 years with each  other and marrying each other and eventually developing  new identities.  When the Shaykhs sent their best students to Azhar  they were eventually exposed to the pan-islamic ideals by the muslim brotherhod founded by the Sufi Scholar Shaykh Xassa Banna (alle ha u naxariisto).   A disengage the regime occured when Barre took the colonial law western out into law and rejected the islamic way inheritance. Since that incident Alle ha u naxariisto Macalim Nuur Siyaad, and Sheekh Aw cabdi celi cumar stopped coperation with government and used their private funds to finance students coming from harar and garisa to study in the settlements.

Everything, literally everything changed in when oil was discovered in Saudia Arabia.  The obscure saudi sect of wahabism suddenly had billions of dollars. They established Wamy. Secular-Arab nationalism was dead with the defeat of the Arabs. The Iranian revolution  that was inspired by Sh Xassan Al Banna showed the confused post-colonial ummah that their was a third way.  Islam was political solution sounded good. While Islax  the muslim brotherhood om Somalia coperated with the traditional leaders Sunni Islam (infact most of them were students of those scholars) they also pursued higher education. During the boom of 1980 thousands of Somalis flooded to the Medina universaty, what those Somalis did not know was that the 4 madhabs of Sunni islam were dismissed. Shaykh Alawi al Maliki and his likes.  Hard-core wahabist scholars Shaykh like Bin baz, and Shaykh Albani who utterly rejected  1300 of islamic jurispudence were made professors. 

The Saud arabs never abandoned the hanbali fiq but came with the innovation that all 4 major sunni schools were not legitimate. A living legend, Shaykh Cabdullahi Qudubi,who is still alive described the mess as "for 1400 we sunni muslims respected our diffirences and diffirence of opinion did not mean that one was right and other was incorrect, it means both were right as the prophet might have done in the way of the opinions, we as somalis have now chaos in our hands"

Students were also taught that all non wahabi sunnis were moshriks, non muslims,  having the belif that the prophet could hear you and you could ask intercession from him our from a wali was deemed to kufr. Thus in a split of a second most Somalis were non muslims  by the students like Sheekh umul  and Shibili, When the civil war broke out  traditional sunni islam  was it lowest point, people needed a new ideology, Communism was dead. Somali nationalism was its lowest. Many intellectuals looked at wahabism. Billions of dollars of pumped into somalia demonizing our cherished scholars that had for a 1000 years protected as  sunni muslims.    Shaykh Yuusuf Kowneyns thousands years old of teaching kids alif la kor***** was replaced by "ba bii buu fatxatayn".  Debates raged weather the mowlid was correct and traditional shafite  fiq as toughing skin of female breaking your abulation was challenged.

Thats history but how is that corrected to Al-shabaab? Few now about this day but the wahabis of najd once captured mekka and pillaged the city and killed many pilgrims in the 1800 century. An ottoman expedition led by Pasha Muhammed Albani captured  the chief leader Al-Saud and he was beheaded as a heretic in Istanbul.  The Book of fatxul majid and kitab tawxid and dividing tawxid in some kind of trinity "uluhibya rububiya" were book of mass takfir. Another author who was not a islamic scholar shaheed- Sayid Qutub borrowed leninist stances and even deemed whole societies to be in a state of "jahiliya"

So how does this narrative fit within Somalia ? Unlike the Taliban, they never abandonded their hanafi fiq and naqshbandi tariqa.  The Somalis were quick to join the wahabist narrative, bizarre fatwas of hyeana meat being halal, Shibili being a rockstar  claiming that he had with own eyes seen 300 girls with aids aged between 14-17-teen was mindboggling.  Imagine if Ethiopia with its 1800 year histort of being a coptic orthodox nation changed into protestant one during 30 years.  Academical articles would be full of information about this.   The gang of Ictisam  who fully supported a jihad  (umul) against Cabdullahi Yusuf simply changed his mind a decade later and boarded a plane and even had dinner with cabdi iley.  During universal tv debate, Bashir Salad who is the gudoomite of this gang was asked this mind boggling question and had no answers. The interview became infamous. Worse was the voa- discussion where Islax and tradionalists united against the takfirism, bashir salad once against condemned al-shabaab yet propogated their views in sermons.While the traditionalists who refused to join the civil war and condemned as "fitna". While Itixaad was 1991 in chaos civil war. 

Al-shabaab did come out from nothing, they are a part of al-ictisam, and large segments of the Somali society do belive in what that they believe in. In Somaliland, Shayk Mustafe tries to educate Somalis about  Sultan Suleyman Qanuni  but does not tell the people that acording to his wahabi belifs suleyman qanuni is a non muslim becouse of being the maturidi-sunni-hanafi school and adhering to the naqshbandi tariqa.   He loves to boast about non somali islamic heroes like salaxadin ayubi but fails to mention that Salaxadin was a devout sunni ashcari, the same creed as somalis belong to. And a creed that shibili declares to non muslims. Never will you hear him talk about 1800 century somali scholars.

THE CHANGE AND DOWNFALL OF WAHABISM AND RESURGENCE OF TRADITIONAL ISLAM.

The traditionalists  had to adapt and have done so. Most Somalis are traditionalists.  Seeing Saudi Arabias crown prince saying live on CNN "we were to export exremism" was a death blow to ictisam. They can no longer draw inspiration from Saudi Arabia and no funds will be coming  from  Saudi Arabia. While on a visit in Kenya I was suprised to see how a poor umul from 1994 had become rich real state magnate.  Macalim nuur siyaad educated thousands and did not leave a penny behind. Such are true sufis who distance themselves from this world at minimum and concentrate on the next world. Al-shabaab will only dissapear once  Somalia turns back to Azhar and not Saudi Arabia.

 

 

 

 

 

[Khadafi]

20 minutes ago, Apophis said:

It is kufri to ask for intercession from a human when one can pray directly to Allah.

And Ibn Taymiyah was not “an obscure” scholar; one can only assume ignorance or hatred has caused you to write such nonsense.

And Alshabab is no more a religious movement than the Mafia is a movement for catholicism. It is a criminal entity and it should be dealt with accordingly.

I intended not the post to become a religous debate. Apopthis, I thought you were an atheist and know your engaging in islamic jurisprudence.. I guess your tribal tentacles went bananas when you heard umul and shibili!

[Arafaat]

Khadafi,

Thanks for this interesting piece, and if I may try to summarize your thesis here is that systematic repression of original Somali religious identity(Sufism) and oppression of the Somali Islamic scholars has led to a confused or loss of social identity, which in turned opened up the space or conditions for many to seek solace and propagate externally constructed and applied extremist ideologies. Does this summarize and capture your thesis to an extend? 

 

[maakhiri1]

Thanks Khadafi,  a great piece, somali religious teachings,  traditions, has been hijacked, and I honest believe somali identity is completely screwed up now. 

It is very interesting to see what happens now after KSA who used to fund this Wahaabi doctrine for years, change the course

We wait for Galbeedi response. 

[Arafaat]

3 hours ago, Khadafi said:

I intended not the post to become a religous debate. Apopthis, I thought you were an atheist and know your engaging in islamic jurisprudence.. I guess your tribal tentacles went bananas when you heard umul and shibili!

I think a valid point we can dissect from here is that, one can’t completely return to the religious practices of the past, as some of that like ‘intercession’ would be considered by many Somali’s today as wrong or even ‘kufri’, as Apopthis stated.
 

I think that is a valid point, how would you respond to that, Khadafi? And how would this fit in with your suggested direction of returning to Sufism? 

[Xaaji Xunjuf]

That was actually a good read and I agree with u on most part. Also on the Muslim brotherhood they always do good on the opposition never really good in being the incumbent leadership of a country. Salafi jihadism and wahaabism is like a cancer and needs to be removed. Ibn baz was a retard he made some scientific errors claiming the sun rotates around the world. Somalis were always suni Muslims followers of imam shaaficis understanding. Some of these wahaabis believe the tusbax is innovation. Making small boxes for a person to pray is  bidca and so on. They believe u can't be allied to a kafir. Yet their nation is the biggest allie of the biggest kafir nation in the world the USA. Hypocrites weye. 

[Khadafi]

20 hours ago, Arafaat said:

Khadafi,

Thanks for this interesting piece, and if I may try to summarize your thesis here is that systematic repression of original Somali religious identity(Sufism) and oppression of the Somali Islamic scholars has led to a confused or loss of social identity, which in turned opened up the space or conditions for many to seek solace and propagate externally constructed and applied extremist ideologies. Does this summarize and capture your thesis to an extend? 

 

Exactly, I think you summarized what have been trying to say.  The civil war did not just completely destrot the somali nation it also had deep sociological affects. With no central governments,  Somali nationalism as it lowest, wahabism with its petro-dollars had a good environment to grow. While my friend galbeedi sees Al-shabaab as a secretive cult he does not see that respected non traditional sunnu scholars like Umul Bashir, Xassan Daahir aweys and most of the Northern somali religous class having common creed with Al-shabaab. The later group belives in armed  struggle while ictisam belives most somalis who do not adheere to their creed as being non muslims. Once the door of takfir is open blood will be shed.  For example.  hatred of christians, while traditional scholars taught us christians are ahlul-kitab but are misled the wahabi mindset framed hatred. While our prophet of mercy visited his sick jewish neighbor the wahabi mindset teaches the somali pshyce to hate jews. 

While the traditional scholars taught Somalis the concept of al-muraqaba (self reflectiveness) and attaining a higher spiritual guide the modern TV-evangelists dismissed this as khurafaat.   Islam according to these TV-evangelists came to Somalia 90-ties. The liturgy was deep spiritual affection that Shaykh Cabdiraxmaan Zeylaci taught is dismissed as them was shirk. While poetry by Saudis are praised.  What I am saying in  a academical way is that if Ethiopia went protestant in a few years from the orthodox coptic church the defines the abyssinian thousands of of the academical articles would have been written. Nothing that nature has been written. 

Even if Ahlusunna-.Wal-Jamaca (I call them the the tradionalists) made a national convention in 1992. For the first time in the history  all of Somalis tariqas  made a decision  modetnise their education system  establish and seek connection with same groups. Tamim in Yemen readily accepted somali  spiritual student to Azhar.  They  took steps to adapt to the modern way of life and refute the claims of the whabiyyada.   A sign that they were resurgent and popular was how they resited al-shabaab in the middle regions. We are seeing the fruits of this.  Wahabism had   its days high in  the late 90-ties. 

Since the advent of the crown prince of , Saudi Arabia has completely shut the funding for these groups.  Another aspect that showed how these groups "ictisam" was contolled by the Saudis was seeing when Saudi Arabia was having great schisms with its Shiite neighbors the sermon of Makka Sudaisi declared them to be non muslims. Somalis has no shiites.  Suddenly we  were seeing hyeana eating umul (1) talking about shicism. It was bizarre but unlike the wahabiyya the  the traditional scholats  ASWJ  are independent and are endogenous to somalis. They did follow the same route and concentrated instead of teaching people peace.

So how is this related to Al-shabaab?  They have the same creed, same world view point, Umul was busy calling armed struggle and killings in 2007 under the pretext foreign soldiers were in Somalia. 13 years later he has radically changed his position`? Why? Even Al-shabaab are quick to point out this theological inconsistency. My point of view is that as long we have people inclined to have the wahabi world view point meaning the world being black or white we will have al-shabaab.  If Somalis return our rich tradition of Sunni Islam and the love our mercfull prophet scw we al.shabaab will be defeated.   Imagine guys, our nomadic students were studying the genious Imam- Ghazali and logic before the advent of Al-shabaab.

 

1- This is not insult, The guy made a fatwa that people could eat hyenas based upon a vageue islamic reference, he was quickly criticized.

 

 

[Arafaat]

Khadafi,

I concur with your analysis on the sociological affects that were underlying to the loss of social identity, which gave rise or rather space for propagation of extremist ideologies. But as the case with complex issues, the religious suppression is just one factor of a multitude of factors that are underlying for the social polarization and inflation of the social contract.  
 

Another factor which might further explain loss of the social contract and people seeking refuge in extremist Ideologies and groups,  is the socio-economic inequality and economic marginalization experienced by many groups and smaller or less influential clans. Many smaller clans in Somalia have been severely marginalized after the state collapse. Take for example some of the agricultural communities that belonged to more marginalized clans, whose land were taken by larger clans that were not even traditional settled agriculturalists but with no central authority to prevent them from taking land by force, and sometimes even land grap took place through state power for private use by representatives of the state. Pushing these communities who often have no own militias, nor political and state influence, neither access to a lot remittances flowing in from the diaspora, or access to donors and NGO’s, could potentially find refuge in extremist groups who they perceive to be economically more equitable and economically more inclusive then the formal state. 

Let us continue to dissect the issue to fully comprehend the full nature of the problem and various factors of influence. I am sure there are a couple more factors giving the issue its complex nature and the challenges and impossibilities of resolving it over the last decades or so. let us think of other probable relevant factors of influence here.