¹ Abdullah al-Ubayd, ‘My time with scholars from the Indian subcontinent—Shaykh Abdullah al-Ubayd’, www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZ64pfRbMVY&t=920s, [accessed 18 May 2021].

² Ibid.

³ A Master's thesis submitted to the Muslim College, London, which was later published, contains some valuable data on the Markaz Jamiat Ahl-e-Hadith, UK (MJAH); see Rashad Ahmad Azami, Ahl-e-Hadith in Britain: History, Establishment, Organisation, Activities and Objectives (London: Ta-Ha Publishers, 2000). The Ahl-e-Hadith and later Salafi cohorts are also one of two groups examined in Hira Amin, ‘Salafism and Islamism in Britain, 1965–2015’, PhD thesis, University of Cambridge, 2017.

⁴ See, in particular, Anabel Inge, The Making of a Salafi Muslim Woman: Paths to Conversion (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016); Sadek Hamid, Sufis, Salafis and Islamists: The Contested Ground of British Islamic Activism (London: I. B. Tauris, 2016).

⁵ See, for example, the short reference to the Ahl-e-Hadith in Sophie Gilliat-Ray, Muslims in Britain: An Introduction (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), p. 105. Danièle Joly's ethnographic study on Muslims in Birmingham between 1983 and 1989 provides some details on the Ahl-e-Hadith as part of a wider analysis on Islamic activism in Britain but mistakenly concludes the movement was founded in Saudi Arabia during the nineteenth century. See Danièle Joly, Britannia's Crescent: Making a Place for Muslims in British Society (Aldershot: Avebury, 1995), pp. 29 and 70; Humayun Ansari, The Infidel Within: Muslims in Britain since 1800 (London: Hurst and Company, 2004), pp. 238, 248, 346.

⁶ A good example of this is Quintan Wiktorowicz's widely used tripartite classification of Salafism which will be discussed in detail below.

⁷ Roel Meijer, ‘Introduction’, in Global Salafism: Islam's New Religious Movement, Roel Meijer (ed.) (London: Hurst and Company, 2009), p. 3. Other studies also focus on the Middle East or parts of Africa: see Laurent Bonnefoy, Salafism in Yemen: Transnationalism and Religious Identity (London: Hurst and Company, 2011); Zoltan Pall, Lebanese Salafis between the Gulf and Europe (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2013); Joas Wagemakers, Salafism in Jordan: Political Islam in a Quietist Community (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016); Alexander Thurston, Salafism in Nigeria: Islam, Preaching, and Politics (Cambridge: International African Institute and Cambridge University Press, 2016). A recent study on Swedish Salafism is a noteworthy exception: see Susanne Olsson, Contemporary Puritan Salafism: A Swedish Case Study (Sheffield: Equinox Publishing, 2019).

⁸ We have purposely not discussed MJAH's appearance in Channel 4's 2007 ‘Undercover mosque’ documentary or the subsequent think-tank reports which refer to their members or publications. While this certainly brought MJAH to national attention, albeit negative, this article seeks instead to locate the Ahl-e-Hadith in Britain as a significant Islamic movement which has largely been overlooked in studies on British Salafism.

⁹ Wagemakers, Salafism in Jordan, pp. 28–36; see also Bernard Haykel, ‘On the Nature of Salafi Thought and Action’, in Global Salafism, Meijer (ed.), pp. 33–50; Stephane Lacroix, ‘Between Revolution and Apoliticism: Nasir al-Din al-Albani and his Impact on the Shaping of Contemporary Salafism’, in Global Salafism, Meijer (ed.), pp. 58–80; Henri Lauziére, The Making of Salafism: Islamic Reform in the Twentieth Century (New York: Columbia University Press, 2016); Lauziére, Henri, ‘The Construction of Salafiyya: Reconsidering Salafism from the Perspective of Conceptual History’, International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 42 (2010), pp. 369–389CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For a rejoinder to Lauziére, see Griffel, Frank, ‘What Do We Mean By “Salafi?” Connecting Muḥammad ʿWha with Egypt's Nūr Party in Islam's Contemporary Intellectual History’, Die Welt Des Islams 55 (2015), pp. 186–220CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Lauziére's counter-note: Lauziére, H., ‘Rejoinder: What We Mean Versus What They Meant by “Salafi”: A Reply to Frank Griffel’, Die Welt Des Islams 56 (2016), pp. 89–96CrossRefGoogle Scholar; for a post-Salafi's typology, see Yasir Qadhi, ‘Rethinking Salafism: Shifting Trends and Changing Typologies Post Arab Spring—Dr. Yasir Qadhi’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yt95RTAnVLg, [accessed 18 May 2021].

¹⁰ Daniel Brown, Rethinking Tradition in Modern Islamic Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), p. 27. See also Muhammad Qasim Zaman, ‘Commentaries, Print and Patronage: “Ḥadīth” and the Madrasas in Modern South Asia’, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 62, 1 (1999), p. 61. For more on the Tariqat Muhammadiyyah, see, in particular, Qeyamuddin Ahmad, The Wahabi Movement in India (Calcutta: Firma K. L. Mukhopadhyay, 1966); Harlan O. Pearson, Islamic Reform and Revival in Nineteenth-Century India: The Tarīqah-i Muhammadīyah (New Delhi: Yoda Press, 2008); Muʿīnuddīn A. Khan, ‘Ṭarīqah-i-Muḥammadīyah Movement: An Analytical Study’, Islamic Studies 6, 4 (1967).

¹¹ Aḥmad Shāgif, Qurrat al-ʿAyn fī Tarjamah al-Sayyid Nadhīr Ḥusain (Lahore: Al-Maktabah al-Salafiyyah, 2002), p. 30. See also Faḍl Ḥusain Muzaffarpūrī, Al-Ḥayāt baʿd al-Mamāt (Life after Death) (Agra: Akbari Press, 1908); Muḥammad Isrāʾīl al-Nadwī, Tadhkirah al-Imām Nadhīr Ḥusain al-Muḥaddith al-Dihlawī (Remembering the Imam Nadhīr Ḥusain the Ḥadīth Scholar of Delhi) (Haryana: Al-Madrasah al-Muḥammadīyyah, 2010). According to Metcalf, members of the movement first referred to themselves as ‘Muḥammadī’ (followers of Prophet Muḥammad), but dropped this name in favour of the ‘Ahl-i Ḥadīth’ which was ‘first used in writing by Sayyid Nazir Husain in 1864’. See Barbara Daly Metcalf, Islamic Revival in British India: Deoband, 1860–1900 (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1982; 4th impression, 2011), p. 272, fn. 11.

¹² See, in particular, Saeedullah, The Life and Works of Muhammad Siddiq Hasan Khan: Nawab of Bhopal (Lahore: Sh. Muhammad Ashraf, 1973); Claudia Preckel, ‘Screening Siddiq Hasan Khan's (1832–1890) Library: The Use of Hanbali Literature in 19th-Century Bhopal’, in Islamic Theology, Philosophy and Law: Debating Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya, Birgit Krawietz and George Tamer (eds) (Berlin; Boston: De Gruyter, 2013), pp. 162–219; and Claudia Preckel, ‘Islamische Bildungsnetzwerke und Gelehrtenkulturim Indien des 19. Jahrhunderts: Muḥammad Ṣiddīq Ḥasan Ḫān (st. 1890) und die Entstehung der Ahl-e Ḥadīt-Bewegung in Bhopal’, PhD thesis, Ruhr University, Bochum, 2005.

¹³ Sayyid Nadhir, in particular, was responsible for teaching hundreds of students who went on to become prominent scholars in their own right across South Asia and beyond. For an exhaustive list of his students, see Muzaffarpūrī, Al-Ḥayāt, pp. 322–367.

¹⁴ See, for example, ʿAbd al-Rahman al-Faryawāʾī, Juhūd Muklaṣah Fī Khidmah Al-Sunnah al-Muṭahharah (Banaras: Idārah al-Buhūth al-Islamiyyah wa ‘l-Daʿwah wa ‘l-Iftā, Al-Jamia-tus-Salafiah, 1980), pp. 3–10.

¹⁵ By relegation, we do not imply a wholesale rejection of madhabs. A cursory look at commentaries of Hadith collections authored by early Ahl-e-Hadith scholars indicates a hermeneutic which draws on fiqh manuals in as much as they do on Hadith commentaries. See, for example, Shams al-Ḥaqq al-ʿAẓīmabādī, Ghāyah al-Maqṣūd fī Sharḥ Sunan Abī Dāwūd (Riyadh: Dār al-Ṭaḥāwī, 1994): a student of Nazir Husain (d. 1911), his commentary on Sunan Abī Dāwūd draws on celebrated fiqh compendiums authored by scholars of the four madhabs. See also Shams al-Ḥaqq al-ʿAẓīmabādī, ʿAwn al-Maʿbūd ʿalā Sharḥ Sunan Abī Dāwūd (Beirut: Dār Ibn Ḥazm, 2005).

¹⁶ This is not to say that the two movements did not cross over with one another in certain parts of North India, for several members of the Tariqat followed Nazir Husain and his students as spiritual guides. Certain Ahl-e-Hadith members similarly joined the Tariqat and participated in different ways for its cause. See examples of correspondences between the two movements in Muin-ud-Din Ahmad Khan, Selections from Bengal Government Records on Wahhabi Trials (1863–1870) (Dacca: Asiatic Society of Pakistan, 1961).

¹⁷ Stephens, Julia, ‘The Phantom Wahhabi: Liberalism and the Muslim Fanatic in Mid-Victorian India’, Modern Asian Studies 47, 1 (2013), p. 28CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

¹⁸ See Ahmad, The Wahabi Movement, pp. 286–287; al-Nadwī, Tadhkirah al-Imām Nadhīr Ḥusain al-Muḥaddith al-Dihlawī, pp. 103–118; Metcalf, B., ‘Islam and Power in Colonial India: The Making and Unmaking of a Muslim Princess’, The American Historical Review 116, 1 (2011), p. 26CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

¹⁹ The reply to this petition by Lepel Griffin (d. 1908), then secretary to the Government of Punjab, is reproduced in full in Ṣiddīq Ḥasan Khān (spelled Múhammad Siddiḳ Hasan Khán), An Interpreter of Wahabiism (Calcutta: published by the author, 1884), pp. 77–79.

²⁰ Ayesha Jalal, Partisans of Allah: Jihad in South Asia (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2008), p. 73.

²¹ Ahmad, The Wahabi Movement, p. 265.

²² Christophe Jaffrelot, ‘South Asian Muslims’ Interactions with Arabian Islam until the 1990s: What Pan-Islamism before and after Pakistan?’, in Pan-Islamic Connections: Transnational Networks Between South Asia and the Gulf, Christophe Jaffrelot and Laurence Louër (eds) (London: C. Hurst and Co. Publishers, 2017), pp. 26–27.

²³ On the ties cemented between the Ahl-e-Hadith and Arabian Wahhabis, see, in particular, Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn Maqbūl and ʿĀrif Jāwaid al-Muḥammadī, Ahl al-Ḥadīth fī Shibh al-Qārrah al-Hindiyyah wa ʿAlāqatuhum bi ʿl-Mamlakah al-ʿArabiyyah al-Suʿūdiyyah wa Ghairuhā min al-Duwal al-ʿArabiyyah[The Ahl al-Ḥadīth in the Indian Sub-Continent and its Connection with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and Other Arab Countries] (Beirut: Dar al-Bashaer, 2014); Abū ʿl-Mukarram b. ʿAbd al-Jalīl, Daʿwah al-Imām Muḥammad bin ʿMuḥ al-Wahhāb Bayna Muʾayyidīhā wa Muʿāriḍīhā fī Shibh al-Qārrah al-Hindiyyah [The Missionary Efforts of Imām Muḥammad b. ʿMuḥ al-Wahhāb between Its Supporters and Detractors in the Indian Sub-Continent] (Riyadh: Darussalam, 2000; 2nd edn); Preckel, ‘Screening Siddiq Hasan Khan's (1832–1890) Library’, pp. 196–199; Metcalf, Islamic Revival in British India, pp. 277–278.

²⁴ See, for details, Martin Riexinger, ‘Ibn Taymiyyah's Worldview and the Challenges of Modernity: A Conflict Among the Ahl-i Ḥadīth in British India’, in Islamic Theology, Krawietz and Tamer (eds), pp. 493–517; Ṣafī al-Raḥmān al-Mubārakfūrī, ‘A Biography of the Author’, in Thanāʾ Allāh al-Amritsarī, Tafsīr al-Qurʾān bi-Kalām al-Raḥmān (Riyadh: Darussalam, 2002), pp. 17–21.

²⁵ The Ahl-e-Hadith's activities in Punjab are the subject of a thesis in German: see Martin Riexinger, Sanāʾullāh Amritsarī (1868–1948) und die Ahl-i-Ḥadīs im Punjab unter britischer Herrschaft (Würzburg: Ergon Verlag, 2004); Martin Riexinger, ‘How Favourable is Puritan Islam to Modernity? A Study of the Ahl-i Hadīs in Late Nineteenth/Early Twentieth Century South Asia’, in Colonialism, Modernity and Religious Identities: Religious Reform Movements in South Asia, Gwilym Beckerlegge (ed.) (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2008), pp. 147–165.

²⁶ Al-Jamia-tus-Salafiah ‘Foundation’, September 2011: http://aljamiatussalafiah.org/?p=60, [accessed 18 May 2021].

²⁷ See, in particular, Yōgīndar Sikkand, ‘Stoking the Flames: Intra-Muslim Rivalries in India and the Saudi Connection’, Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East 27, 1 (2007), p. 98; Jaffrelot, ‘South Asian Muslims’ Interactions’, pp. 43–46; Ayesha Siddiqa, ‘Pakistani Madrasas: Ideological Stronghold for Saudi Arabia and Gulf States’, in Pan-Islamic Connections, Jaffrelot and Louër (eds), pp. 49–71; Abou Zahab, ‘Salafism in Pakistan’, in Global Salafism, Meijer (ed.), pp. 129–130; Al-Jamia-tus-Salafiah, ‘Imam-e-Haram and Other Saudi Delegates in Jamiah Salafiah’, March 2013: http://aljamiatussalafiah.org/?p=744, [accessed 18 May 2021].

²⁸ For example, ʿAbd al-Ghaffar Hasan (d. 2007), a Hadith scholar who was trained in the prestigious Ahl-e-Hadith seminary Al-Rahmaniyyah in British Delhi, was invited to teach in the Faculty of Hadith at IUM in 1964 and he remained there until 1980. See AbdurRasheed Iraqee, 40 Ahl-e Hadith Scholars from the Indian Subcontinent (Gujranwala, Pakistan: Umm-ul-Qura Publications, 2019), p. 493; Irtiza Hasan, ‘Suhaib Hasan on His Father Abdal Ghaffar Hasan’, (2007): http://muslimmatters.org/2007/04/05/shaykh-suhaib-hasan-reminisces-on-his-fathers-life, [accessed 18 May 2021].

²⁹ Ansari, The Infidel Within; Gilliat-Ray, Muslims in Britain.

³⁰ Metcalf, Islamic Revival in British India; Abdul-Azim Ahmed and Mansur Ali, ‘In Search of Sylhet—The Fultoli Tradition in Britain’, Religions 10, 10 (2019).

³¹ Azami, Ahl-e Hadith in Britain, pp. 18–19.

³² Ibid. There are currently 50 mosques attached to MJAH (including the mosque headquarters in Small Heath, Birmingham). These were initially referred to as branches but later as affiliates for administrative purposes. Azhar Majothi, interview with Maulana Abd al-Hadi al-Umari, 17 March 2020.

³³ Interview with Asim cited in Azami, Ahl-e Hadith in Britain, p. 20.

³⁴ Ibid.; Mahmood Ahmed Mirpuri, Fatawa: Siraat-e-Mustaqeem (UK: Darussalam, 1998), p. 7.

³⁵ Azami, Ahl-e Hadith in Britain, p. 22.

³⁶ Hasan, ‘Suhaib Hasan on His Father Abdal Ghaffar Hasan’.

³⁷ Scholars of MJAH UK, In Defence of MJAH: A Response to the Unjust, Deceptive and Slanderous Allegations Made against Markazi Jamiat Ahle Hadith UK (Birmingham: MJAH, 2008), pp. 33–34.

³⁸ Ibid.

³⁹ Azhar Majothi, interview with Suhaib Hasan, 6 June 2020.

⁴⁰ Masjid Tawhid, ‘About’, (2013): https://www.masjidtawhid.org/about, [accessed 18 May 2021]. It should be noted that the Islamic Shariah Council includes a pool of scholars from different madhabs and does not claim to be strictly Salafi. Hasan is also a founding member of the European Council for Fatwa and Research (est. 1997). Both councils offer civic services and answers to local issues, demonstrating cooperation between Islamic trends normally pitted against one another inside Europe.

⁴¹ Ibid.; Saudi Arabia also funded other mosques, and in this period their funding was not just restricted to Salafi-inclined groups. See John Eade, ‘Nationalism, Community, and the Islamization of the Space in London’, in Making Muslim Space in North America and Europe, Barbara Metcalf (ed.) (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1996), p. 219.

⁴² Scholars of MJAH UK, In Defence of MJAH, p. 36.

⁴³ Mahmood Ahmed Mirpuri et al. (eds), The Straight Path, vol. 8, no. 6 (Birmingham: MJAH, 1987), p. 25.

⁴⁴ Ihtisham Al-Haqq, Dār Al-ʿUlūm Aḥmadiyyah Salafiyyah: Sadr Salah Mud Wa Jazr (Darbhanga: Maktabah Salafiyyah, 2016), pp. 29–31.

⁴⁵ Lauziére, ‘The Construction of Salafiyya’, p. 383.

⁴⁶ M. A. K. Saqib, Mrs I. B. Saqib and Mahmood Ahmed Mirpuri (eds), The Straight Path, vol. 3 no. 1 (Birmingham: MJAH, 1982). Azhar Majothi, interview with Suhaib Hasan, 6 June 2020.

⁴⁷ Wiktorowicz, Quintan, ‘Anatomy of the Salafi Movement’, Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 29, 3 (2006), pp. 207–208CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Joas Wagemakers, ‘Revisiting Wiktorowicz’, in Salafism after the Arab Awakening: Contending with People's Power, Francesco Cavatorta and Fabio Merone (eds) (London: Hurst and Company, 2017).

⁴⁸ Cavatorta and Merone (eds), Salafism after the Arab Awakening; Zajac, Anna, ‘Between Sufism and Salafism: The Rise of Salafi Tendencies after the Arab Spring and Its Implications’, Hemispheres 29, 2 (2014)Google Scholar; Al-Anani, Khalil and Malik, Maszlee, ‘Pious Way to Politics: The Rise of Political Salafism in Post-Mubarak Egypt’, Digest of Middle East Studies 22, 1 (2013)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Mneimneh, Hassan, ‘The Spring of a New Political Salafism?’, Current Trends in Islamist Ideology 12 (2011)Google Scholar.

⁴⁹ Jaffrelot and Louër (eds), Pan-Islamic Connections, pp. 1–2.

⁵⁰ Jalal, Partisans of Allah, Chapter 5, p. 3.

⁵¹ Iraqee, 40 Ahl-e Hadith Scholars from the Indian Subcontinent, pp. 219–222.

⁵² Ibid., pp. 240–243.

⁵³ Mohammad Waseem, ‘Origins and Growth Patterns of Islamic Organizations in Pakistan’, in Religious Radicalism and Security in South Asia, Satu P. Limaye, Moham Malik and Robert G. Wirsing (eds) (Hawaii: Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies, 2004).

⁵⁴ The Markazi Jamiat Ahl-e-Hadith (MJAH)—the main Ahl-e-Hadith organization in Pakistan which can trace its origins back to the All India Ahl-e-Hadith Conference in 1906—has managed to gain a very small amount of influence through alliances, for example: in 2002 with the Muttahida-Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), a heterogeneous alliance of six diverse parties, and the Pakistani Muslim League (Nawaz Sharif), where the amir of MJAH, Professor Sajid Mir, was appointed as the Pakistani Muslim League senator from 2002 and remains so up to the present day. Similarly, in Bangladesh, the Bangladesh Jamiat Ahl-e-Hadith (BJAH) also tried to form political parties with little success. Yet, the underlying current of fusing their religious ideology with the political context remains. For more detail on the different factions and their offshoots, see International Crisis Group (ICG), The State of Sectarianism in Pakistan (2005); International Crisis Group (ICG), Islamic Parties in Pakistan (2011); for more on the Ahl-e-Hadith and politics, see Bizaa Zeynab Ali, ‘The Religious and Political Dynamics of Jamiat Ahle-Hadith Pakistan’, Columbia Academic Commons, 2010; Humeira Iqtidar, Secularizing Islamists? Jama'at-e-Islami and Jama'at-ud-Da'wa in Urban Pakistan (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2011). For more on the Ahl-e-Hadith in Bangladesh, see Mumtaz Ahmad, Ahl-e-Hadith Movement in Bangladesh: History, Religion, Politics and Militancy (Islamabad: International Islamic University Islamabad, Iqbal International Institute for Research and Dialogue (IRD), 2006).

⁵⁵ Jalal, Partisans of Allah, Chapter 6, p. 21.

⁵⁶ Saeed Shafqat, ‘From Official Islam to Islamism: The Rise of Dawat-ul-lrshad and Lashkar-e-Taiba’, in Pakistan: Nationalism Without a Nation, Christophe Jaffrelot (ed.) (London: Zed, 2002); Samina Yasmin, Jihad and Dawah: Evolving Narratives of Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jamat Ud Dawah (London: Hurst and Co., 2017); Tahir Kamran, ‘Salafi Extremism in the Punjab’, in Communalism and Globalization in South Asia and its Diaspora, Deana Heath and Chandana Mathur (eds) (Oxon: Routledge, 2011).

⁵⁷ Madawi Al-Rasheed, A History of Saudi Arabia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), pp. 1–66.

⁵⁸ John Habib, ‘Wahhabi Origins of the Contemporary Saudi State’, in Religion and Politics in Saudi Arabia: Wahhabism and the State, Mohammed Ayoob and Hasan Kosebalaban (eds) (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2009).

⁵⁹ Lacroix, ‘Between Revolution and Apoliticism’, in Global Salafism, Meijer (ed.).

⁶⁰ Wiktorowicz, ‘Anatomy of the Salafi Movement’, p. 221.

⁶¹ International Crisis Group (ICG), Saudi Arabia Backgrounder: Who Are the Islamists? (2004), pp. 2–4; Al-Rasheed, A History of Saudi Arabia, Chapter 4.

⁶² S. Lacroix, Awakening Islam: The Politics of Religious Dissent in Contemporary Saudi Arabia (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011).

⁶³ Wiktorowicz, ‘Anatomy of the Salafi Movement’, p. 223.

⁶⁴ Fawaz Gerges, The Far Enemy: Why Jihad Went Global (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009; 2nd edn), pp. 1–3.

⁶⁵ Mirpuri, Fatawa: Siraat-e-Mustaqeem, pp. 292, 303.

⁶⁶ Suhaib Hasan (ed.), The Straight Path, Sep/Oct (Birmingham: MJAH, 1992), p. 23.

⁶⁷ Hira Amin, interview with Usama Hasan, 27 May 2015.

⁶⁸ Azhar Majothi, interview with Abu Muntasir, 10 November 2019; see also Hamid, Sufis, Salafis and Islamists, p. 56 and pp. 50–67 for more details on how JIMAS was established.

⁶⁹ The JIMAS centre was established in 2011 but within a few months fell victim to an arson attack and has yet to be reopened. See JIMAS, ‘JIMAS documentary 2011’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cxPx4poSMC0, [accessed 18 May 2021].

⁷⁰ Note that all but Awlaki were graduates of IUM.

⁷¹ For more detail on each of these trends, see ICG, Saudi Arabia Backgrounder; Lacroix, Awakening Islam; Wiktorowicz, ‘Anatomy of the Salafi Movement’.

⁷² Khadijah Elshayyal, Muslim Identity Politics: Islam, Activism and Equality in Britain (London: I. B. Tauris, 2018), Chapter 4.

⁷³ Alexandre Caeiro, ‘The Power of European Fatwas: The Minority Fiqh Project and the Making of an Islamic Counterpublic’, International Journal of Middle East Studies 42, 3 (2010).

⁷⁴ One of the leading scholars in this group is Yasir Qadhi. In his many lectures and interviews, Qadhi emphasizes that Muslims in the West need autonomous religious authority, that the primary reason Islam has not ‘flourished in the West as much as it could is precisely due to the outsourcing of Islamic rulings to scholars in other Muslim-majority lands’, and that Muslims should refer to scholars who are similar to them, lead their own lives, and live in their own countries to develop an ‘indigenous flavour of Islam’. Qadhi is careful not to call for significant changes to the main tenets of the Islamic sharia. Using the analogy of a house, he argues that the foundations remains the same, yet the furniture and interior design could be amended. He differentiates between the essentials of Islam, which are universal, and those issues that could change according to context. The latter, he claims, must not be outsourced. However, other Salafi groups openly criticize him, claiming that he is disrespecting the Arab Salafi scholars. Since 2011 Qadhi has publicly distanced himself from the ‘Salafi’ label, but he still has considerable influence on the Salafi movement in the West. See Christopher Pooya Razavian, ‘Yasir Qadhi and the Development of Reasonable Salafism’, in Modern Islamic Authority and Social Change. Volume 2: Evolving Debates in the West, Masooda Bano (ed.) (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2018).

⁷⁵ AbdurRahman Bennett and Isa Calliste, ‘Dr Yasir Qadhi's Unusual Methods—Part 1’, SalafiManhaj.com (2014): http://salafimanhaj.com/dr-yasir-qadhi-and-his-unusual-method-of-looking-back-to-change-how-we-look-forward, [accessed 18 May 2021].

⁷⁶ Uriya Shavit, ‘“The Lesser of Two Evils”: Islamic Law and the Emergence of a Broad Agreement on Muslim Participation in Western Political Systems’, Contemporary Islam 8 (2014).

⁷⁷ Wasatiyyah, literally translated as taking the middle path, is a socio-juristic approach led primarily by Yusuf Al-Qaradawi (b. 1926), which aims to harmonize Islam and modernity. The European Council of Fatwa and Research and the Fiqh Council of North America base their rulings on this approach. See Alexandre Caeiro, ‘The Power of European Fatwas: The Minority Fiqh Project and the Making of an Islamic Counterpublic’, International Journal of Middle East Studies 42, 3 (2010).

⁷⁸ Shavit, ‘“The Lesser of Two Evils”’, p. 250.

⁷⁹ There are some exceptions, the most notable being Al-Albani who prohibited all political participation in the West and rejected the use of the ‘lesser of two evils’ argument on this issue. See Lacroix, ‘Between Revolution and Apoliticism’, pp. 68–69.

⁸⁰ Asma Mustafa, ‘Diversity in Political Perspectives and Engagement among Young British Muslims’, in Muslims and Political Participation in Britain, Timothy Peace (ed.) (London: Routledge, 2015), p. 150.

⁸¹ For more detail, see Sadek Hamid, ‘Islamic Political Radicalism in Britain: The Case of Hizb-ut-Tahrir’, in Islamic Political Radicalism: A European Perspective, Tahir Abbas (ed.) (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2007).

⁸² One main example of this trend is British-based Salafi scholar, Haitham Al-Haddad, who argues that voting is ‘almost obligatory’ for Muslims living in the West.

⁸³ See, for example, Salafi Sounds, ‘Question: Is It Permissible for Muslims Living in Non-Muslim Countries to Vote?—Answer by Abu Khadeejah’: https://www.salafisounds.com/question-is-it-permissible-for-muslims-living-in-non-muslim-countries-to-vote-answer-by-abu-khadeejah/?fbclid=IwAR0Iqg0ZnQterUR0kHjiYe0Y6eEQK4kkTfJxrMN38dyrQ_7mwOzY2ESqidA, [accessed 18 May 2021]; Abu Khadeejah, ‘Are the Issues between Green Lane Mosque [GLM] and Salafi Publications Personal?’: https://www.abukhadeejah.com/are-the-issues-between-green-lane-mosque-glm-and-salafi-publications-personal/, [accessed 21 May 2021]; ‘Voting, Democracy, the Ikhwani Manhaj and Waleed Basyouni’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kVabUqtzuM, [accessed 18 May 2021].

⁸⁴ John R. Bowen, On British Islam: Religion, Law, and Everyday Practice in Shari'a Councils (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2016), pp. 47, 54–55. See also Islamic Sharia Council, ‘History of ISC’: http://www.islamic-sharia.org/history-of-isc, [accessed 18 May 2021].

⁸⁵ Azhar Majothi, interview with al-Umari, 17 March 2020.

⁸⁶ Green Lane Masjid occasionally held student recruitment courses on behalf of IUM and also facilitated applications by providing references. Azhar Majothi, interview with Nahim Akhtar, 17 May 2020.

⁸⁷ Azhar Majothi, interview with Suhaib Hasan, 6 June 2020.

⁸⁸ See examples of episodes here: Digital Mimbar, ‘The Sunnah, The Better—Abu Usamah Ad-Dhahabi’: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL82EFEDD31C3CCDFA, [accessed 18 May 2021]. The influence of Ahl-e-Hadith and Salafis on a national level requires closer inspection as their general programme appears to espouse Salafi ideas without labels. This may be an important, yet understudied, aspect of the spread of Salafism in Britain.

⁸⁹ Azhar Majothi, interview with Waqas Ali (currently in charge at IslamWise), 17 March 2020.

⁹⁰ Nusaybah Naeem (ed.), GLMC Newsletter (Birmingham: Green Lane Masjid and Community Centre, May 2019).

⁹¹ ‘Birmingham's Green Lane Masjid Celebrates As It Wins Mosque of the Year Award’, BirminghamLive, 3 February 2020: https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/birminghams-green-lane-masjid-celebrates-17683188, [accessed 18 May 2021].

⁹² Azhar Majothi, interview with al-Umari, 17 March 2020.

⁹³ See, for example, Scholars of MJAH UK, In Defence of MJAH, pp. 36–38.

⁹⁴ Azhar Majothi, interview with Naveed Ayaaz (Abul Abbaas), 17 March 2020; Salafi Events UK, ‘Home’: http://salafieventsuk.com, [accessed 18 May 2021].

⁹⁵ Azhar Majothi, interview with Ayaaz, 17 March 2020.

⁹⁶ See Umm-ul-Qura Publications, ‘Our Publications’: http://umm-ul-qura.org/, [accessed 18 May 2021].

⁹⁷ ‘Masjid Al Ikhlas Cambridge Affiliation with MJAH UK’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ATwvO4X-WY, [accessed 18 May 2021].

⁹⁸ Iraqee, 40 Ahl-e Hadith Scholars from the Indian Subcontinent.

⁹⁹ Azhar Majothi, interview with Ali Hassan Khan, 10 November 2019.

¹⁰⁰ Ibid.

¹⁰¹ Azhar Majothi, interview with Ayaaz, 17 March 2020.

¹⁰² Jamia Masjid Ahl-e-Hadith Dawah, ‘About Us’: https://www.jmahdawah.org/about-us/, [accessed 18 May 2021].

¹⁰³ Ibid.

¹⁰⁴ Initially this was called Higher Learning Centre but morphed into Islam Halifax in 2012. Hira Amin, interview with Abdul Rauf, 24 May 2015.

¹⁰⁵ ‘MJAH Annual Conference 2017—Shaykh Mahmood Al Hassan’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7uMfH5hErQ, [accessed 18 May 2021; translation by Hira Amin].

¹⁰⁶ Azhar Majothi, interview with al-Umari, 17 March 2020.