Ibn Taymiyyah

Taqī ad-Dīn Ahmad ibn Taymiyyah (Arabic: تقي الدين أحمد ابن تيمية, died 26 September 1328), known as Ibn Taymiyyah for short, was a controversial medieval Sunni Muslim theologian, jurisconsult, logician, and reformer. A member of the Hanbali school of jurisprudence founded by Ahmad ibn Hanbal, Ibn Taymiyyah was also a member of the Qadiriyya Sufi order founded by the twelfth-century mystic and saint Abdul-Qadir Gilani. A polarizing figure in his own lifetime, Ibn Taymiyyah's iconoclastic views on widely accepted Sunni doctrines such as the veneration of saints and the visitation to their tomb-shrines made him unpopular with the majority of the orthodox religious scholars of the time, under whose orders he was imprisoned several times. Often viewed as a minority figure in his own times and in the centuries that followed, Ibn Taymiyyah has become one of the most influential medieval writers in contemporary Islam, where his particular interpretations of the Qur'an and the Sunnah and his rejection of some aspects of classical Islamic tradition are believed to have had considerable influence on contemporary Wahhabism, Salafism, and Jihadism. Indeed, particular aspects of his teachings had a profound influence on Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab, the founder of the Hanbali reform movement practiced in Saudi Arabia known as Wahhabism, and on other later Wahabi scholars. Moreover, Ibn Taymiyyah's controversial fatwa allowing jihad against other Muslims is referenced to by Al-Qaeda and other jihadi groups. 2Name Ibn Taymiyyah's full name is Taqī ad-Dīn Abu 'l-`Abbās Ahmad ibn `Abd al-Ḥalīm ibn `Abd as-Salām ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Khidr ibn Muhammad ibn al-Khidr ibn `Ali ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Taymiyyah al-Ḥarrānī (Arabic: تقي الدين أبو العباس أحمد بن عبد الحليم بن عبد السلام بن عبد الله بن الخضر بن محمد بن الخضر بن على بن عبد الله ابن تيمية الحراني‎). Ibn Taymiyyah's name is unusual in that it is derived from a female member of his family as opposed to a male member, which was the normal custom at the time and still is now. Taimiyatu was a woman, famous for her scholarship and piety and the name Ibn Taymiyyah was taken up by many of her male descendents. 2Overview Ibn Taymiyyah had a simple life, most of which he dedicated to learning, writing, and teachin