Wahhābism

The History of a Militant Islamic Movement

Cole M. Bunzel

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English

Princeton University Press
06 August 2025

Middle Eastern history; Islamic studies; Political ideologies

An essential history of Wahhbism from its founding to the Islamic State

In the mid-eighteenth century, a controversial Islamic movement arose in the central Arabian region of Najd that forever changed the political landscape of the Arabian Peninsula and the history of Islamic thought. Its founder, Muammad ibn Abd al-Wahhb, taught that most professed Muslims were polytheists due to their veneration of Islamic saints at tombs and gravesites. He preached that true Muslims, those who worship God alone, must show hatred and enmity toward these polytheists and fight them in jihd. Cole Bunzel tells the story of Wahhbism from its emergence in the 1740s to its taming and coopting by the modern Saudi state in the 1920s, and shows how its legacy endures in the ideologies of al-Qida and the Islamic State.

Drawing on a wealth of primary source materials, Bunzel traces the origins of Wahhb doctrine to the religious thought of medieval theologian Ibn Taymiyya and examines its development through several generations of Wahhb scholars. While widely seen as heretical and schismatic, the movement nonetheless flourished in central Arabia, spreading across the peninsula under the political authority of the l Sud dynasty until the invading Egyptian army crushed it in 1818. The militant Wahhb ethos, however, persisted well into the early twentieth century, when the Saudi kingdom used Wahhbism to bolster its legitimacy.

This incisive history is the definitive account of a militant Islamic movement founded on enmity toward non-Wahhb Muslims and that is still with us today in the violent doctrines of Sunni jihds.

By: Cole M. Bunzel
Imprint: Princeton University Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 235mm, Width: 156mm,
ISBN: 9780691241616
ISBN 10: 0691241619
Pages: 408
Publication Date: 06 August 2025
Audience: College/higher education , Professional and scholarly , General/trade , Primary , Undergraduate
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Forthcoming

Cole M. Bunzel is a Hoover Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.

Reviews for Wahhābism: The History of a Militant Islamic Movement

""Bunzel’s scholarship is groundbreaking. . . . It is essential that it reaches as wide an audience as possible.""---John McHugo, History Today ""The amount of primary sources and manuscripts referenced in Cole Bunzel's new book is dizzying in the best way possible. The new standard for literature on Wahhabism! . . . A must read book.""---Aaron Y. Zelin, Brandeis University ""The single most significant event in the publication history of the scholarship on Wahhābism—period. There’s no book that rivals it . . . in scope, erudition, and breadth. . . . It's one of these books that will set the agenda for future scholarship.""---Omar Anchassi, Islamicate Book Reviews ""Remarkably detailed, robust, and cohesive. . . . This is a worthwhile read for anyone with an interest in either Islamic history and/or the lasting impact of Wahhābism.""---Troy E. Spier, Reading Religion ""Telling this complicated story in accessible prose, Wahhābism is a fine book worth reading by anyone interested in the history of ideas in Islam.""---Mustafa Akyol, Religion & Liberty ""Cole Bunzel’s Wahhābism is a fine work of exacting scholarship, combining the best of the philological tradition in Islamic Studies with a gumshoe’s nose for locating evidence and reconstructing historical contexts. The book is an outstanding contribution to the study of Wahhābism, especially in its presentation and analysis of the movement’s doctrine and its evolution, and it sets a high bar for studies of Wahhābism to come.""---Daniel Lav, Islamic Law and Society ""Through a reexamination and historical-doctrinal analysis of primary sources, Bunzel’s study provides important elements for the study of the discipline . . . and represents one of the primary texts on which to base a study on Wahhabism.""---Christian Tratzi, Islamochristiana ""Bunzel’s study will be a standard reference for its richly descriptive documentation of Wahhabism over its first two centuries.""---Paul L. Heck, JAOS ""This is a first-class work of religious and especially doctrinal development. . . . A vast number of previously unknown or underutilized sources have been brought to bear on the phenomenon of Wahhābism that need to be assimilated by anyone who is interested in contemporary Islamic thought.""---David Cook, Nova Religio