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The Life, Teachings and Influence of Muhammad ibn Abdul-Wahhaab
belief that ziyara and tawassul is valid and beneficial were to be
false, there is no logical reason for condemning the belief as
entailing exclusion from Islam… 1
It is difficult to know where to start with a passage like this that has so
much falsehood in it. First, he claims that anyone who performs any of
the above-mentioned acts are mushrik (polytheist, outside of the fold
of Islam) according to the “Wahhabis.” This is simply and blatantly
not true. At no time, for example, did ibn Abdul-Wahhaab or any of
his followers declare a person a disbeliever simply because he
“expected” or had “aspirations” for the prophets’ or martyrs’
intercession. Similarly, there is no place in which ibn Abdul-Wahhaab
or his followers state that the visiting of a tomb or even the building of
a mausoleum over it is an act of shirk. The latter, for example, is
simply an act that leads to shirk and was, as such, prohibited by ibn
Abdul-Wahhaab as it was prohibited by the Prophet (peace and
blessings of Allah be upon him) before him. Did ibn Abdul-Wahhaab
or his followers declare the one who makes tawassul by mentioning
the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) a disbeliever?
On what basis is Algar making these claims? He himself offers no
references. He does not refer to any writing of ibn Abdul-Wahhaab or
any of his numerous followers to support these claims.
Algar says in the passage above, “All the allegedly deviant
practices just listed can, however, be vindicated with reference not
only to tradition and consensus 2 but also to hadith.” He is claiming
that all of those acts can be justified by reference to hadith. Of course,
he offers no proof for that. Not one hadith is quoted to support such a
claim and not even one reference is given who, one could assume,
provides those hadith. Is he trying to imply that there is a hadith in
which the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) or one
of his Companions sought help in a spiritual manner from someone in
a grave? If a man is not careful about what he claims is found in the
hadith of the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him), it is
not surprising that he is not careful in what he says about ibn Abdul-
Wahhaab.
1 Algar, pp. 32-34.
2 How he makes the claim to consensus is yet another miracle.
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