The Life, Teachings and Influence of Muhammad ... - IslamHouse.com

The Life, Teachings and Influence of Muhammad ibn Abdul-Wahhaab
acts taking one closer to Allah. 1 They even had a grave in Jiddah that
was supposedly Eve’s grave. The same types of practices occurred in
Egypt at the grave of al-Badawi and elsewhere throughout the Muslim
lands. 2
(2) The cult of saints and saint worship. On the general history
of cults of saints, Vassiliev writes,
One of the innovations in Islam was the cult of saints. The Romans
merely included local gods in their pantheon to increase the
ideological impact on believers in the newly seized territories, but
Christianity introduced the cult of ‘regional’ saints. The worship of
local deities was replaced by the worship of Christian saints, which
absorbed the earlier cults after an appropriate process of
transformation. Islam [the author should have stated ‘Muslims’]
followed the same route. The cult of saints in the Muslim world is
chiefly of local, pre-Islamic origin; but the earlier idols and
Christian saints were replaced by Islamic preachers, the Prophet’s
Companions and prominent ulama [scholars]… The spread of the
cult of saints was closely related to the activities of Sufis, or Islamic
mystics. To attract wide numbers of believers, they ascribed to their
saints the ability to perform miracles. 3
This issue was perhaps the greatest source of enmity toward
Muhammad ibn Abdul-Wahhaab. He speaks often of Shamsaan and
the sons of Shamsaan, Idrees and the sons of Idrees and Taaj in Najd,
Yoosuf and al-Ashari in Kuwait, and al-Idroos and Abu Hadeedah
(common among Sufis). 4 Muhammad ibn Abdul-Wahhaab referred to
them as tawaagheet or false objects of worship. These deceased
people were prayed to, sought forgiveness from and so forth. People
would actually say things like, “O so and so, you know my sins, so
please forgive me and have mercy on me.” 5 People would sacrifice
animals for them and believe that they could bring about harm or
benefit. (Saint cults were very important and popular in the Ottoman
Empire during the time of Muhammad ibn Abdul-Wahhaab.
Attempting to correct this evil practice was not a simple step.
1 Ibn Ghannaam, vol. 1, p. 14.
2 See ibn Ghannaam, vol. 1, pp. 13-19. Ibn Ghannam also discusses numerous
other parts of the Muslim world.
3 Vassiliev, p. 68.
4 For more information concerning the identity of these figures, see Abdul-
Muhsin ibn Baaz, vol. 1, pp. 60-61.
5 Ibn Ghannaam, vol. 1, p. 64.
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