Mohammed Bin Salman and Religious Authority and Reform in Saudi Arabia

REPORT 09.19.19 Mohammed bin Salman and Religious Authority and Reform in Saudi Arabia Kristian Coates Ulrichsen, Ph.D., Fellow, Center for the Middle East Annelle R. Sheline, Ph.D., Zwan Postdoctoral Fellow, Baker Institute and Boniuk Institute for Religious Tolerance In the eyes of some sections of the foreign interests that successive Saudi rulers have policy commentariat and many of his followed in a pragmatic and gradualist international supporters, Crown Prince approach to socio-political development. Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud (MBS) is Such policies enjoyed a measure of a religious reformer working to degrade success in cushioning the impact of rapid the influence of powerful forces in Saudi economic modernization and guiding the Arabia that have pushed Islam in a more kingdom through periods of great internal conservative direction over the past strain. Section three examines instances 40 years, both within and beyond the of religious pushback through the growth kingdom. However, perceptions of MBS of the Sahwa movement in the 1990s. The as a religious reformer rest on flawed meteoric rise of Mohammed bin Salman readings of the history of the relationship and the emergence of his “1979” narrative between the reigning Al Saud family and about “moderating” Islam is examined in Perceptions of MBS as the Wahhabi clerical establishment. The section four, while sections five and six history of the modern Saudi state has make the case that MBS is not in fact a a religious reformer shown that at key junctures where it could religious reformer but instead has pursued rest on flawed readings have acted otherwise, the leadership within changes more symbolic than substantive. of the history of the the royal family has made decisions that This report ends by contending that, like relationship between maintained their political supremacy over his predecessors, MBS is using religion and against any contestation from religious as a tool of political control, despite the reigning Al Saud elites or individual clerics. If MBS seeks to attempts by some supporters to claim he family and the Wahhabi substantially reform the religious sphere, is reforming Wahhabism. clerical establishment. he would need to target the kingdom’s most powerful religious institutions, such as the Council of Senior Scholars. This has HISTORICAL CONTEXT yet to happen. This report analyzes the relationship The contemporary Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, between political and religious authority in ruled since 1932 by King Abd al-Aziz Al Saud Saudi Arabia. An opening section explores and his sons, is the third iteration of a Saudi the nature of the political-religious pact state in the Arabian Peninsula. The first Saudi that has positioned political authority state, known as the Emirate of Diriyah, took above that of religion as the ultimate shape in 1744 when Prince Mohammed bin source of domestic power. A second Saud of Diriyah joined with Mohammed Ibn section details the careful mixture of Abd al-Wahhab, an Islamic scholar from consensus and balancing of competing Lower Najd (corresponding to today’s Riyadh), BAKER INSTITUTE REPORT // 09.19.19 to create a politico-religious entity aimed Saud control. An early example occurred in at ridding Islam in the Arabian Peninsula the 1920s during a conflict with the Ikhwan of heretical practices and deviations. Abd (Brotherhood) movement. Abd al-Aziz al-Wahhab was the author of Kitab al-Tawhid undertook a campaign to settle the Bedouin (the Book of Monotheism), which aimed to and turn them into a fierce fighting force take Islam back to its pure and unadulterated that greatly assisted the conquest of the roots, thereby forming a core component of Hejaz and al-Ahsa provinces. However, the Salafi movement. Mohammed bin Saud when the Bedouin Ikhwan rebelled against and his descendants expanded the Saudi Abd al-Aziz’s moderation of religious policy state well beyond its Najdi heartland and at its in the new territories, they were crushed height, the first Saudi state covered a region in battle by the forces of the nascent Saudi extending from Yemen in the south to Aleppo state in 1929-30.3 When the agenda of and Palestine in the west and Karbala in religious conservatives conflicted with modern-day Iraq to the north.1 the centralization of control, Abd al-Aziz The first Saudi state collapsed in 1818 demonstrated that the House of Saud would after a series of British attacks on Saudi not be constrained by the “dynamic alliance.” territory and a final Egyptian assault on Fifty years later, the seizure of the Diriyah. It was quickly replaced by a second Grand Mosque in Mecca by a group of Saudi state, the Emirate of Najd, which lasted religious militants led by Juhayman until 1891, when Abd al-Rahman Al Saud al-Utaybi represented “in many ways the was defeated by the rival al-Rashid dynasty sequel to the Ikhwan revolt of 1929” in of Ha’il and forced to flee with his family, the struggle over the speed and direction 4 Abd al-Aziz Al Saud which included the young Abd al-Aziz. After of Saudi modernization. Al-Utaybi’s finding refuge in Kuwait and regrouping, Abd father had fought with the Ikhwan at the and his successors al-Aziz Al Saud reconquered Riyadh in 1902 Battle of Sabala in 1929 that ended with have, in key moments, and began the process of unifying through their defeat by Abd al-Aziz’s forces. His mobilized religion both conquest the remainder of Najd (1912) and son became radicalized while studying in as an instrument of the adjoining provinces of al-Ahsa (1922), Medina in the 1970s and being exposed to the Hejaz (1925), and Asir (1930). In 1932, the modernist lifestyle in Riyadh and other power and as a source Abd al-Aziz proclaimed the merger of the major Saudi cities. Juyahman recruited of legitimacy. Najd, Hejaz, and Asir into the Kingdom of similarly disaffected Bedouin from humble Saudi Arabia, leaving him in control of the backgrounds who were cut out of (and majority of the Arabian Peninsula north of rejected) what they saw as the oil-fueled Yemen, with the exception of the British- transformation of Saudi Arabian society. protected emirates of Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, After taking control of the Grand Mosque, the Oman, and the Trucial States (today the militants released a list of their grievances United Arab Emirates) on the shoreline of the with “Western” innovations, including Persian Gulf.2 television and women’s education. They Many observers of Saudi Arabia attach made personal attacks on the freewheeling significance to the “dynastic alliance” made activities of senior Al Saud princes.5 by Mohammed bin Saud and Mohammed Ibn On this occasion, the Al Saud responded Abd al-Wahhab in 1744 and see as its legacy very differently to the direct challenge to a separation of responsibilities, whereby the the religious and political basis of their Al Saud exercise political leadership while legitimacy than after 1930, when Abd al-Aziz the descendants of al-Wahhab (primarily had (militarily defeated and) marginalized the al-Sheikh family) monopolize religious the religiously conservative Ikhwan. posts. However, the reality is more complex After executing Juhayman and the other as Abd al-Aziz Al Saud and his successors perpetrators, the royal family then proceeded have, in key moments, mobilized religion to implement many of the rebels’ demands. both as an instrument of power and as They did this through measures that a source of legitimacy, each time using refocused the role of religion in Saudi society. a strategy of co-optation that kept final Measures taken included an increase in responsibility for policy firmly within Al funding for religious universities, expansion of 2 MOHAMMED BIN SALMAN AND RELIGIOUS AUTHORITY AND REFORM IN SAUDI ARABIA the remit and size of the religious police, and American forces would leave the kingdom further support for pan-Islamic organizations after the war.7 and causes, such as the anti-Soviet campaign Aware of the need to reinforce such a in Afghanistan. In addition, the emergence momentous decision to station American of post-revolutionary Iran and the decline in troops in the Muslim holy land, the Saudi oil prices in the early-1980s challenged the government asked the Council of Senior Saudi regime’s leadership of the Muslim world Scholars to legitimate the move through and its ability to provide for the economic a fatwa. Initially, the Council, led by Abd welfare of its citizens. Faced with multiple al-Aziz bin Baz, the senior religious authority threats to its political and religious legitimacy, in the kingdom, refused to support the the regime responded by slowing down the government’s position, but after pressure process of liberalization and granting more the Council issued a fatwa on August 13, The House of Saud 6 8 political space for Islamist activism. 1990, endorsing the king’s decision. By alternatively repressed so doing, the government alienated a significant portion of the Salafi establishment. and responded to DOMESTIC BALANCING ACT Some members coalesced into the Sahwa9 criticism from the most (“Awakening”) movement of religious- The episodes of domestic unrest described conservative aspects political activism, while others turned to of society. above illustrate how the House of Saud more radical critics of Saudi policy such as alternatively repressed and responded Osama bin Laden, whose offer of the use of to criticism from the most conservative his Arab fighting force based in Afghanistan aspects of society. Following 1979, to repel Saddam Hussein had been rejected

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