Since at least the sixteenth century, it has been possible to talk of an intellectual elite of Muslim scholars in the Sahelian milieu. These scholars were not ‘elite’ in the sense that their position brought them political influence, universally acclaimed high status or significant personal wealth. On the contrary, many subsisted on very few resources, had little interaction with West African political systems, and were often relegated to a low status within them. Rather, I call them an ‘elite’ in the sense that a long-established tradition of peripatetic scholarship and migratory practices, as well as family, clan and tariqa affiliation, created a shared body of values, pursuits and conceptions of the world that I have termed a Sahelian discursive tradition, and which was believed was superior to other knowledge systems. Members of this elite, such as the Fodiawa, appealed to the understanding of legitimacy that existed within this tradition as it stood in the early nineteenth century, through the medium of Arabic texts.

It follows that if we are to make the writings of the Fodiawa recognisable in their intellectual context, as discussed in subsequent chapters, we must first understand the markers of authority and the structures for receiving, managing and transferring it as they existed within this discursive tradition. This chapter offers a novel way to think through legitimacy’s composite nature in the Sahel, introducing the terms fiqh, kashf and nasab, and explaining how they worked together to create a durable authority that could be invoked by Muslim actors.

Fiqh

Among the names of God in the Muslim tradition is al-ʿalīm [the supreme knower]. Knowledge, in a scholarly milieu such as that of the Sahel, essentially meant fiqh. Although often translated as ‘Islamic jurisprudence’, fiqh is rather more expansive than that. In essence, the science of fiqh is man’s attempt to interpret God’s wishes for how humankind should behave and order itself, as revealed in the Qur’an and distilled from the hadith, and to implement this Divine Will to further the goal of a just, harmonious and vibrant Muslim society. But the task of interpretation is challenged by the inferior intellect of man. God’s word is infallible, but an erroneous interpretation of it is possible, and holds catastrophic consequences for the Umma and the fate of Muslim souls.